Film History: Or History Expropriated

Author(s): Michèle Lagny

Source: Film History , Spring, 1994, Vol. 6, No. 1, Philosophy of Film History (Spring,
1994), pp. 26-44
Published by: Indiana University Press

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/3815006

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide
range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and
facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
https://about.jstor.org/terms

Indiana University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to
Film History

This content downloaded from

118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 Film History, Volume 6, pp. 26-44, 1994. Copyright John Libbey & Company
ISSN: 0892-2160. Printed in Great Britain
IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII II I IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII IIIIIIIIIII IIIIIIII IIII -I I III IIIII

Film history:
or history
expropriated
Michele Lagny
Ihave often attacked film history; at least, Iframework of analysis through whic
aesthetic
have expressed myself against the way filmis made to overcome the long-time dicta
attempt
history is being made and written. First of of
ship all,semiology in my country. I am not una
because - while pretending to be a 'history of
of English-language literature in film studies as w
films' - it seemed to me little more than as
an in
incom-
the so-called 'cultural studies' which ha
plete and incoherent catalogue of what sprung
has been
from cinema as much as from other cul
made. Films don't have a history. What activities.
does haveReaders of Film History know it better
a history is the film as an object, a piece ofI celluloid
do. What follows, therefore, results from obs
lacquered with secret images, with all its tions
existences
strictly related to my exotic environment.
and vicissitudes; it is the notion of what films Although
should I do care about film as a historian
do not
or should not be, the meanings that have been believe in film as a document of 'reali
given
to them and are changing according to the(whatever
time and they may be, they are inaccessible
place of their being made, viewed, enjoyed and can only rely upon their sources). Polit
historians
and
used; it is that peculiar micro-environment, social conflicts, economic structures and circ
'cinema'
as an institutional framework, within whichstances leave institutional traces which are far m
films are
born and evolve, expressing through -their being
relevant than film. Within this context, film is not
'media' their relationships with the external world.
more I circumstantial evidence of what may h
than
have also criticized film history because ithappened
seemed - in the past. I do not see cinema
and still often does seem - to be infatuated by its
mirror of society. On the other hand, especiall
object, incapable of admitting the need for a certain
one considers the period ranging from the end of
distance, necessary to all intellectual enterprise; and
19th century and the time in the 20th century du
because, for several reasons, film history which
seemedittohas been the most important form of v
lack - as it still often does nowadays - themass entertainment, cinema is an essential too
discipline
understanding
which is crucial to all historical analysis worthy of its a culture, or the cultures seen
name. So much work has been published in theof values, representations and behaviou
systems
meantime, and I certainly feel the need to revise my
standpoint. Still, I'm intrigued by some contradict-
ions I see, so strong that they make me wonder
about the very nature of writing about history.
Michele Lagny teaches Cinema and History
Let me point out right away that I'm the University of Paris III - Sorbonne Nouvelle
mostly
where
referring to the place where I live, France. her particular fields of interest are time an
I have
cinema,
been trained within the school of the nouvelle his-and cinema and popular culture. Her mo
recent books are Methode historique et histoire d
toire, but I am now teaching in a department called(Colin) and Senso, A Critical Study (Na
Cinema
'Cinema and Audiovisuals' where history (including
than). Correspondence to 149 Blvd Magenta
75010
film history) plays a role which is secondary Paris, France.
to an

This content downloaded from

118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 Film
Film history: orhistoiy: 27
history expropriatedor history expropriated 27

On many occasions I have

Film history as mediation claimed the
for differentiating It seems to
two me, then, that the real interest
different in film
perspective
proaches for history, seenOn
research. as a partone
of the larger domain of
hand ther
history of cinema, dealing with
socio-cultural history, lies the
in its fulfilment phenom
of a media-
of film and with film
ting function,production as
allowing historians to use films as much such
other hand there is the
as helping social historian,
film analysts to evaluate them in their own who
films in order to find
context, other
regardless of theirthings
own assumptions, while
than ci
most cases social and
keepinghistorical variables,
the right (as I do myself) to study them
tenacious mythology ofnon-historical
following a shared - if
ideologies or aesthetic postu-not co
imagination, leadinglatestowards long-term
within other (non-historical) perspectives. It is hi
anthropology. Bothfromconceptions
this articulation of different expertises are
that film some
strictive, as they history claimsrespectively
entail, a specificity which should make it 'a red
view of the so-called specificity
possible of
for it to play an active and critical film
role: first an
leading sociological ofideology.
all, building the 'archaeological'
Such perspective
separat
the other hand, is which
not tells the
as researcher
radical
how films mayas be ap- it ma
From the latter proached and what method
perspective, in mayorder
be followed in to see
indicators of their order to studywithout
times them, and then proposing a series of
interpretin
anachronistically (through
procedures for textual modern concept
analysis which are coherent to
egories) or as the chosen
direct method.
expressions of the cu
their period (through the analysis
Let me take the following example.of other
I am current- m
written sources), the historian must
ly co-ordinating a working catch
group in charge of cata- them
own existential environment, and
loguing all French documentaries know
made between ho
cipher their 1945 and
language. 1995. (Indeed,the
From France is other
not at the stan
film history cannot avant-garde in the archival
survive inmovement. We recently
an ivory towe
are not supposed to produced
be catalogues
treated as
of fiction feature separate
films, yet we e
as they exist in relation
still don't have anyto other
systematic cultural
listing of short films or
ranging from the documentaries.)
most While watching printsand
eminent from this widel
nized to the most period, we were and
humble surprised todespised,
see how often African the o
production designed for
immigrants - eitherwhat
blacks or from we know
the Maghreb - a
culture', exploited were
by depictedthe
in a positive same people
light, very different from w
watching films, what we were used to seeing in fiction
acknowledging or films (al-
refusing
giving it an ephemeral
though known triumph or
mostly through the productions of thea post
reputation. 1930s)2. Such a view is also different from what
Film history, in my view, is therefore a part of a Pierre Sorlin has disclosed in European Cinemas,
larger ensemble, the socio-cultural history, a new Europeans Societies3, where he stresses how the
term meant to replace the fetishist term 'history of European cinema of the 1980s tends to deal with
mentalities', too ambitious and too ambiguous at the the novelty (on a spectacular or exotic level) brought
same time. If it is true that the definition of 'socio-cul- by immigrants to the developed world, while doc-
tural history' has not been codified yet, it can be umentaries - although confined to the medium of
said that there is - at least in France - a lively television - insist instead on the difficult conditions of

debate about its meaning and its objectives, leaning
on reflections based on philosophy (Foucault), socio-
logy (Bourdieu) and history (de Certeau, Chartier)1.
Whatever it may be, such an approach is con-
ceived as an articulation among three types of anal-
ysis, dealing with cultural objects, with the
framework of their creation, making and circulation,
and finally with their consumption, which depends
on social, ethnic and maybe sexual variables.
their life. The dominant representation of immigrants
we have noticed in non-fiction films made almost
half a century ago, on the contrary, insists on the
possibilities of integration of black or Maghreb
people, often shown as not being 'strangers'.
One easily acknowledges that historical condi-
tions are different. In quantitative terms, the phe-
nomenon of immigration was not of massive
dimensions, and therefore could not justify the fear

