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Blog 5

The French new wave was truly a film movement that was before its time. In an era where the world just ended a global conflict and traditional Hollywood movies just weren't cutting it anymore, the French new wave paved the way for a new style of film to blossom. In a book by Richard Neupert, he discusses the main reasons that directors were inspired to create something new. "By the middle of the 1950s, angry young critics were using the term 'tradition of quality' to deride the mainstream output. The phrase now connoted old-fashioned costume epics out of touch with modern life." (Neupert 2007)

To me, one of the most impressive aspects of the French new wave was the way the directors had to make everything else work like the script and themes of their films as they did not have the funding that big-time studios had. In an article by Filmmaking Lifestyle, they talk about some of the experimental techniques that directors in the new wave used when they say "The films were often shot on location with non-professional actors...In addition, they often employed techniques like hand-held cameras and jump cuts – something that had not been regularly done before French New Wave."

The film that I wanted to discuss that encapsulates everything I have talked about so far is The 400 Blows. I know that it is the second time that I have talked about this film but there are so many sources out there to back up how good this film is that it is worth talking about again. It is also my favorite film of the French new wave.

In an abstract from a book by Frank McLaughlin, he discusses why the film is important to learn due to its uniqueness. "In the film, a powerful image of the terrifying isolation that the adolescent, Doinel, experiences is presented through repeated camera shots of symbolic barriers in his environment--his cramped and cluttered apartment-home, the drab decay and gloom of the inner city, the selfish preoccupation of his teacher and parents, and, finally, the immense and impersonal ocean." (1967)

I have already talked about what happens in the film so I will go more into why the film is considered to be a part of the French new wave. The first and obvious reason is that the film takes place in the time period declared the French new wave. Another example is the main character of the film Antonie. This is one of the first times where we saw a child be considered the main character instead of a side character as the story is all about his life and his journey. This was very uncommon at the time. We also see in this film how we are going through Antonie's everyday life and how there is really nothing that is outstandingly special about him. He is just a kid and we are viewing his story. We also see examples of abstract camera angles throughout the film that are a staple of the movement. Here is an example of one below where the actors are looking directly into the camera.

In the video below there is another example of the filming and camera work techniques from this film being non-traditional. In this scene we see Antonie being questioned about things he has done throughout the film. This is the same shot for 3 minutes with a couple of fade transitions. This is an example of the directors not having a budget for multiple cameras so instead they rely on the actor's ability to make this scene feel real.

Finally, I wanted to talk about one of the most discussed scenes in cinema, the final shot of this film. In this shot we see Antonie escaping and running where he eventually ends up on a beach. The shot is long and does not have many cuts. For most of it, it's just one continuous shot of him running. Then he finally reaches the beach and walks around for a little, he looks right into the camera and the film ends on a freeze frame. Here is said scene

In an article by Susannah Bragg McCullough and Julian Cornell, they discuss why the scene ends on a freeze frame and why it is important. "I love that The 400 Blows ends in a freeze frame...He’s escaped from juvie. He’s going to get caught and brought back — we’ve already seen what’s happened with the other kids, and that’s what’s happening to him eventually...Part of what’s going on in the French New Wave is reorienting the relationship between the artist and the audience – making it much more intimate, interpretive and collaborative in a way. Respecting the audience" (McCullough, Cornell)

I love this quote because it shows what the directors and the French new wave in general were trying to do. This isn't a happy Hollywood ending that audience members have been accustomed to seeing. There is no clear-cut ending to this film, just the actor looking into the camera. I also like that they made the point that this is probably not going to work out for Antonie. He is probably just going to get caught as he is on the beach and doesn't have a plan. That's what the directors of this film and other new-wave films want though. The point of these films is to be real and show that in life, some stories end with no true happy ending or one that is easy to comprehend.

Overall The 400 Blows is a great film and one of the best examples of what the French new wave was trying to do with their new and inventive films.

Sources:

The Take (Final Scene)

Princeton Film Society

The Teachers Guide to Media and Methods (book)

Filmmaking LifeStyle

A History of the French New Wave Cinema (book)

[willnicholson-french-new-wave]

Blog 4

One of the later films that I chose to look into was the 1970 film Clair's Knee or le genou de Claire. This film was directed by Eric Rohmer who was one of the first to pick up a camera at the end of the 1950s to start the film movement. Most of his early work unfortunately did not do well. It was only with My Night with Maud (1969) and Claire’s Knee that Rohmer’s reputation began to scale the heights of his former colleagues.

