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Auteur - An author is the sole creator of meaning, but applying it to cinema, an industrialized enterprise that moves millions of people and money, can be a concept difficult to grasp.

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Historical context -

The notion of authorship has its roots in the late 18th century when the romantic era started. It was a reaction against the Newton age of science, the Age of Reason.

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Historical context - During Romanticism, the author was considered an individual with a unique personal vision. The author was the only creator of meaning.

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Sociohistorical context - To apply this notion to film seems very daring, but the French did it. To understand why, let's first look at the state of France at the time.

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Sociohistorical context - World War II had just ended and the colonial war was a failure. Post-colonial France was highly politicized. There was a climate of tension between classes, and a loss of identity and national pride.

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Sociohistorical context -

There was no access to American cinema and the available French cinema was mostly based on novels and adaptations.  

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Film didn't reflect society - These movies didn't reflect the country's situation and something needed to be done so that the climate of revolution could be portrayed on the big screen.

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Film revolution -

The pursuit of a cultural renewal drove young French film critics to start a revolution in cinema, based on an innovative analysis of American cinema and its directors. 

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'Cahiers du Cinéma' - The magazine 'Cahiers du Cinéma' changed everything. Film critics François Truffaut (pictured), Jean Luc Godard, André Bazin, Eric Rohmer, Jacques Rivette, and Claude Chambrol, changed the history of cinema for ever.

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'Cahiers du Cinéma' - Although now called a theory, all the French film critics did at 'Cahiers du Cinéma' at the time, was to identify a new language of self-expression in American cinema, where the director was considered to be an auteur.

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'La politique des auteurs' - 'La politique des auteurs' ("the policy of the authors") revolutionized film criticism. The boundaries between European "art" cinema and Hollywood productions had been broken.

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Birth of theory - But it was not until the intervention of American film critic Andrew Sarris and 'Movie magazine,' that this new approach started to gain shape as a theory.

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Éric Rohmer - The French film critics compared film with other arts. For instance, Éric Rohmer (pictured) compared it to architecture.

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Auteur structuralism - The auteur-structuralist approach consisted of looking at a director's body of work as a whole and considering its thematic patterns.

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Auteur structuralism - This essentially means that a director would only be considered an auteur after certain particular characteristics had been identified in their films.

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Auteur structuralism - This theory was based on French anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss' structuralism theory.

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Hollywood - Auteur theory often raises an important question: does an auteur have a place in Hollywood? Can a director really express their individuality in a profit-driven industry?

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Hollywood - Film critic Andrew Sarris believed that it was possible, and that it essentially boils down to personal interpretation of the material  given to the director.

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Hollywood - American director John Ford is a good example of how it's possible to shape a traditional genre like the Western with his own style.

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Hollywood -

One might argue that Hollywood chooses some directors based on their signature style, which can be used as a marketing tool.

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Hollywood - But if the studio takes advantage of it, it's also because the director has got something very distinctive. An auteur works almost as a brand.

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French New Wave - Many of those who wrote for 'Cahiers du Cinéma' went on to become successful directors, giving birth to the French New Wave.

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Hollywood New Wave - In the late 1960s, heavily influenced by the French New Wave and the film scene in Europe, a new generation of directors was born in Hollywood.

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New Hollywood - New Hollywood directors included names such as Martin Scorsese, David Lynch, Francis Ford Coppola, Woody Allen, and Robert Altman, among many others.

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New Hollywood - This new generation of young filmmakers brought a fresh perspective to American cinema. Most of these directors are considered auteurs.

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History was made - The young French film critics started a revolution in cinema and made history. 

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History was made - They influenced an entire generation of American filmmakers who completely reshaped Hollywood.

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Film studies - Despite its pros and cons, auteurism continues to have its place in film, and Hollywood is no exception.

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