This content downloaded from

118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
28 28 MichIe Lagny
Michele Lagny

. ..... .''':''::;. , i.; ! ..' ;

Fig. 1. Raoul Couta

of a loss him
of (with
would-b
unemployment, the
brance?) o
steals bread
veryor othe
differ
clear his
that childh
during t
would have been
ties of b
int
justify
their roots. objectiv Imm
theUnionalmost do. Francai
though Positive images like this one may be half
slightly read not
ent, thus,
as mirrors to give
of reality, but as manifestations of colonial th
and with
hypocrisy die
dece
and paternalism. Despite its evidence,
mosquee de
such an interpretation is far tooParis
simple, a conse-
workers and
quence intelle
of our vision a posteriori of the evolution in
tal, but also
the the
relationship between the Maghreb or black Af- M
also right to
rica and imperialist power. Itgive
would be too easy to im
the big town, espec
reverse its implications, as these two little films would
(such is display a desire (or
the namean illusion) of generosity on of
same title, produc
behalf of the Republic, backbone of the Union Fran-
from Cameroun -
caise. In order to avoid the pitfalls of this ideological sp
the Latin Quarter
misinterpretation, film history may give some help
cause thewith a street
process of mediation and warning. scen

This content downloaded from

118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 Film
Film history:
history: 29
or history expropriated 29
or history expropriated

How can this be who made

done? these images,
First of even those
all, whoproviding
had seen
with the evidence necessary toin the
them (because they work whatfilm industrywe
or simplymay cal
'external critique of becausedocument'
the they are used to going to the
andmovies) have
its conte
ization in time and space:
their own representation of what a film might have
looked like, how motion pictures are made and put
- aiding the 'authentication' and the dating
together, of what may be shown and what may not
the prints, finding whenever necessary all lac
(for political, ethical or aesthetic reasons), of what
nae, interpolation and manipulations suffer
may be done and what may not, for technical and
by the prints. It seems that non-fiction short film
economic reasons.
because of their loose narrative structure an
Both short films I have taken as examples have
their weaker status in terms of legal protectio
more or less the same theme: they underline the
by comparison to fiction films, are particular
interest of traditional cultures, all the while develo-
affected by this phenomenon;
ping the assumption that their value will be en-
- retrieving hanced thanks
information on to the contribution
the rationale of French
for t
production of thesemodernity (economic as well as technological
documentaries. Were and th
made upon commission, as
cultural), which willpropaganda too
eventually bring a true equality
or wereconceived they
as anand
between Maghreb act of
French good
people, fai
blacks and
in the reciprocal recognition of- A
whites. One of them, though coloniali
I'ombre de la
values, even at a time
mosqu6ewhen
de Paris - iscolonialism w
conceived as a series of
becoming an issue of hot
juxtaposed debate?
clich6s, provided with an off-screen com-
mentary which stresses the good deeds of the French
- knowing more about the audiences whi
'help', with references to Lyautey. The film itself is
were seeing these
films las far as they cou
organized as an album of barely moving photo-
actually see them), the socio-cultural conte
graphs, some of them staged in advance and with a
within which they were experiencing them
'slightly official' look (for example those of the hon-
whether or not they were immigrants or nativ
ourable dean of the mosque), others taken in the
and whatever their social status and politi
realm of real life. The other film, Kalla, employs a
beliefs. How were the films received in Paris,
young actor and exploits a semi-fictional construc-
neighbourhoods already occupied by large m
tion, regulated by a clever alternation between
norities of immigrants in the post-WWII d
'here' and 'down there', between the African child-
cade? or in Barbes, in a beautiful theatre, th
hood and the transition to maturity in Paris. Here,
'Louxor' (now closed and abandoned, despit
framing and light are carefully designed, expressing
the fact that its Egyptian-style facade is co
with further subtlety the role which is being attributed
sidered an artistic highlight of the town)? or
to the homeland, that is, a land which allows imma-
the more intellectual art houses of the Lat
ture populations to enjoy the full flourishing of wealth
Quarter (the caf6 where Kalla had his drea
thanks to their initiation to western technology. (Kalla
and the great
mosque are located in the 5t
dreams about becoming an electrical engineer in
arrondissement)? or finally - and more prob
order to make his own country benefit by the ac-
ably - elsewhere, far away from the 'packa
quired knowledge.)
deals' proposed by distributors and screen
This comparison makes clear the need for a
following the individual taste of theatre owner
and what about 'film analysis' roughly or
educational draftedmilitant
here, yet sufficient fi
to

clubs? identify the role of a mode of 'visual representation'

Another good reason for adopting these
strategies is that film history should be able to adopt
film analysis as a standard practice, so that films can
be understood not just within their own existence,
but also in relation to other films, in a relatively
autonomous complex of moving images. The people
in the constitution of an 'historical reality' which we
will perceive through such representation. The formal
differences between the two short films impose a
careful consideration of the relationship between the
film as document and reality, thus forcing us to raise
the further question of the relationship between
documentary and fiction. I have already mentioned

