André Bazin on French Cinema, 1938-1958

André Bazin (1918-1958) is credited with almost single-handedly establishing the study of film as an accepted intellectual pursuit, as well as with being the spiritual father of the French New Wave. In 1951 Bazin co-founded and became editor-in-chief of Cahiers du cinéma, the single most influential critical periodical in the history of the cinema. He can also be considered the principal instigator of the equally influential auteur theory.



Included in André Bazin on French Cinema, 1938-1958 are discussions of such prominent French filmmakers as Jean Renoir, René Clément, Jacques Tati, René Clair, and Jean Cocteau; of well-known films like Mr. Hulot's Holiday, The Wages of Fear, Night and Fog, Daybreak, and Les Parents terribles; and, together with these movies and moviemakers, the following important subjects are treated: art and politics, film and comedy, theater and film, and cinema and the avant-garde. Moreover, this new book contains nearly all of Bazin's writings about the practitioners as well as the predecessors of the French New Wave, a movement that had a profound impact on the evolution of cinematic style and subject matter during the post-World War II period.



André Bazin on French Cinema, 1938-1958 also includes illustrative movie stills and, in addition, the book features a sizable scholarly apparatus: explanatory notes, an extensive index, a contextual introduction to Bazin's life and work, a bibliography of Bazin's writings on French film, a French film bibliography, and credits of all the films discussed.