To me, this film was a little confusing and is around the time period when the French new wave starts to lose me. The film is about a man named Jerome who decides to prepare for a lifetime of matrimony by enjoying one last vacation by himself. Upon arriving at his lakeside destination, he finds Aurora, a love from his past who is staying nearby. Through Aurora, Jerome is introduced to two teenage sisters, Laura and Claire. Although Laura is interested in Jerome, it is Claire or, more precisely, her knee that fascinates the soon-to-be-married man.

While I did not entirely understand the film, Samuel Wigley describes it as "a deceptively simple yet highly ambiguous and troubling film about the nature of desire and fixation (specifically that of a vainglorious alpha male with a teenage neighbor’s knee). It’s both naturalistic and uniquely otherworldly."

I also found an article by Daniel Hayes where he discusses Rohmer's intentions with the film. In the article, Hayes quotes Rohmer when he says "She stands for an attraction that is purely erotic, in the most refined sense of the word. Indeed, Jerome says that even if Claire threw herself at his feet he would turn her down, and Rohmer describes this seemingly bizarre desire when he says that “touching her knee is simply a way of being able to say ‘I touched it."

This is again where the French new wave starts to lose me in terms of being cinematically different with its writing and themes. I believe that the other French new wave films were unique and while they might be considered strange, they had meaning. This film is considered in the French new wave but a lot of critics question the film's legitimacy as it came around 7 years late from the movement's peak and from a director that failed during the peak.

Overall though I think that the French new wave is a very good film movement that brought a sense of uniqueness that the film world needed at the time.

Sources:

Claire’s Knee (1970)

Clair's Knee - Sense of Cinema

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Blog 3

While the French new wave was influential it is important to note that the film movement itself was influenced by another country's film renaissance. The French new wave was heavily influenced by Italian Neorealism and classical Hollywood cinema.

The Italian Neorealism films were experimental for the time where directors would be the authors and once again use a "pen" to tell their stories (sound familiar?). They would also use real people who were not considered actors and would shoot in public areas so films felt more realistic. The styles of these films were also different and not traditional for the time.

Classical Hollywood cinema however was a part of the French new wave influence of what they did not want to do. The classical Hollywood film genre always had something called a "Hollywood ending" in which in the third and final act of the film the "good guys" of the film would win with a clear-cut ending that anyone who was watching could understand.

While these films were considered good and did do very well, for many directors at the time the style became too predictable and done out. This is why classical Hollywood films are considered an influence on the French new wave as they wanted to make films that were in direct contrast to classical Hollywood films in order to try and do something new and unique.

One of the big attractions of the French new wave style is that the films "broke the rules" by not relying on a big-time studio to pay and produce a film, having big-name actors, and following a clear narrative. America at the time essentially had 5 big-time studios that would produce their films, until the Hollywood new wave came along that was inspired by the French new wave. These were made up of directors who were influenced by French films and wanted to take the style to America

Little Fugitive, directed by Morris Engel, Raymond Abrashkin, and Ruth Orkin, was one of the first American films born out of the revolution of the French New Wave. Little Fugitive details the story of two brothers, namely Lennie and Joey, and how a practical joke between them goes horribly wrong. Little brother Joey is never taken seriously by his older sibling and his gang due to his stature. The latter plays a joke on Joey by staging a toy gun shooting to seem as though Joey has shot and killed his brother. This obviously was a different film from what Hollywood was doing at the time

In an article by 2bridges, a videography analysis company, they say "Just like the new wave advocated for, Engel’s independent production got away from generic industry themes and techniques. The Hollywood industry at the time wasn’t as expressive and open to new ideas as it is now. It was formulaic with its plot and spirit, and there was little room for filmmakers to experiment."

The French new wave films loved to use the long take as I mentioned in my last blog about 400 Blows. In one scene from Goodfellas we see a scene that when you look at it has a direct influence from the 400 Blows

Looking at all of this information and connections between Hollywood and The French New Wave it is hard to say that there is no inspiration between the two.

sources:

2Bridges

HOLLYWOOD WAS INSPIRED BY THE FRENCH NEW WAVE?