This content downloaded from

118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
30
- perhaps because of an institutional habit - a
difference between 'document' and 'fiction film' but
categories such as these immediately look much less
sharp and certainly less grounded theoretically than
we are accustomed to think. There is, in any event,
a 'filmic filter' linked to the rules of film language
(and, in this respect film history owes much to film
theory) as much as to the attitudes of filmmakers and
audiences at the time when films are made. One
cannot know much about this without a thorough
knowledge of the complex of production, of the
subjects, themes, forms and styles which are seen as
common (or uncommon) at a given time.
Admittedly, I have oversimplified these ques-
tions, and raised them from a very partial perspec-
tive. Still, one point holds true: I'm asking film history
to perform a role of mediating knowledge. It is
through this history that I would be able to measure
the supposed value of my 'documentary' shorts, and
interpret the images they are displaying. It will be my
duty, then, to build a picture, however tentative, of
the evolution of the social attitudes towards immi-
grants and the emancipating colonies through a
contextualization of these films with other images
produced by other media with newspapers, radio,
and - why not? - with the available evidence of the
political debate of that time. In short, what I'm trying
to do is to see films within a socio-cultural history,
which is in turn linked to the general history.
A strategy of this kind should prevent us from
falling into an all too common trap in which both
historians and film specialists often find themselves
caught. As a matter of fact, with few notable excep-
tions, the current situation is characterized by a
phenomenon of reticence and reciprocal borrow-
ings, in a circular relationship coming partly from a
current practice in film criticism, and partly from an
ignorance of what cinema is for historians and what
history is for film analysts. Too often, in order to
draw the 'historical context', historians use film with-
out knowing much about the rules of film language
at the time when a chosen film was made. In doing
so, they fail to consider the link between cinema and
the real world, and they overlook the 'filtering' func-
tion performed by the microcosm of film language.
As for film specialists, they like to use 'context' in
order to explain films and their production, without
thinking of the double transposition with which the
practice of historiography affects the 'contextual
This content downloaded from
118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Michele Lagny
facts' they are referring to. The first is due to the
documents (witnessing facts in their own way, and
according to their degree of preservation), while the
other owes much to the way historians used these
documents from their own perspectives and with
their own working methods.
Such attitudes entail a reductionist, 'historiciz-
ing' misconception, similar to the vicious circle 'text-
context' (where the text looks determined by the
context, while the context seems 'reflected' into the
text), or a cleavage between film analysis and the
study of society, socio-economic variables, the inten-
tions of the filmmakers and the reactions of the
audiences. In order to avoid allegations of partiality,
let me raise an example drawn from my own essay
on Luchino Visconti's Senso5. Some pages of it are
devoted to the political context (the success of Chris-
tian-Democrat right-wing policy in Italy) and the situ-
ation within the film industry both from the point of
view of institutions (the pressure from censorshipl and
aesthetics (the crisis of neorealism); some clues are
given about the cultural milieu within which Visconti
and his collaborators conceived and made the film
(mostly from the novel used as source for its produc-
tion, from Gramsci's writings on the period of the
so-called risorgimento, from the opera - a main
interest throughout the director's career- and the
paintings which appear to inspire several se-
quences). Finally, attention is called to some
examples of press response. Of course I wasn't so
naive as to claim that the shape of the film was
determined by the context (although context had
indeed some kind of influence, especially through
censorship), nor that the film itself was some sort of
mirror of it, although Visconti had said that Senso
could be seen as 'our own history'. Directors can be
so contradictory! I never trust what they say. How-
ever, in dealing with my own knowledge as a
historian (knowledge of the data highlighting a pol-
itical and cultural environment) and with film ana-
lysis, I was forced to keep a kind of fracture
between the two. In the absence of a comparison
with other cultural objects (visual and nonvisual) of
the period, I didn't try hard enough in order to reach
an articulation and a mediation towards film history
and socio-cultural history. What I did was to submit
a slightly a-temporal interpretation of the film (which,
in any case, I certainly won't deny now). I did try to
put it in relation to its times, but I couldn't explain
 Film
Film history: orhistory: 31
history expropriated or history expropriated 31

Fig. 2. Luchino Visconti addressing a class a

Sarris (left) and Arthur Barron (right). 'Dire

much of the mediation ofof

meaning
meanings in the constraints,
time
film).
The role of a film historian draws all its relev-
ance - along with the relevance of its mediating role
- if we mean the term 'mediation' as a specific
ability to connect historical knowledge and film ex-
pertise. From the standpoint I have selected (the
socio-historical perspective is only one of many
possible frameworks), this mediation provides the
elements necessary to evaluate the potential relat-
ions between the representations and conceptions
suggested by the films, those which were hege-
monic at the time, and our own (the ideas which
may lead us to interpret a film in a totally different
manner, not necessarily 'bad' or 'wrong', but cer-
tainly not an 'absolute' one), as well as between the
film and the supposed reality of its time. True, a
this kindsuch
involves an awareness of its
relations
and precautions
placewhich are bound
ofto existence
make
our task particularly difficult already, and a series of
caveats against abusive appropriation and institu-
tional ideologies perhaps rewarding in the short
term, yet destructive to the discipline.
Plurality of viewpoints and loss of control
With my naive suggestion of questions to film history
through some examples, what I really was thinking
about is the way film history is built from a set of
fundamental needs of historical practice: the choice
of sources; their treatment according to different
perspectives and the scales adopted in order to
examine them; finally, the crucial issue of articulating
viewpoints derived from this treatment. In fact, history
resembles an image, as it requires - as in photo-
graphy or the moving picture - the selection of

This content downloaded from

118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
32 32 Mich~~~~~~~~~~Ie Michele Lagny
Lagny~~~~~~-

framing and peripheral,

lighting marginal production:
options. As short documen-film
with
an editing taries on science, education, industry, or home
process.
movies. Certainly, some of these films could afford
The material: insome audacities because of
praise they were inexpensive
the quan
The examples of and financed
my without much
little trouble, sometimes
documentar
seemed bizarre. After
thanks all, fiction
to the policy of 'quality films' film is
followed by the st
of a film Centre
historian's National de la Cin6matographie8,
world, and thesome- very
inventory has beentimes
madebecause of the
yetsponsoring
of zeal of institutions
non-ficti
proof of it. On aiming
the at publicizing their
other hand,activities or products
we (in coul
their only France,
interest the colonial
lies in administration,
their the army,
beingthe
instead of 'film'. Looking
Ministry of Agriculture,at them,
the nationalized companiesnev
least as far as I can tell
like Renault from those ma
or SNCF).
during the 1950s), one may
I'm not trying realize
here to push that
towards a rehabilita-
certainly help us in tion of documentary and short films. Instead,
understanding the I wouldtran
in the art of like to stress the as
filmmaking, fact that
somehistory is aof
matter of
these
visual exercises. I'm
quantity thinking about
as much as of quality. It is through mass a
known film of production
1948 by that we may recognize, even
Yannik in the
Bellon,
The depressing realm of art, the deeper
conditions of movements
life leading
of to the
seaw
are described here in
expression 23
of the minutes
most brilliant of s
results. It is not necess-
(seaweed was thenary,
used as
I think, to insist a onfertilizer
further this point: the shining i
What we have herepath
isof the
aauteurs is still overshadowing display
stunning the humble
framing and craftsmen vividly
lighting, who worked for theportraying
screen, but many
overwhelming isolation oppressing
scholars are now trying - with different means and th
and the
luminosity unequal
of fortune
the- to ensure cataloguing, preserva-
space in that
tion and
deniably, films like restoration one
this of films and
arenon-visual sources
someti
but mostly becauseon they
film related toarethese people.
made As a matter
by of no
who became famous thanks
principle, to
the time of 'selective' their
preservation is over. fea
films; that's whyNeither
we will I know the
insist on the need for docum
development of a
well-known 'philology'
people like of the Georges
document, the evaluation of its
Franju
origin, the authentication
nais and Agnes Varda. However, of prints. With all who
the
about the director of
problems Kalla,
it entails Francois
(and I am fully aware of them), V
nevertheless madethis
at least
is a preliminary stagetwo documen
of work, often undertaken
year between 1946by filmand 1955?
archivists, sometimes Besides,
in cooperation with film
documentaries arehistorians.
made Historians,
by however, must address a fur-
so-called au
are most often seen as
ther question: whatminor works,
to do with the staggering amount
period of of preserved - and,In
apprenticeship7. to some
my extent, view,
available - ho
like Le sang des betes or
viewing material. Nuit et brou
important to the knowledge of film as H
amour or Les yeux sans visage from the p
of film language The law of
and series; or, large scale and its
aesthetics.
In order to have aconstraints
full understanding of
phenomenon, and Ifto
we are realize
talking about large quantities,
where it's because
the
ters of historians
cinema were never work on an isolated
growing up, source. That's
it is
realize what was the
why it iscurrent practice:
necessary to draw a distinction between the n
mercial films (theactivity
notorious
of a historian and the work 'poverty
of a film analyst, r
French cinema, or the
although (as it is American
a requirement in film history as'B
much mo
days so much appreciated
as in socio-cultural historyby the
in general) mos
the same re-
film programmers searchers
in should deal with both aspects
French of the issue.
broadcast
but also what has been considered until now a No historical question will be solved with a selective

