Unit 26: 'Auteur and Genre Theory'

Auteur Theory

Auteur Theory in filmmaking is a theory in were the idea is that the director is the main creative driving force behind the film, as oppose to the screenwriter being seen as the author, the director is. This is because directors who are seen as Auteurs take more control over their films by over seeing all visual and audio aspects of the motion picture. Such fundamental elements such as; visual style of the film, camera angles and placement, lighting and scene length are controlled by the Auteur director. Directors who are consider to be auteurs all leave personal stamps or trademarks on their pieces meaning that there films can easily be identified. All of their works may also portray a similar style or narrative too. Some Auteurs such as Wes Anderson are so good at applying there cinematic stamp on a film that their works are easily identifiable. The theory its self originated out of France in the 1940's however it was American film critic Andrew Sarris who named it Auteur Theory. I will be discussing a few of these 'Auteurs' in more detail.



Directors who are considered to follow Auteur Theory:
Wes Anderson
Quentin Tarantino
Martin Scorsese
Zack Snyder
Tim Burton

Wes Anderson
Wes Anderson is one of the best examples of an Auteur Director, he applies his own personal stamp to each one of his movies and because of this they are easily identifiable. His films always follow a similar narrative and have a light-hearted and fun theme. His style is distinct as he uses colour brilliantly in his films, each Anderson movie is bright and full of life often linking back to the colour yellow which is a predominant colour for important objects in his film. Wes Anderson creates beautiful elaborate and often perfectly symmetrical sets for his films this helps give all of his films a story book feel. As well as this his perfect sets allow him to crate beautifully framed shots, every shot in a Wes Anderson films is special with a tireless amount of work gone into it to make it look perfect. He is often hailed for his perfectly framed shots. His best example of this is the Grand Budapest Hotel, as well as the other Anderson Tropes such as the colour scheme the Grand Budapest Hotel is framed perfectly in every shot, with allot of them being symmetrical and shot straight on. Anderson is known to keep the camera still for most shots, preferring to shoot straight on, many directors avoid this as it doesn't give the film that 3rd dimension it needs to feel real. However Anderson shoots straight on beautifully the way he does it makes the film look like every shot has been set up perfectly almost like a series of paintings giving it that story book feel. Narration is also prominent is his movies as well as stylised and uniformed costumes which help ring the characters to life. As well as this Wes Anderson repeatedly uses the same actors across almost all of his works, for example; Bill Murray, Owen Wilson and Jason Schwartzman feature in most of his films.

Quentin Tarantino 

Tarantino is another director who is widely regarded as an Auteur because of the tropes he uses in each of his films. Often it is easy to identify a Tarantino film. He writes and directs his own movies giving him full creative control over them, he uses this control to craft his masterpieces. He has a talent for dialogue which can be seen in all of his films but especially in; Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs. These films in particular are credited for having great dialogue that doesn't drive the plot of the story but tells us more about the personality of the characters, for example the diner scene at the beginning of Reservoir Dogs helps us understand what kind of relationship all of the characters have with each other, and gives us an early indication of their personality. Another Tarantino trope is homages and little Easter eggs he puts in his films to pay tribute to over pieces of work, he sometimes even reference's another one of his films in the movie. Tarintino loves doing this and only him himself could point out all of the small little movie references he throws in his films. Strong female leads and hyper stylized violence are also featured in a lot of his movies for example both are featured in Kill Bill. The hyper stylisation comes into the film when 'The Bride' fights the 'Crazy 88's' in a black and white fight scene. Graphic violence is another trope he uses, his films are often very blood featuring lots of gore. This can be seen in; Reservoir Dogs, Kill Bill, Pulp Fiction and Inglorious Bastards  just to name a few. He is also technically brilliant at using crane and tracking shots and has a love for music which plays an essential role in his films. Finally Tarantino likes to break his films up into acts or chapters with almost all of his films having title cards between each chapter.

Genre Theory


Genre is defined as a style or category, art forms such as music and films can fit into these category's or genres. Genre theory is the idea that categorising films into genre's can help; producers, directors and distributors produces motion pictures faster and more efficiently by looking at a genre and using other films that fit into the genre as a template or guide on how to make their film. As well as this categorising films into Genres also benefits the audience as they can identify films they like or may want to see based on what the genre of the film is.

Codes and Conventions

All Genres have rules that films need to follow in order to fit into that genre. A genre is like an imaginary contract between producers and consumers as the consumers will expect certain things from films depending on the genre it fits into. However genre texts do not work just by copying other films from that genre instead they add their own contribution to the genre depending on the intentions and creativity of the director.



Genre: Action
Action movies are one of the most popular genres of films today, lots of action films follow the same codes and conventions which make them identifiable as being part of the action genre. For example action films always feature fast paced fight scenes with rapid cutting between shots which is intended to throw the audience off to give them that feeling of uncertainty where they don't know who will win the fight. These types of fight scenes can be found in most actions films, they will almost allows use intense music and lots of cuts when a fight is happening, therefor this is a convention of action films. A great example of this convention is a fight scene from Bourne Identity.Another convention of action films is that in action films the protagonist is usually on one long quest to stop the antagonist as the film progresses the protagonist finds himself in increasingly difficult fights or chase scenes with each one more dangerous than the last. This is to build tension, the director wants to ramp the intensity of the action up right until the climax so that the audience is always on the edge of their seat.

Genre Theory Effect

Producers;

Genre Theory can benefit producers of a film as it helps them to create a template for their film. They can look at other films from the same genre as their own and take what audiences like about them to make their own film successful. Doing this means the producers are guaranteed to have interested in their film from people who are already fans of the genre. For example if a producer was looking to fund and create a new action film, they would look at other films in the genre and use what audiences liked about these films/what made them successful and apply those features to their own film. This means that all films from the same genre tend to be similar and follow certain tropes and traits.

Distributors;

Genre Theory can help distributors and promoters get their film seen as they already have an idea on who their target audiences is based on other films from the genre that their film fits into. This lets distributors use marketing methods that they know will work on their audiences and allows them to advertise places that they know their audiences will see it.

Audience;

Genre Theory may benefit the company behind the film but it also has an effect on the audience. Genres act as labels for films allowing audiences to establish their likes and dislikes for certain genres. For example they may associate a film they do not like (i.e. Die Hard) with the action genre, this would mean that the audience member would be less likely to watch other movies from that genre based on the fact that they would be similar to the movie they disliked and so the audience member would be less likely to like another movie from that genre. It also helps audiences figure out what they like, for example if some one really likes a western they may find them selves watching more westerns because they know that they will like the film from that genre and therefore are not wasting their time watching something that they do not want to watch.