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The film that I chose to talk about for this second blog post is The 400 Blows which is a French film made in 1959 and directed by François Truffaut. The film is considered a part of the French New Wave due to the timing in which it came out and the different styles of film used to tell the story. While I was taking film history in the spring of 2022 this is one of the films that I watched when introduced to the French New Wave cinema. The film follows a young 14-year-old boy named Antoine as he goes through his day-to-day life struggles. He is surrounded by inconsiderate adults, including his neglectful parents and his school teacher. When not at school, Antoine spends his days with his best friend, Rene, trying to plan for a better life. When one of their schemes goes south, Antoine ends up in trouble with the law, leading to even more conflicts with unsympathetic authority figures.

The film's final scene is one of the most iconic when it comes to the French New Wave. The final scene is the video that I have attached to this blog post. When Antoine gets sent to what seems to be a behavioral rehabilitation school, he decides to run away for good. He takes off during a soccer match and finds himself running on the beach. In this shot, we see very long takes accompanied by medium shots that show him running from the forest to the beach. The last shot of this scene is important because it relays the metaphor that Antonie is finally free and on the ocean. Earlier in the film he also talked about wanting to see the ocean. The last scene however is up to many different interpretations.

This is why this film is considered a part of the French New Wave. It fits the characteristics of not having a clear-cut ending and we see the style of having a long uncut shot of Anotinie running through the woods to escape and the final scene where he runs along the beach. What also makes this film unique is that the main character Antonie is a child that is surrounded by adults that are considered to be in the wrong. For the time period it was shot having a child be the main protagonist was considered to be unique and did not happen often. Jakob Owens describes this film being considered in the film category the best when he says "The 400 Blows remains a prime example of the stylistic innovations of the French New Wave...it recounts the story of an adolescent boy “raising hell."

Owens also goes on to talk about how this film and the new wave created their own style of cinematography and camera work. Owens goes on to say "A director became the “author” of a film, using the camera as a “pen” to tell the story. In order for a film to qualify as art." We can see examples of this technique in the film 400 Blows. You can see in the very last shot that the director does a close-up on Antonie's face and then the film ends with a freeze frame of him looking into the camera. In the photo that I attached, you can also see the meaning behind this shot is not just to show Anotnie, but to show how he is feeling in life right now as he feels trapped and behind bars. Another new wave technique is where we are being told a story with the camera and not words.

sources: https://reelrundown.com/movies/The-400-Blows-Antoine-Doinels-Place-in-the-French-New-Wave#:~:text=The%20400%20Blows%20remains%20a,Coups)%20(Fabe%20125).

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The topic that I have for the blog assignment is the French New Wave of Cinema. In the picture above are some popular films that influenced the film movement. So what exactly was the French New Wave? It was a film movement that rose to popularity in the late 1950s in Paris, France. The idea was to give directors full creative control over their work, allowing them to favor improvisational storytelling instead of strict narratives. In Alexandre Astruc's manifesto he writes "cinema was in the process of becoming a new means of expression on the same level as painting and the novel...This is why I would like to call this new age of cinema the age of the caméra-stylo." This essay inspired many French filmmakers to start experimenting with new ideas of how we should shoot and view cinema. These new filmmakers such as Jean-Luc Godard, Agnès Varda, Éric Rohmer, Jacques Rivette, and Claude Chabrol wanted to experiment with film form and style but didn't have the budgets to do it. Instead of trying to find the money to get high level gear and equipment they decided to use portable equipment to have a run-and-gun style. This led to a unique style of film that had fragmented, discontinuous editing, and long takes that allowed actors to explore a scene. The combination of realism and commentary allowed these movies to have unique characters, motives, and even endings that were not so clear-cut. When it comes to these French new wave films, some recognizable characteristics stick out and signify which movies fall into the New Wave category. The main one is the rejection of classical filmmaking, with a focus on experimental and/or avant-garde techniques. These films also featured existential themes that were in direct contrast to what film was doing previously with the Hollywood golden era. These films wanted to showcase the individual and the chaos of human existence. So what did these films mean for the rest of the world? Even after the movies stopped being made, it inspired many other international movements including the New Hollywood era. You can see these influences across Woody Allen, Spike Lee, and even in the mumblecore films of the 90s and 2000s. To summarize, at the movement's heart was the idea that anyone should be able to make a movie, and that sentiment has lived on today. Overall this new film design led to many interesting and artistic films that still hold up today.

Source used: https://nofilmschool.com/what-is-the-french-new-wave