This content downloaded from

118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Film
Filmhistory:
history:or history expropriated
or history 33
33
expropriated

Fig. 3. Putyovka v zhizn (The Roa

Nikolai Ekk. 'Some kind of Great
each film is but a variant.

choice of sources: what

are Ivisible
have just
in said
theirabou
m
short lent/sound,
documentaries black
on immigrants an
woul
sense without extent,
systematic cinema of
research helps
a la
of documentaries once
in the structural
a given ele
period, a ho
'series' large enoughthrough the
to justify orsystem
falsify
hypotheses possible
suggested by the to treat of
process the
o
'Series' of films: variations,
it's sometimes
not something like
of prices for itical
cereals, speech,
or the nameseach law
of bor
or deceased people on
in its
some official
own, there reg
are
through which allow
history has the interpretati
found its basic
nomenon,
of serial analysis). We may think instead of
instead
of political speeches,
(anecdotal)
or judicialevent,
papers.
wh
this may seem an iconoclastic
case impossible statemen
with
partisans of films phenomenon.
as an art, cinema is
However,
expression which largely allows - the essent
within th
the role of -
its 'technical reproducibility' the
thehistor
repe
variation of a theme build
or model. Pierre Sorlin
a theoretical mo
reminded us that is supposed
films to explai
are comparable ob
the point of case,
view of visual)
their modesfunctioni
of expr
financial and technical constraints.
to submit These se
the entire c

This content downloaded from

118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
34 34 MichIe Lagny
Michele Lagny

Fig. 4. Toni (1934)

tioning and
the to th
'uniq
us to formulate
on a negl
utions or ruptures
to do only
followed, for
ments exam
as
study on the
studyorig
by
the available film
Renoir's
many dull movies
ards of f
ofGreat changes
Collective
be seen as
ofathis
varia
fi
'against the very
gives us t
ceived grading';
on the q
pro
variations of
turn the
of t
sailor, dures
the fo
bolshev
the styles, taking
between
(such as framing,
Tesson ma
and view
time) and (ba
pa
cussion
patterns, actors' o
p
My insistence
though,o
certain amount
archives o
conceive be confro
'series'
might look
of peculi
the sa
ciety and - althou
further d
politics. global
This m
need
in film would
history, di
sti

