Media

Entertainment
Authorship and Media
Prof Marc Raymond
 Personal
Introduction
• Professor Marc Raymond
• I am originally from Canada (small town,
east coast)
• I did my PhD in Visual Culture (Film) at
Carleton University in Ottawa (Canada)
• My main research is cinema studies
• Hollywood’s New Yorker: The Making of
Martin Scorsese (SUNY Press, 2013)
 These next three lectures will be on the subject
of “media entertainment”

We will be exploring how media is discussed

Introduction to within culture through the framework of
authorship, genre, and race/ethnicity
Media
Entertainment
I will discuss in relation to primarily American
and European culture in terms of examples, but
these concepts can be applied to most
countries, even if there will be differences
(which hopefully we can discuss during on live
Zoom review)
 • All media is created by an individual or group of
individuals.
• But not all media has an author or is felt to be a
creative act worthy of this “authorship” label.
• A novel has an “author,” but much everyday media
does not (advertising, cat videos on YouTube, etc).
• When it comes to media products like films, TV
Authorship shows, on-line videos, etc, they are usually
collaborative processes with many dozens or
hundreds of workers.
• However, authorship has become a key aspect in
how we understand and interpret many media
texts.
The Work of Art in the Age of
Mechanical Reproduction
• 1934 essay by Walter Benjamin
• Argues that mass reproduction / mass media
has changed the idea of art
• Paintings had an “aura”: there is an “original”
that cannot be completely reproduced (this is
why people go to art museums even though
they can see digital copies online)
• This is not the case with mass reproduced art;
however, authorship is one main way in which
this aura gets reproduced in mass culture
Authorship and Art History
• Art (paintings, sculptures, drawings, etc) has
been around for thousands of years
• However, the idea of an “art history” and an
“art historian” can be traced back to the
Renaissance in Europe in the 16th century
• Giorgi Vasari, The Lives of the Painters,
Sculptors, and Architects (1550)
• One of the first works of art history, and also
established the artists as the main organizing
principle of this history
• This was not the norm at the time: art was
discussed more in terms of patrons, mediums
or iconography
 •Vasari shaped the field of art
history and his influence is still
seen today
•art-making as aesthetic rather
Vasari’s than functional (“art for art’s
Influence sake”)
•creative and visionary genius
•Key figure for Vasari was
Michelangelo
Michelangelo as
Artist/Genius

• The depiction of Michelangelo given by Vasari

remains the clichéd idea of the “artist” we still have
today
• Melancholic (sad, unsatisfied)
• Brooding (dark, unhappy)
• Angry (bad temper, prone to rage and violence)
• Child prodigy (talent at early age) (thus natural,
God-given)
• We can see this idea moving forward in art history,
in figures such as Vincent Van Gogh (tortured artist)
Sistine • An example of the problems in
over-investing in the image of the
Chapel artist
• Art historians worked on restoring
Restoration Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel
• However, many were angered by the
result, which they felt was too bright
and vivid and different from
Michelangelo’s original, even though
the research suggested that the
restoration was proper
• People had a view of the work and
the artist as much darker than the
restoration produced, especially
when seen up close in photos (as
opposed to on the ground of the
church looking up)
• The image of Michelangelo was
contrasting with the actual work
 Romanticism and Authorship

• The contemporary idea of the “author” is very much an influence

of Romantic culture
• Romanticism: artistic, literary, and intellectual movement that
originated in Europe toward the end of the 18th century and in
most areas was at its peak in the approximate period from 1800
to 1850.
• primary importance of the free expression of the feelings of the
artist
 • Romanticism believed that art
should begin as "the spontaneous
overflow of powerful feelings,"
which the artist then "recollect[s] in
tranquility," evoking a new but
corresponding emotion the artist
can then mold into art
Imagination • In order to express these feelings, it
was considered that the content of
the art needed to come from the
imagination of the artist, with as
little interference as possible from
"artificial" rules dictating what a
work should consist of
(anti-classical)
 • As well as rules, the influence of
models from other works was
considered to impede the creator's
own imagination, so that originality
was essential.
• The concept of the “genius”, or
artist who was able to produce his
Originality own original work through this
process of "creation from
nothingness", is key to
Romanticism, and to be derivative
(copying others) was the worst sin.
• This idea is often called "romantic
originality."
 • The author was thus seen as an
imaginative, original individual
who created unique works of art
• Interesting this notion comes
about in response to the
industrial revolution, with its
Individuality expansion of cities and the crisis
of people becoming part of a
mass
• Thus, literature and the genius
author are seen as distinct from
mass culture
 The Author in Media Culture
• Today, however, the writer has a very different relationship
to society
• Literature is no longer central to the culture
• While authors and literary culture still exist, they have
become increasingly marginalized
• As a result, many writers now work within other media
forms, even many authors, in order to get their work more
exposure
• This is often seen as less authentic or artistic by other
writers and critics or even the writers themselves (“selling
out”)
 • Film is the first “new medium” to
achieve recognition as an “art
form”
• However, this did not happen
History: immediately
Cinema as • In 1915, the U.S. Supreme Court
determined that film was not
an Art Form protected as speech (unlike
writing)
• Thus, it was not considered to have
an “author” but was simply a
consumer product (like cars, bars
of soap, etc.)
 Rise of “Art
Cinema”
• After World War II (1945), there is the
rise of European art cinema in the United
States
• Italian Neo-Realism: considered seriously
as art, as opposed to commercial
Hollywood
• 1952: Supreme Court grants films the
right to free speech for the first time; the
case involves an Italian art film, The
Miracle (directed by Roberto Rossellini)
• Film beginning to be seen as an art form;
also, being replaced as popular culture by
television (which would not be taken
seriously as art until many years later)
 Auteur Theory
• Francois Truffaut, “A Certain Tendency of the French
Cinema” (1954)
• Argued for the director as the main creative force in film
• “There are no good and bad movies, only good and bad
directors”
• “camera pen”
• Became a significant approach to film and its history partly
because many of the French critics (Truffaut, Godard,
Rohmer) became important filmmakers (French New Wave)
 Hollywood Cinema
• One of the most radical ideas in Truffaut’s essay was
concerning Hollywood
• Argued that many Hollywood directors (John Ford, Howard
Hawks, Alfred Hitchcock), often considered simply genre
filmmakers, were in fact great artists, many superior to the
prestigious “art film” directors of France
• One of the first critics to take Hollywood seriously
(ironically, when Hollywood itself was beginning to lose
popularity, especially to television)
 Andrew Sarris
• American film critic who brought the auteur
theory to American cinema
• “Notes on the Auteur Theory” (1962)
• The American Cinema (1968)
• Ranked directors into various categories
• “The Pantheon” “Far Side of Paradise” “Less
Than Meets the Eye”
• Very influential on cinema taste in the
following decades
 • (1) technical competence (“a
great director has to be at least
a good director”)
Three • (2) distinguishable personality
of a director (“the way a film
Premises looks and moves should have
some relationship to how a
director thinks and feels”)
of Auteur • (3) interior meaning (the
temperature or the soul of the
Theory director) (Romantic notion)
(difficult to define) (tension
between director and his
material)
 • “It is not quite the vision of the
world a director projects nor quite
his attitude toward life. It is
ambiguous, in any literary sense,
Sarris on because part of it is imbedded in
the stuff of the cinema and cannot
“Interior be rendered in noncinematic
terms. Truffaut has called it the
temperature of the director on the
Meaning” set, and that is a close
approximate of its professional
aspect. Dare I come out and say
what I think it is to be is an elan of
the soul?”
 Video Essays on the Auteur
The meaning Sarris was trying to express with the phrase “interior
meaning” is perhaps best expressed through the “video essay” form of
film criticism
Two examples:

