Action Scholar

If you, like me, enjoy film on multiple levels, then you will be interested to know you do not have to go to film school to learn about film (although it does help create a structured environment for learning).

This month, I have continued compiling list to help you better understand the world of Film Theory. Below, I have listed five film theories and links. Remember, this is just the early introduction to the deep and complex world of film theory. Later posts will be added to this list, and you will be introduced to intermediate—and advanced-level theorists, theories, concepts, and philosophies.

5 Film Theories (in no particular order)

1. Auteur Theory
   • Focus Topics:
     François Truffaut and Andrew Sarris.
     The director as the “author” of a film.
     Readings:
     Truffaut’s essay “A Certain Tendency of the French Cinema.”
     Andrew Sarris’s Notes on the Auteur Theory.
     YouTube
     Auteur Theory Explained by DiAnté Jenkins
     Introductory Film Studies: Auteur Theory by Screen & Sound
     Films to Watch:
     Works by Hitchcock (Vertigo or Psycho)
     Kurosawa (Rashomon).
     Breathless (1960) – Jean-Luc Godard.
     Seven Samurai (1954) – Akira Kurosawa.
2. Semiotics and Structuralism
   • Focus Topics:
     The language of film (Christian Metz, Roland Barthes).
     Narrative structures.
     Readings:
     Metz’s Film Language: A Semiotics of the Cinema.
     Barthes’ essay “The Death of the Author.”
     YouTube
     Christian Metz’s Semiotic Film Theory by Film & Media Studies
     Roland Barthes’s “Death of the Author,” Explained by Film & Media Studies
     Films to Watch:
     The Seventh Seal (1957)
     Persona (1966).
     Pierrot le Fou (1965) – Jean-Luc Godard (semiotics in action).
     Last Year at Marienbad (1961) – Alain Resnais.
3. Psychoanalytic Film Theory
   • Focus Topics:
     Freud and Lacan in cinema.
     The male gaze (Laura Mulvey).
     Readings:
     Mulvey’s essay “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema.”
     Excerpts from Slavoj Žižek’s work on psychoanalysis and film.
     YouTube
     WHAT IS PSYCHOANALYSIS IN FILM? By BBP Reel Insights
     WHAT IS PSYCHOANALYTIC FILM THEORY? By BBP Reel Insights
     Film Theories – Psychoanalysis and the Cinema by Zoltán Dragon
     Mulvey’s “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema” and Psychoanalytic Theory by Film & Media Studies
     Auteur Theory Explained by DiAnté Jenkins
     Films to Watch:
     Vertigo (1958)
     Blue Velvet (1986)
     The Shining (1980) – Stanley Kubrick.
     Eraserhead (1977) – David Lynch.
4. Marxist Film Theory
   • Focus Topics:
     Ideology in cinema (Louis Althusser).
     Dialectical materialism in film analysis.
     Readings:
     Walter Benjamin’s “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction.”
     Selections from Antonio Gramsci.
     YouTube
     Summarized #12 Althusser’s Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses by Benjamin
     UNDERSTANDING IMPLICIT AND EXPLICIT IDEOLOGY IN FILM & CINEMA By BBP Reel Insights
     Critique as Praxis: Edel Garcellano and the Dialectics of Cinema | 3rd Edel Garcellano Conference by Adrian Mendizabal
     Cultural Hegemony and Antonio Gramsci by Another Dive
     Films to Watch:
     Metropolis (1927)
     The Battle of Algiers (1966)
     Salt of the Earth (1954) – A Marxist perspective on labor rights.
     Modern Times (1936) – Charlie Chaplin’s critique of industrialization.
5. Postmodernism in Film
   • Focus Topics:
     Fragmentation and pastiche.
     Challenges to traditional narratives.
     Readings:
     Jean Baudrillard’s Simulacra and Simulation.
     Frederic Jameson on postmodernism.
     YouTube
     Postmodernism explained for beginners! Jean Baudrillard Simulacra and Hyperreality explained by The Media Insider
     Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism by Frederic Jameson by The Autodidact’s Toolkit
     Films to Watch:
     Pulp Fiction (1994)
     Blade Runner (1982)
     The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014) – Wes Anderson’s pastiche.
     Inception (2010) – Christopher Nolan’s layered narratives.