This content downloaded from

118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Film history:
FlhItoyor history expropriated
ohIstr xrpitd3
possible to appreciate
simply because
tioned by Tesson
In other words, describe
a single
with convincing precision
meaningful to the
consecutive shots, cault
takenhad stressed this from
order to help us
ture.
Variable points of view: history by levels
The problem is in the editing: the polymorphism of
cinema is a global phenomenon requiring the expan-
sion of systematic research, with several different
approaches. Traditional history has taken into ac-
count the pluri-dimensional rule. However, as soon
as history was supposed to deal with film, films were
always given the foremost - if not the only - place;
economic, social, political and cultural knowledge
of film has been seen as ancillary evidence, either in
terms of 'factors' (more or less determining the output)
or 'influence' (more or less strong). I have used here
the past tense (although this kind of auxiliary history
is still very much alive), but at least we now know
more about the richness and diversity of these docu-
ments, leading us to explore each aspect in its own
right, thus supporting the development of a 'history
by levels'.
So we are witnessing the surging of a 'strati-
fied' film history, where each layer owes something
to established disciplines (economics, sociology, an-
thropology, aesthetics, semiotics) endorsing a better
knowledge of its organizational models. So, we
either analyse films in themselves, and in their rela-
tionship with each other and with other forms of the
art of representation; or else we study - mostly
through the exploration of written sources - their
financial and economic implications (through the
systematic analysis of the structures of production,
funding, distribution and exhibition), the role of tech-
nique in terms of invention and innovation (that is,
the actual enforcement of technological resources),
the institutions surrounding and shaping film produc-
tion, show business, the evolution of the public.
This multi-layered pattern seems inexorably ac-
celerated by the fact that we are often working on
documents organized on homogeneous series, as
these series are the result of a certain choice of
sources (what has been put in a 'serial' framework?)
and a certain set of points of view (how are we
addressing these sources?). In fact, 'series' exist
This content downloaded from
118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
35
the
diacronic
we are asking preliminary questions cha
at ofthe
a group ofend
comparable of
documents;
his yet they can
article.
'close
shot'
and insight only
some aspects of a social phenomenon.
historian's work Michel Fou- than
point in Arch6ologiedifferen
du savoir
shaping
(The Archaeology ofa
Knowledge)
full, Documental
moreseries nu
are logically defined by the way they have been
built, that is, by the set of relationships imposed
upon them. As they will provide answers only within
the framework of this logic, it should be admitted
that they 'often lead to a specific kind of history for
each series' 1.
In order to gather the meaning of the per-
manences, evolutions and ruptures observed in the
process of research, we must find our way out of the
series we are studying. The structure and the global
evolution of a phenomenon can be interpreted only
if we compare the observed aspects with other
aspects designed through other 'series', yet its articu-
lation remains a random factor. Of course, the point
of view on a given 'series' may be determined by
hypotheses coming from other 'series' of documents,
thus allowing a certain amount of contextualization.
To return to the earlier example, I can question the
representations proposed by the documentary films
on immigrants through a 'series' of official texts
published by the institutions which distributed land
sometimes commissioned) these films, so that I may
evaluate to what extent the films obey a set of
directions given by the institutions. Yet the conclu-
sions one may draw from this procedure are some-
how limited: we may well understand more about
the objectives of the films, but probably nothing
about the way they were made. In order to fulfil this
further task, we will have to study the films from other
'series' of documents (for example, the way do-
cumentary films were conceived at that time). As to
the assessment of their value, we'll have to work on
radically different 'series': some of them coming
from an inventory of the titles of films screened in the
theatres (which will be done using the daily pro-
grammes of the theatres), following a rationale and
a set of constraints depending on the reality of
exhibition practice, instead of from using sources
like the director, the producer, the possible sponsor.
Other 'series' may come from quantitative and quali-
tative data on the spectators entering the theatres.
These 'series' will obey further criteria, both econ-
omic and sociological.
36
In other words, we will know, at best, in what
perspectives these films as a whole have been pro-
duced, and how it was thought they should be. A
corpus of relatively homogeneous documents (films
and writings on political, technical and stylistic
norms) can be articulated as much as we are able to
distinguish them by their references, even when
these references are implicit. We might be able to
know (although this may be very difficult to ascer-
tain, more so than it would be with feature fiction
films) how often these films have been screened, and
what kind of audience - immigrant, intellectual,
suburban - had seen them. On the other hand, we
will not try to articulate their discourse, their motiva-
tions and their effects unless we will be able to make
these 'series' meet through some documents related
to one or more films, their production and reception.
These crosscuts, however, are likely to give idiosyn-
cratic answers to our questions, If we use these
answers outside the 'series', we will abandon the
field of the historian who wants to think about 'facts',
and we will enter the domain of probabilistic ana-
lysis (which is indeed the most frequent destiny of
historians, and their luck as well, as it gives them the
chance to prove their inventiveness).
The curse: history exploded or
expioptiated?
Should we say that the current development of re-
search is leading us to the era of the history (histories)
of cinema (cinemas)?12 Or, maybe, to a history
which is thinking of itself in terms of 'perspectives',
multiple viewpoints instead of 'factual truth', multi-tem-
porality instead of linear and homogeneous chrono-
logy. That's what Jean-Louis Leutrat suggests when he
presents film history as something 'made of a thou-
sand actions which cannot be reduced to a single
sense and a fully linear time frame; which doesn't
mean that we cannot disclose any sense what-
soever'13.
To be honest, this idea is hardly new; we have
seen it expressed, for example, in Gian Piero Bru-
netta's monumental Storia del cinema italiano first
published about fifteen years ago. Nor is the idea a
very original one: just a very basic recognition of a
debate held among historians for more than sixty
years! The 'nouvelle histoire' is now seen (not with-
out some hesitation and regrets) as a series of
This content downloaded from
118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Michele Lagny
discontinuities, a random game between these
series. In a way, this is an answer to an observation
raised by Jean Greimas in 1970: 'historicity, which
is characterized by an infinite amount of micro-
events occurring everywhere and at every moment
... cannot be described exhaustively and systemati-
cally' 14
The truth of the matter is that the practice of
'serialization' of documents is still rare in film history.
The sources are too scattered, too uncertain (espe-
cially in terms of the actual film holdings), with too
many gaps for a serious attempt to work on a truly
massive amount of documents. We should also add
to this the persistence of a certain fetishistic attitude
towards certain films, certain authors, certain prin-
ciples seen as the essence of the 'aesthetics' of
'cinema'. If it is true that so many research projects
of our time are of a fragmentary nature, this happens
mostly because we are finding ourselves prisoners of
the exploitation of all the sources of documentation
recently discovered, where the exploitation is done
following neo-positivist techniques, making cross-ref-
erences of documents considered as 'relevant', and
then insisting on the cause-effect relationships be-
tween the 'facts' thus identified. The fragmentary,
discontinuous aspect of historical research is pass-
ively assumed more than actively pursued, and it is
therefore often misunderstood.
The misunderstanding brings some dangers,
which have already become apparent in general
history: the most frequently denounced is the disart-
iculation of film history; the other is the loss of its
specificity (i.e. identity), leading to some extreme
forms of complaint on behalf of those researchers
who devote themselves to cinema studies. They are
quite worried indeed, as they are wondering where
cinema actually was. Are we going to find it in the
films? in the mind of filmmakers? in the off-screen
work of film crews, or in the actors' performances?
in the secret meetings and the manoeuvres of pro-
ducers, bankers, film moguls? in the theatres where
the nocturnal activity of of obscure audiences was
bound to decide the destiny of the films' survival?
Disarticulation
There is a clear-cut opposition today between a film
history essentially founded on film analysis and an
institutional history of cinema. Evidently, the tendency
 Film
Film histoiy:
history: or 37
or history expropriated 37
history expropriated
Fig. 5. Cinematographe
history'.
to have the latter prevail over the other tendency is
stronger than ever. The current fashion of the history
of 'modes of production', of technique, and more
recently of film reception tends to push to the back-
ground the study of films in a historical perspective.
There is, then, a double fracture, between film ana-
lysis and the analysis of cinema, but also between
the different layers of institutional analysis, as Allen
and Gomery have correctly pointed out in 198515.
As much as the study of each layer requires the
adoption of 'series' belonging to different sources
and specific methods of analysis, the economic
history of cinema enters the domain of economic
history: the history of film reception overlaps social
history, and so forth - not without reason, as re-
searchers know very well how to find and treat their
sources. Even when the discrepancy between the
layers is not exaggerated by a specialization pushed
to extremes, these interrelations seem too complex to
suggest the adoption of permanent 'models' built on
This content downloaded from
118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Lumiere, Bouleva
the serious grounds of a structural history of cinema
with its own characters, its own rhythms, following
the places where cinema is developing itself (or
where its development has ceased).
In order to take into account some of these
relationships (essentially between means of produc-
tion, technologies, economies, and film production
in itself), one may propose the adoption of the
so-called 'open systems', insofar as this involves the
identification of 'generative mechanisms' in the re-
search field defined by case studies precisely situ-
ated geographically and chronologically. We may
also try to build longer-term models, articulating in a
smooth and flexible chronological framework the
necessities of economic profit, the rationalization of
technological practice, and a stylistic model, as
Bordwell, Staiger and Thompson have done for the
cinema of Hollywood'16. On the other hand, it
seems much less clear how to provide a systematic
account of the relation between production and
38 Michele Laqny3 I