https://vimeo.com/98484833

https://filmmakermagazine.com/93086-watch-mirrors-of-bergman-by-
kogonada/#.VewByM7IKH8
Individuality and Mass Culture

• The auteur theory was basically trying to find

the individual within the mass cultural
products.
• Much of mass culture was standardized and
homogenous (the same) (the culture
industry) (Theodor Adorno)
• The auteur theory argued that, with certain
films and filmmakers, you could see
individuality
• Seeing the art within (certain) popular
culture
The Commerce of
Auteurism
• Scholar Timothy Corrigan was one of the
first to suggest that authorship has become
a major commercial strategy within film
discourse
• Auteur as Star (Brand Name)
• Authors are now recognized brand names
within film discourse
• For example, some films are described as
“Hitchcockian” after the director Alfred
Hitchcock, one of the first celebrity
filmmakers
• Films are often marketed by their director’s
name, in both mainstream cinema and,
especially, art and festival movies.
Authorship and
Television
• Cinema became recognized as an art form
in the 1950s partially because it was
replaced as mass culture by television.
• Up until the 2000s, television was
considered low culture and the idea of
authorship was rarely discussed.
• However, in the 2000s, there begins a
“Golden Age” of American television, with
shows such as The Sopranos, Deadwood,
The Wire, and Breaking Bad
• This was also a point at which television
was being replaced as mass culture by the
internet
 The Rise of the “Showrunner”
• Television shows, however, rarely had a single writer or single
director; they were very much collaborative productions.
• However, when television started to gain more prestige, critics began
to discuss these shows through the figure of the “showrunner”
• This person was often the creator of the show, worked as the head
writer, and even directed some episodes.
• They were considered the main author of the television show, even if
there were many episodes that they did not write or direct.
• Today, television shows, if they are critically acclaimed, usually have
showrunners that are praised as auteurs.
Critiques of
Auteurism
• One of the most outspoken critics of auteurism was Pauline Kael.
• Thought auteur critics were judging movies like “buying clothes
by the label: This is Dior, so it’s good.”
• Felt a movie needed to be judged by its own merits, not its
author.
• Also did not think being distinctive or recognizable was a positive:
• “The smell of a skunk is more distinguishable than that of a rose.
Does that make it better?”
• Argued film is a collaborative process and rarely the result of a
single sensibility. Kael also liked movies “low-brow” status and did
not want them to become “respectable”
Roland Barthes, “The Death of the Author”
• 1968 essay
• An even more fundamental challenge to the idea of
authorship, critiquing the idea of the author in literature.
• Barthes felt western culture placed too much importance on
the individual creator; instead, he wanted to shift the
emphasis to the reader, who really give meaning to texts
through their interpretation.
• “To give a text an author is to impose a limit on that text.”
• For Barthes, texts should remain open and not fixed in
meaning.
• “The birth of the reader must be at the cost of the death of
the author.”
Discussion Questions

• Think about the following mediums:

• Literature, Painting, Sculpture, Music, Architecture,
Film, Television, Video Games
• In which mediums is the idea of authorship most
important, and in which is authorship least important?
Why?
• Should the “intention” of the author matter? If the
author says a text has a particular meaning, should the
audience agree to that meaning? Why or why not?
• How important are “authors” in terms of your
consumption of media entertainment? Do you know
the author of most media you consume? Is authorship
important to why you decide to read, watch or listen to
a specific type of media?
 Authorship and Meaning
Authorship is one way in which we can make meaning of a
text.

But it can also limit the meaning to the author’s intention.

Audiences will always interpret texts, but authorship will

structure and restrict these interpretations.

This is essentially the “author function” (Michel Foucault)