Film theory

Among our most intrinsic human characteristics, we strive to express ourselves both creatively and socially. Combining these two traits creates an artistic interaction between an audience and a medium. Cinema, arguably the most visually astounding form of art, not only stimulates visually, but subjects viewers to haptic and acoustic experiences as well. The film scholar, Thomas Elsaesser, makes various points in his book “Film Theory” describing several ways in which we can experience the film as a spectator. A particular type of metaphor that stood out to me that Elsaesser mentioned was cinema as a visual experience, more precisely cinema as eye or as a look and gaze. All of Elsaesser’s ideas can be related to and exemplified in the mystery/thriller…

advanced, in correlation, the accepted knowledge concerning film and media are also changing just as fast. Since the birth of the cinema and Hollywood style movies, many philosophers and theorists have shared their knowledge concerning film theory. However many theories are having to be updated and even ruled out due to the advancement in technology. For many years these theories were commonly accepted with minor changes. Not only does technology affect film through technical and aesthetic…

Before analysing Tarantino’s films and establishing his style as a filmmaker, not only does the auteur theory have to be looked at, but also the criteria that a director has to tick in order to be considered an auteur in their field. The auteur theory originated in France, and initially began as a reaction of criticism against the Hollywood studio system in the 1910s. However, it only became a popular topic of cinematic debate in the 1950s when cinema exploded into the American mainstream…

Content Theory Structuralism Structuralism is a theory that suggests that all ideas have a structure; “structuralists” believe that structures are the “real things” that lie beneath “the surface” or the appearance of meaning. (Sternagel, 2012) When using structuralism theory, we attempt to analyse the meaning or try to see a forming pattern. In films this theory emphasizes how certain film clips convey meaning through the use of codes and conventions that are similar to the way languages are…

The theory is based on a collective of three assumptions. The first assumption centers around the concept that men and women perceive the world differently primarily due to the division of labor. The second assumption rests on the fact that men enact their power politically while simultaneously suppressing women’s ideas from obtaining public recognition. Finally, the last assumption, allows women to participate in society only if they transform their distinctive ideas, experiences, and…

aggression to make my film stand out in horror film circles. I first started my research into psychological horror films by going back to the very beginning and up until 1960 there wasn’t any films…

In Janes Gaines’s, White Privilege and Looking Relations: Race and Gender in Feminist Film Theory, Gaines wanted to show how a theory of the text and its spectator, based on the psychoanalytic concept of sexual difference, is unequipped to deal with a film which is about racial difference and sexuality. “The Diana Ross star vehicle Mahogany (directed by Berry Gordy, 1975) immediately suggests a psychoanalytic approach because the narrative is organized around the connections between voyeurism…

Finding a clear understanding of what queer theory actually is and being able to define it academically has always been somewhat a challenge for me. This field of study seems to be very broad and diverse, that it can be grueling at times when trying to grasp the actual concept or central idea. For the most part, it would seem that it is based on various theorists observations and analysis at how sexuality is depicted in entertainment such as in film, but once you start reading into their points…

for the Sylvia Wynter Graduate Fellowship, my area of interest is film theory, especially as it is challenged by the work of Sylvia Wynter. Wynter’s work challenges us, as diasporic people of African descent, to create unique stories, and to approach them as “new ceremonies.” In cinema, Wynter’s challenge is primed to authorize the film scholar to approach other ways of performing humanness as a verb, and to find inventive ways of implementing humanness as a creative and biographic practice. As…

The Christus Victor theory of atonement holds that Christ is a conqueror, and has defeated the powers of evil, thus redeeming mankind from its grasp. It is the ultimate battle of Light versus Dark, in which the light prevails gloriously. The Lord of the Rings is prime example of redemption theory in film through its parallels to the Christus Victor theory of atonement. Throughout the films, we can find the embodiment of this theory in the characters of Gandalf, Aragorn, and Frodo. The first,…