reception. In analysing
tion andthe decrease
its different in film
methodological approaches,
attendance in Europe at the
give a synthetic end
view which is at the of the
same time
Pierre Sorlin considers these
enthralling years
and a little scary for a French as
reader 'abno
(and
terms of market economy,
certainly for myself). and ends up ad
that the behaviour of the European filmg
been modified by a Expropriations
broader social evolution
more than by problems (ofofwhich
This instability Sorlin
articulations seems nev
to me a sign of
underlines the effects)
vitality, if related
not of maturity, butto
it givesfilm
the impressionpro
distribution or exhibition;
that film history is the
crumbling articulation
and decomposing, and
production and consumption
that cinema takes the risk of
of beingfilms
expropriated bycan
solved within cinemaresearchers
alone. More
of all horizons than
who, while findin
putting film in
between different layers of
relation to too film
many history,
things make it lose its identity. the
stake becomes the understanding of
On the other hand, the current division the r
of labour,
between a socio-economic land socio-cultura
necessary both from a methodological and humanist
ution taken as a whole, and
point of view (we can't the
do everything, desir
as Thomas
movies. Elsaesser has pointed out)19 is enhanced by institu-
As for the fundamental question for those who tional needs, at least in the academic field, where
want to deal with cinema in terms of 'images of everybody has his or her own chair, and therefore
society', as in my case - the question of the recep- his or her own speciality. Film history, thus, is conti-
tion and the effect, the aesthetic, cultural or ideologi- nued - and sometimes almost confiscated - by
cal value of this production - things are even more researchers who make reference to their practice of
clear: we can't evaluate the relevance of films land a certain method (in fact, methods) of history, or to
their impact on society) without establishing a rela- their competence in the study which is essential to
tionship between film production and other cultural cinema, the film itself. Some consider film not as a
productions, and between these productions and 'text' in itself, but more as a cultural 'product' among
the social habits of those who are absorbing, admir- others, and an 'instrument' of social exchange. They
ing or rejecting them. Then comes the very tricky can't be blamed for this. Others criticize them,
question of knowing what series of data are necess- though, because they speak only in terms of content
ary to approach the 'series' of film productions, in or function, without considering films in their own
clearly defined chronological and geographic cir- specificity. They can't be blamed, either. It looks,
cumstances. Films acquire a 'historical' significance though, as if the two tendencies are incompatible, as
in relation to what Rick Altman calls the 'community if film history can't make the two currents find a
of interpretation'17. This community is partly linked to meeting point.
the cultural and global consumption of a certain The current evolution has the enormous advant-
period: novels (from 'high' to pulp literature; enter- age of showing that film, as a socio-economic and
tainment, from theatre to music hall; painting and socio-cultural structure, follows rules which are com-
popular imagery, including traditional illustration; mon to other comparable social phenomena in a
music, from opera to rock and rap: radio, television, given society. The difficult thing is that all the differ-
advertisementsl. This consumption is also a function ent specialists tend to treat film as a product ex-
of spectators affected by their own habits, which are ploited economically, or consumed sociologically,
defined in a complex manner by their ethnic, sexual, overlooking its distinctive characteristics. As the divi-
social, familiar and professional affiliations. Every- sion between the layers tends to grow, film history
thing may seem not only admissible, but vital, up to loses its specificity: it is confiscated because it is
the point that reading several works of the 'cultural being diluted. Sure, projection equipment has been
studies' trend, where cinema is dealt with, we are sold in the same way and at the same time as soap.
not talking about 'open systems' any more, but of Douglas Gomery's joke of applying the principle of
'waving systems' instead. The first part of the fasci- 'industrial analysis' to the economics of cinema is
nating book by Janet Staiger, Interpreting Film'8, therefore confirmed: at the national fair of Geneva
which presents the field of historical studies of recep- in 1896, the Swiss representative of the British soap

This content downloaded from

118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Film
Film history:
history: or
orhistory
historyexpropriated
expropriated 39
39

manufacturers Lever prone to

Brothers a certain
Ltd. over-
(producer of
light soap) combines egories
'popular entertainment
which have beco
publicity in a use - some
pseudo-Japanese kind of
pavillion ideol
introd
the Cin6matographe Lumiere. One could
talist', 'bourgeois', also
'phall
tion the example of standpoint,
the certainly,
Werner company inw
owning a 'society for to
the storage
another and of
form sale of
expro
writers and reproduction
rian machines'
is someoneas well
who as
inte
senting the Edisonthan
phonograph and sel
others, as much as
kinetoscopes20. After institutional
all, though, category
film industr
ten
developed in a different
away. way than
I would the
say soat
here
typewriter industry: cated
the because it withdr
Cin6matographe has cr
film, and film has a (and
social about)
role film.
which is different
the role performed by other
Both products in
approaches, of m
a
(typewriters) or less (soap) relevant
trying social
to look funct
too far aw
This evolution also because
leads to leaving
the cinema
interpretation
the 'theoreticians' who often work
extended. Fromfrom post
the poin
which eliminate all historical
there are connection wit
only two legitim
object under scrutiny. Wewe
what should not exagg
may know abou
our criticism in this something
respect: the at the time
semiology de
from Christian Metzduced
has been
land too
the often acc
fact that
while film analysis has never
that really been
its meaning en
could n
dependent upon semiology, andof
spectators it that
has never
period
pletely eliminated the points
ance of condition)
of this view of crit
or
(which often deal with pretations,
the 'historical'
andcontext of
their mea
as I have recalled earlier when
won't I mentioned
insist my
here on the
work on Visconti). Besides, 'film theory'
differences inspir
in perception
language studies has Illusion
never before
shown anyand after
contem
synchronic (sociological) differentiations,
ever, that the film nor
had of
b
chronic (historical) in 1937, this
evolutions; and that after
theory im
more and more, with reservations that Renoir
the semio-pragmatic thoh
developed by Roger the
Odin and
film Francesco
in 1958 withCa
an
the construction of what models',
'partial concerns the histo
correspondi
certain judgements of acceptability,
with involving
by contemporary p
receptive role of the socio-cultural
- who class
knows? - might
viewers'21. Film analysis can't be
historical blamed, then
significance).
real incompetence, or for
On conscious refusal
another level, of
conc
tory; there is instead, the tendency
of the historyto
ofgive prior
cinema a
the study of the process land the
necessary distinctive
insertion o
of cin
ality) of making meaning out of and
economic visual texts. An
sociologica
tendency is visible today, at least
specific in France, in
characteristics.
ing a predominant role of 'comparative'
conceptualized analys
in order
which Jean-Luc Godard
ismsmay be seen
of events as I'm
- and theq
ancestor with his Introduction a une
it is also v6ritable
(perhaps mos hi

du cin6ma22. This tendency is the

particular. Ifresult
cinemaof is
ana a
tion of uncovering the social demands
most relevant and a sy
meanings o
films through a comparison between
sentations, them,
it has with
its own
sometimes audacioussuch
refusal of In
a role. a chronolog
order to
framework. Here, again,
and the cultural
in order to and soci
analyse
itical context are notthe
ignored,
relationbut they are
between the

This content downloaded from

118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
40 40 Mich~~~~~~~~~~~~Ie Michele Lagny
Lc~~~~~-Ign

Fig. 6. La Grande Illusion (1937). Re-edite

[Museum of Modern Art/Film Stills Arch

and the production random

of theirmethod and a
values (with
might include the 'micro-analyses' of part
mediating function I p
tionships), we may well imagine
beginning a 'cin
of this ess
conceived as a space of 'objective
logical' data - thatrela
is,
with its constraints,but
itstheir contextua
dynamics, its pa
its undetermined necessary
margins. toWhat we m
analyse f
then, is its 'genesisthis
and history
structure', as B
present
for literature and several
art23. films,
The someti
priority giv
and to the organization of its
egories network
(author, of
perio
- in a semiotic and or
intertextual
as a series perspec
of case
be the best safeguard
level (not taken Or,
of study? enou
sh
count by Bourdieu)principles
against 'sociologism'
of organizat
the cinema phenom
problem generated b
Film as the core dimension
of a semio-history
has a very
Would it be although
possible I have
that a film my
history

