French New Wave Analysis

Register to read the introduction… They labelled it the cinema de papa (old fogies cinema). They put forward and discussed many different propositions and ideas in the pages of the cahiers du cinema in the 50s. The most significant one which had the greatest influence on new wave films was la politique des auteurs (The policy of authors). Largely created by Truffaut in his famous essay a certain tendency in French Cinema he argued that a film, through the way in which its images are presented to the audience on the screen, should express and reflect the personality of the director. This policy later became known as the auter theory. These critics were renowned for their praise of some Hollywood directors, particularly Howard Hawkes, Alfred Hitchcock and John Ford who they admired for their individual styles. For the best part of a decade these critics argued their beliefs in the pages of cahiers du cinema. It was in their criticisms of other peoples work that subliminally they defined the kind of films that they wanted to make, but it wasn't until 1959 that any of them actually made a feature length film. The French New wave is widely regarded, and quite rightly so, as a significant movement in film style and form, but it is important to understand that without certain social, economic and technical freedoms it might never have happened. …show more content…
The main reason why the nouvelle vauge existed was because the French Film industry went through a drastic change and opened its doors to new ideas. These changes were brought about inadvertently because of a number of different factors. For reasons that I have outlined above the French film industry was pretty closed and un-sympathetic to new ideas. By 1957 things were changing. Attendances to cinemas were falling sharply. This was partly due to the growing popularity of television as an entertainment medium and partly due to the stagnant nature of French cinema. By 1959 the industry was in crisis. Roger Vadims 1956 film Et Dieu crea la femme, (And woman was created) was a low budget film which was a commercial success. It proved that low budget films made outside of the tradition of qualityrquote could make money and it acted as a sort of catalyst within the industry and led to a climate of experimentation. This, along with the invention of new fast emulsion film stocks and light weight cameras, enabled film makers with material restraints to make saleable films on a low budgets because they needed less crew and could work with ease on location. This new openness within the industry was significantly aided by a government initiative known as the avvance sur recettes (advance on receipts) system. This initiative funded first time film makers on the basis of a script and enabled hundreds of potential film makers to finance their debut features. These factors combined together to form the climate for production that prevailed in the late 50s but to understand why the nouvelle vague was so embraced by the public we must look at the actual term nouvelle vague. The term nouvelle vague was actually coined by a journalist named Franois Giroud to describe the new and socially active youth class. The idealisms and politics of the post war years like sexual liberation, along with new fashions and American influences like Rock Music and Hollywood combined together to create what has become known as youth culture. It was this new and affluent youth class that created a new market with leisure time and money to spend that so embraced this revolution in Film. It was also in this climate that this new generation of directors emerged from to fill the spaces of the old and out dated. They had an empathy with their audience which is demonstrated by the fact that the term nouvelle vague was so quickly attributed to this movement in film style and form.