French new Wave

                                           

Read the article on my blog entitled: French new Wave: where to start.

(You will find in on the French new Wave page.)

Answer the following questions:

 

1.What is another name for The French New Wave?

   The Nouvelle Vague

2.Who are the main film directors associated with The French New Wave?

       Francois Truffaut , Jean-Luc Godard, Claude Chabrol ,Eric Rohmer ,Jacques Rivette ,Louis Malle ,Alain Resnais , Agnes Varda and  Jacques Demy

3.What is meant by the word progenitor?

A person or a thing from which a person, animal ,or plant is descended or originates ;an ancestor or a parent

 4. What does it mean in the context of the article?

The New Wave itself may no longer be "new", but the directors and their films are still important. They are the progenitors of what we have come to think of as alternative cinema today, and they had, and continue to have, a profound influence on cinema and popular culture throughout the world. 

5.What did the directors of the Nouvelle Vague archive?

   a.Why is this important ?

Without the Nouvelle Vague there may not have been any Scorsese, Soderbergh , or Tarantino (or Forman ,or Wanders, or Bertolucci),and music ,fashion and advertising would be without a major point of reference .

6.Which Filmmakers influenced the directors of the Nouvelle Vague?

Realist Italian directors like Roberto Rosselini to hard-boiled Noir and B movies from America (as well as early silent classics and even the latest technicolour Hollywood musicals).

7.What theory did these filmmakers develop?

    a.What is meant by this?

         They developed a belief in the theory of the auteur: that is, a conviction that the best films are the product of a personal artistic expression and should bear the stamp of personal authorship, much as great works of literature bear the stamp of the writer.

a. They created a new cinematic style, using breakthrough techniques and a fresh approach to storytelling that could express complex ideas while still being both direct and emotionally engaging. Emphasizing the personal and artistic vision of film over its worth as a commercial product.

8.What did they think of the French films of the time?

They thought that French Film at the time did not expressing human life, thought, and emotion in a genuine way. Many of the popular movies of the era, they argued, were dry, recycled, inexpressive and out of touch with the daily lives of post-war French youth.

9.Which influential journal or magazine did many of the Nouvelle Vague directors work for?

They worked for the French journal called Cahiers du Cinema, regularly praised the films they loved and tore apart those films they hated in print.

10.What did the Nouvelle Vague reject and why?

Nouvelle Vague rejected the idea of a traditional story in the "Old Hollywood" sense of stories based on narrative styles and structures lifted from earlier media, namely books and theatre. The New Wave directors did not want to hold your hand through each scene, directing you emotion by emotion, through a fixed narrative. There was a feeling that this sort of storytelling interfered with the viewer's ability to perceive and react to film just as they would perceive and react to life. 

 

11.What did they aspire to do instead?

They wanted to break up the filmic experience, to make it fresh and exciting, and to jolt the moviegoer out of complacent viewing - to make the viewer think and feel, not only about what they were watching, but about their own lives, thoughts and emotions as well. Dialogue was to be as realistic and spontaneous as possible, or philosophical in a way that made one think beyond the film. Expressing the truth was of the utmost importance. The object was not simply to entertain, it was to sincerely communicate.