This content downloaded from

118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Film
Film history:
history: or
orhistory expropriated
history 4141
expropriated

under this ing

viewpoint, the relationship
producing some filmbe
or work on some authors andin
reception genres. The
a regime o
hypothesis seems tofact
me that,
as utopian and to
according dant
one always has to choose a hierarchy
to them of det
as being the 'se
tions which can't be On the
proved, contrary,
with the risktalk
of
time and efforts toms, that
wondering - as is, consider
professiona
do - whether or not other
the signs, which
production ma
(and quali
given film is determined
whichby
is the taste
built of th
by them,
(often defined in toohistory
narrowwhose
sociological
role is ter
to
the logic of economics
theor technology
signs or by
expressed byt
tional constraints24. duced by other series o
It would be far better to activities.
social think that there
As I im
such thing as one or be conceived
more (and
histories hold
of s
cine
ceived as closed fields of analysis
viewpoints, and kno
producing
instead of an open while
field opening
where possibilit
different force
omic, social, political,
tile technical,
effects. As cultural
in the br
thetic) come into being and
W ou leconfront
souvenir each o
de I'en
order to build the become of
itineraries visible
a filmonly at
histor
accepts its 'an without
dissemination imaginary story m
fragmentin
there is a crucial absences,
condition, gaps, doubt
whatever the s
point of view, of dotes'
the made by source
methodological appr
and the relationships taken close
stories into to
considerati
each oth
core is the film text, re-composed
because from
only the series
film is
that cinema does hypothese)
exist which
(or doesn't exist woul
any
Working from the cinema or on by
put together thethe
cinem
his
starting from the the
film, sources.
and It would
going back to it.
doubt, films are not the result
never saidof
inchance, but
one thing,
are they the result of necessity;
only they
in the fragile nev
inter
consequence (of economic, social,
Insisting on cultural
the filmor
a
cal determining factors, crossing
history each
doesn't oth
mean
non-systematic way), nor thean
through cause of anyt
isolated ana
political action, a social
theyreaction, or keep
obviously the pro
- d
of other films). They time - important
can be, socially and relat
histo
seen as symptoms. ideological effect) with t
Film history, of
then, cinema
cannot included
depend in
uniquel
the neo-positive theory founded on
macro-milieu. a 'realis
The analy
claimed by Allen andmade
Gomery (whom
without I very
looking ou
admire, both for the the documentaries
consistency of their I h
ana
the historiographic clear
practice
thatand forfinanc
their the c
richness of their work).
modesAsof
a matter of fac
production are
caution (when they stress
greatthat 'thefilms,
fiction re-descrip
altho
the event under them. In order
examination to evalua
exposes the r
possible causal mechanisms responsible
allusion to earlier, andfo
t
19) and that the will need
generative to know abou
mechanisms of t
systems within as about
which the institution
several factors co
among themselves in different ways give In
of film production. new
o
every time) gives place once again
tiveness, I will to redu
have to
determinisms. These formal
are visiblemechanisms
in their worko
the sheer importance given they
simple to mechanisms
may be) to r

This content downloaded from

118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
42 42 MichIe Lagny
Michele Lagny

which will
the common characteristic trigge
of systematically reducing
the audience.
the dangerous figures visible in both, against whichTh
de la mosqu6e
films constitute a 'powerful protective screen'26. d
family The references often come from other films as
album, o
Kalla, well:
which there is a level - both on a technical
adop and a
ence formal viewpoint
(for its - where cinema subj
has its own
the relative autonomy so that
partial Pierre Sorlin has the im-
identi
protagonist. pression that films escape their own times as much
Each film, or each 'series' of films, comes into as the universe of cinema which is somehow seen as
existence because of some borrowings from the a universe in itself. Sorlin also remarks that the
outside. It may happen that films react directly - as representations of Resistance during WWII in the
is probably the case with the documentaries I have European cinema work better as references from
analysed - in relation to some 'rough' ideological one film to another than as references to reality (or to
discourses (such as paternalism and technologism) the historiography of Resistance). Great Britain has
concerning social (immigration) and political (the produced its earliest images, at a moment when
colonial context) realities. Yet, cinema is also in- action begins (with Secret Mission, 1942), and
scribed into former or parallel cultural traditions these images perform a role of matrix for post-war
which display themselves through some similar films on a thematic level (despite some changes
modes of expression (mass entertainment or im- made in films produced on the continent), while their
agery) or through other forms, sometimes seen as precocity is such that - because several scenes were
'examples' to emulate (or to 'adapt', in certain shot on location - their presence will be kept through
cases), such as literature, painting, theatre. It is then the interpolation of actuality footage within historical
necessary to evaluate the relationships between dif- reconstructions. Even after the 1960s, there will be
ferent forms of representation. Marie-Claire Ropars, the tendency to employ non-professional actors, or
for example, asks herself (although without talking people who actually participated in the Resistance
explicitly of history) about 'the points ... where the movement, rather than well known actors27.
imagination of a certain period ... finds its shape', Using films in order to evaluate their relations
and on the role of 'cultural exchanger' performed by towards other films or other texts does not mean that
cinema in the France of the 1930s. This would one only has to consider the reciprocal 'influences'
allow, among other things, to judge the use of films between texts, authors and genres. This procedure,
in the 'mass diffusion' of a literary production which on the contrary, forces one to establish some cross-
would benefit from (or be the victim of) a rewriting reference indexes, relevant series of intertextual refer-
operated by film. Ropars structures her research ences, and to admit that the exchange is not made
building a 'series' of films which have as a common in terms of determining influences, but instead in
feature the fact of being adapted from literary terms of complex interferences, in which some frag-
works, and then using these literary sources (made mented elements are interspersed28. Each film, as a
comparable by the very fact that they have been matter of fact, associates all these elements into a
adapted for the cinema) as a literary 'series', al- different system of combination which changes their
though tradition considers these sources as separate status and their meaning; hence the absolute
entities because they have been produced in differ- necessity to study each film in its own organization.
ent periods and they belong to different genres, from The study of film (or of a series of films) must then go
Zola to Mac Orlan. Thanks to a cogent analysis of through the analysis of the film signifier, made ac-
narrative structures and writing forms of the texts and cording to rules already established by film theory
the films, Ropars finds, instead of the differences (theories) as much as by history. What matters here
between the stories or their atmospheres, a draft of is not replacing film history with a semiological
a 'recurring configuration' of the 'accents' and the description of films, nor reducing film history to the
'discrepancies' between them. Ropars also determination of the process of producing the sense
measures the 'interval' between what looks like a of 'film language'. Instead, we must avoid any direct
'trend of modernity' in books and films which have evaluation of sense, too often made only through the

This content downloaded from

118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
Film
Film history:
history: or
orhistory
historyexpropriated
expropriated 43
43

logical choices
script, the plot, the relationships they chara
between are r
the direct allusions to exterior
feeling thisevents. Ther
way. George
different conceptions of cinema as a system,
'I do not claim to give [
involving different forms of representation. Alt
to suggest to him wh
we are far from having convinced everybody
vide him with the imag
this, this is a point upon which I have often ins
for myself of what I th
after Pierre Sorlin and within the editorial grou
this image is made b
the periodical Hors Cadre - too often to mak
have to try to make su
point again here without looking obsessed by
shifting contours of th
The references I have chosen here, especia
attached to grounds I
Foucault and Bourdieu, may look idiosyncrati
as meticulously as I co
though these names have often been put cl
ments. They are my pr
each other. Michel de Certeau, for example,
It'sto
referring to them in order not a return
criticize to the
them, f
tru
also in order to recognize their
instead, influence
it's whe
the refusa
was trying to clear upepistemological referen
the field and the meth
right to a research
approach of a cultural history29. It seems which
to me
an in-depth analysis ofcourse,
their positions
but which(also
is abou
sur
need
construction of coherent to provide
'series' a cross
necessary to an
discourses and practices, as well
proaches, as to
while evaluat
trying to
social space within which these discourses
their possibilities and th
practices are articulated) would
(from allow one to
concurrences, or t
the 'question of cinema' in the
cies) theevolution ofrelat
occasional its f
and social functions. cal and fragmentary31,
works
This conception of film and does
history as 'series')
not refuh
economic
'facts' which one may draw fromconstraints, so
documents, no
ral conditions.
complex of determinations which we may esta
among them. Such a conception, however, i
Notes
'factual' (that is, descriptive) or 'positive', (th
determinist). Such a conception does not refu
1. I'm not developing her
possibility of treating film
dealtas a specific
with field;
in two works
ever, it deals especially with the
cinema. value of
Methode docu
historiq
(Paris:
as symptoms, which cannot Colin,
be read if1992) and 'P
not with
turelle',
network of transitory and complex Cin6matheque
relationships
ing them to each other.
2.This history
Several builds
research its
projec
ions from a set of predefined
way, Forquestions, and
the time being,
questions are not relatedsuggest
only tothat the image
cinema. The o
'sanitized' than dismissed
makes sense, as a matter of fact, within a larg
of phenomena to which cinema
3. Pierre is more
Sorlin, or
Europe
cieties
connected (in a framework (London: Routled
of institutional pra
but also in the shifting4.
interplay
A I'ombrebetween indiv
de la mosque
practices, more or less determined by their
France, 1946, 23 min) pl
society). In claiming suchmosque of Paris and
a conception the
of film
munity
tory, I firmly belong to the in Paris.
community Kalla (
of those
1955, 19 min.) by Fran
rians who assert their beliefs (and they do
black student from Cam
beliefs!) while keepingevolution
a methodological
while walkingdo
a
about their own discourse and their own prac
5. Senso. Etude critique
as much as about the intrinsic value of the epist
6. Goemons (Films Etienn

This content downloaded from

118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
44 44 Mich6le Lagny
Michele Lagny

Yannick19. Thomas Elsaesser, Bellon

'The New Film History'. Sight &
life on Sound,
the Autumn 1986: 246-251. islan
Brittany. Prem
20. On the first example, see Roland Cosandey and
7. As an opp
Jean-Marie Pastor, 'Lavanchy-Clarke: Sunlight et
Georges Franju
Lumi6re, ou les debuts du cinematographe en
and Georges
Suisse'. Equinoxe, Histoire(s) de cin6ma(s), 7, F
1992: 9-27. For the 1992,
Villette, second one, see Laurent
Mannoni, '1894-95: les annees parisiennes du
8. Legislation
Kin6toscope Edison', Cin6math6que, 3, 1993: 47-
period. 57.

9. Myriam Tsikounas, Les origines du cin6ma sovie-

tique, un regard neuf (Paris: les Editions du Cerf,
1992).
10. Charles Tesson, 'La r6gle et I'esprit: la production de
Toni deJean Renoir' Cin6math6que 1, 2, 3, 1992,
1993: 44-59; 86-97; 46-56.
1 1. Michel Foucault, L'Archeologie du savoir (Paris: Gal-
limard, 1969).
1 2. Title given to a special issue of Equinoxe (Lausanne),
7, Spring 1992.
13. Jean-Louis Leutrat, Le cinema en perspective: une
histoire (Paris: Nathan, 1992: 7.
14. 'Sur I'histoire 6v6nementielle et I'histoire fondamen-
tale', published in the proceedings of the Constance
symposium, Geschichte und Geschichten in Semio-
tique et sciences sociales (Paris: Seuil, 1976): 163.
15. This has been largely described for the United States
by Robert Allen And Douglas Gomery in Film History,
Theory and Practice (New York: Knopf, 1985).
16. David Bordwell, Janet Staiger, Kristin Thompson, The
Classical Hollywood Cinema, Film Style and Mode
of production to 1960 (London: Routledge and
Kegan Paul, 1985).
21. Roger Odin, 'Christian Metz et la linguistique', Iris,
10, special issue on Christian Metz et la th6orie du
cin6ma (Paris: Meridiens Klincksieck, 1990): 95; 'La
s6mio-pragmatique, sans crise ni d6sillusion'. Hors
Cadre, 7: 77-92.
22. Jean-Luc Godard, Introduction 6 une v6ritable histoire
du cinema (Paris: Albatros, 1980).
23. Pierre Bourdieu, Les r6gles de I'art. Gen6se et struc-
ture du champ litteraire (Paris: Seuil, 1992).
24. Thomas Elsaesser, op, cit.
25. Georges Perec, W ou le souvenir de I'enfance (Paris:
Denoel, 1975)
26. Marie-Claire Ropars, 'Entre films et textes: I'intervalle
de I'imaginaire', in Masses et culture de masse dans
les ann6s 30 (Paris: Editions Sociales, 1991).
27. Pierre Sorlin, op, cit., Chapter 2.
28. On this point, see Paolo Cherchi Usai, 'Imitation?
paraphrase? plagiat? Influence et jugement esthe-
tique au cinema', Cinematheque, 1, 1992: 38-44.
29. Michel de Certeau, 'Foucault et Bourdieu' and 'Arts
de la theorie', in L'invention du quotidien (Paris:
Folio, 1989: 75-117.

17. Rick Altman, The American Film Musical (Blooming- 30. Georges Duby, L'histoire continue (Paris: Editions
ton, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1987). Odile Jacob, 1991): 81 -82.

18. Janet Staiger, Interpreting Film, Studies in the Histori- 31. Carlo Ginzburg, Mythes emblemes traces, Morpho-
cal reception of American Cinema (Princeton, N.J.: logie et histoire (Paris: Flammarion, 1989): 153-
Princeton University Press, 1992). 154.

This content downloaded from

118.71.190.165 on Tue, 16 Aug 2022 15:28:38 UTC
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms