David Bordwell's Call to Arms

Fellow film bloggers and critics take note — contemporary film criticism is failing. At least that's academic and author David Bordwell's opinion in an essay found in the latest issue of Cinema Scope. Entitled Against Insight, it's a piece that will undoubtedly raise eyebrows and perhaps even bruise a few egos. And though it's not quite a polemic for a new criticism, Bordwell doesn't mince words, and there's more than a slight hint of J'accuse throughout the piece. As Bordwell sees it, the problem is widespread, and both the academic and the everyday film critic are responsible for the decline in quality film writing: "In academic venues, it mostly grinds Movie X through Theory Y, in the hope that somehow the exercise will yield political emancipation. Meanwhile, film magazines and free city weeklies promote that self-assured nonconformity which prizes jaunty wordplay and throwaway judgments." While I must confess to not keeping up with the latest academic trends in film criticism, I couldn't agree more with the second sentence, and it's both disheartening and irksome to find that an increasing number of film bloggers have aligned themselves with this approach. (Out of a desire, perhaps, to find work at said newspapers/magazines?) Complaining that most critics have abandoned probing for posturing, Bordwell believes that facts and ideas should lead the way over opinions and insights, which, according to him, stem from the doctrine du jour, though they are rarely given the analysis and investigation they require. Bordwell would like to see film writing "achieve the rigor and lucidity" of a scientific text, or at least be on par with an Auden or Barzun essay on literature. For an essay entitled Against Insight, Bordwell is surprisingly brief in his discussion of insight, which he reduces to little more than a hunch. Yet is it not possible to have genuine insight into a film on some level — be it cultural, social, political — i.e., something tangible, that needn't be speculated on? (I'll have to think about that one.) While I agree with Bordwell that critics who cling to the trite axiom of film as reflection of the zeitgeist is tiresome at best, I disagree with him on the value of opinion. It is precisely for a critic's professional persona (formed by their opinion) that we continue to read them. Of course, opinion must go hand in hand with other factors, including a genuine love of the art, which sadly doesn't always seem to be the case with some critics. However, it's impossible to read a piece by Jonathan Rosenbaum, Jim Hoberman, Manohla Dargis, or Glenn Kenny (to name a few) and not pick up on their unyielding passion for cinema. Sure, I find myself disagreeing with them (often, in some cases), but their opinions are informed by (among other things) the very "sensitivity to history and technique" that Bordwell claims is lacking in film writing. These are the critics who convinced me to see films I'd normally avoid (Dargis with Bee Season, Rosenbaum with Looney Tunes Back in Action) and have caused me, in several cases, to seriously reflect on my own opinion. Is it possible for a critic to convey ideas and information (which Bordwell prefers), without opinion? This once again raises the whole subjective vs. objective argument, as discussed last week. Bordwell ends the piece by stating that nobody is producing the type of film criticism he'd like to see — something that cleverly balances opinions/ideas with factual evidence, historical knowledge of cinema with auteurship, and which simultaneously educates and entertains. Is there truly nobody who satisfies all the criteria? (Feel free to leave suggestions below.) Regardless, it's refreshing to see someone from the inside (for a change) openly addressing a very real and worrisome trend. I've personally had my fill of gifted but vacuous writers who feel legitimized simply because they collect a paycheck. Some of the most interesting, challenging, and simply pleasurable writing on film is stemming from the blogosphere, and perhaps one unexpected outcome of essays such as Bordwell's will be greater recognition of those who are offering more than clever quips, puns, and hollow praise.

Comments

[Filmbrain]

I think we all sense that American film criticism just isn't important anymore in a larger, mainstream vein. But then, neither is mainstream American film.

Good point, TLRHB. And perhaps it would be overkill for a print journo to provide in-depth analysis of Bloodrayne.

Let's face it, the next Pauline Kael will be blogging, not working for The New Yorker. Why should that be viewed as disappointment instead of progress?

Cinephiliac and I were talking about this just last night. If Kael hadn't been writing for The New Yorker, but rather a smaller, less significant weekly mag, would her influence on the future of American film criticism be lessened? I doubt it. Kael was loved (and hated) because she was Kael, not because of the mag she was affiliated with. Yet today, the publication is more important than the individual, and that annoys me to no end. Without naming names, would anybody be listening to what person X had to say if they didn't write for mega-publication Y?

I'm not talking about pullquotes -- we all know why a hollow bit of praise from Publication Y is going to draw more people into the theater than a meaningful one from [insert favorite blogger here]. What angers me is how these people are then considered "subject matter experts", and are invited to speak on panels, moderate discussions with directors, etc. Yet instead of thought-provoking, intelligent (or even relevant) discussion, we get nonsense, gossip, and the same boring, tired questions. (And anybody who was at the NYFF press conference for Sympathy for Lady Vengeance will know exactly what I'm talking about.)

But back to TLRHB's comment -- I think that there's first going to have to be some sort of major change in the blogosphere before that happens. Right now we are all huddled under the same umbrella, at least in the eyes of those outside of the blogosphere. We might as well all be Harry Knowles. Bloggers are perceived as having a lack of accountability, and I've heard this complaint from several professional critics.

How do we get over that hurdle? Or, better yet, do we want to? Are we looking for a greater sense of legitimacy or acceptance, or are we content writing for the people who read us? If, as TLRHB suggests, the future Kael is out there in the blogosphere, how will he/she be recognized as such? Will it take a film scholar, twenty years in the future, combing through blog archives? Or will this person only be legitimized upon receiving a paycheck?

I guess what I'm getting at, in an extremely roundabout way, is that do we (those of us who aren't blogging as a means to an end) need some sort of manifesto? A code of ethics? I've had far too much coffee today to think clearly. . .

[Urbaniak]

Let's face it, the next Pauline Kael will be blogging, not working for The New Yorker.

"Siegfried Kracauer is teh suck!"

[Edward]

A manifesto? That'd be playing into the dissenter's hands.

[Michael Blowhard]

Can I dissent? Along two lines ...

1) I think a lot of writing about film these days is pretty darn sharp. Many mainstream film reviewers these days are a lot better educated and a lot more film-savvy than they were back in, say, the '50s. And a lot of the business coverage is darned good. If the public discussion about film isn't what it might be, I don't think it's the good film reviewers' fault. I think that movies aren't very vital these days, especially in ways that might hit Americans. Many of the young people I know stop going to movies when they get into their mid-20s. Hollywood movies have become kids' stuff -- something to move past. Younger people seem to find the web, music, TV, and videogames much more interesting and exciting than movies.

2) And who cares whether the reviewers are great or not? (Let alone whether the academics are.) They're being undercut by bad movies, and overwhelmed by editorial pressure to run promotional fluff. But at the same time, the web has made it possible to swap tips and compare notes with tons of other bright people. There was a special buzz one got from following Kael and Robin Wood and others. But movies were vital then, and magazines were more open. I'm just as happy to be taking part in the online conversation (if in a different way) as I was reading Kael and Wood ...

[Michael Kerpan]

I think David Bordwell is, by far, the most valuable academic analyst of cinema I've encountered. And his most valuable teaching is that great cinema really demands remarkably intense (and close) attention if one is going to say much about it. There is one problem with this approach, however. At least for me, it is hard to find the time to watch a film so "thoroughly". For my previous piece in "Senses of Cinema" on Ozu's "Passing Fancy" and my upcoming one on "Naruse's "Apart From You" -- I needed to spend over 12 hours in shot-by-shot viewing for each film (and the latter film is barely an hour long). I doubt that I can tackle such intensive scrutiny of a film more than once a year -- but I must admit I learned far more about (and found more to appreciate in) these films than I did during prior "normal" viewings.

[msic]

I agree with Michael Kerpan above. When Bordwell is doing what he does best -- close formal analysis and historicized film poetics -- he can't be beat. His monographs on Ozu, Dreyer, and what I've read so far of the new one on staging, are all marvelous and informative. Where Bordwell is well-nigh useless is in his broadside, argumentatively defective attacks on most film theories besides his. In short, he thinks the use of ideas from continental theory / philosophy in the analysis of cinema is wrongheaded, and that in practice it has become routinized to the point of offering no new knowledge. But it seems to be that in his anti-theory books ("Making Meaning," "On the History of Film Style"), he always intentionally misreads major theorists in order to score his rhetorical points.

Example: his section on the "modernity thesis" in his "Film Style" book (pp 142-147 for those of you playing along at home). He basically misreads Walter Benjamin and his followers as saying that shifts in modernity (city life, mass transit, cinema) physically altered the organ of the eye. (Bordwell derides this as Lamarckian evolution.) In fact, Benjamin's thesis is that the cognitive apparatus of vision (eye, mind, body) all had a lot of new, faster things to cope with, and as a result the way that the eye was trained to function was different in the modern era. People had to learn to process information visually at a faster rate (not unlike claims about the Internet generation today). Isn't this reasonable?

But for Bordwell, such speculative thinking is never of any real value compared to hard facts. I totally value what Bordwell and his followers offer film studies: empirical data about specific films, and the cinema in general, and concrete historical arguments about the development of these styles. But "Grand Theory" (or really, it's philosophy we're talking about here, with some sociology and psychoanalysis) exists to help us weave speculative (read: often unprovable) explanatory narratives for all facets of human life, including the cinema. Humans make meaning; that's what characterizes us. I really don't understand, apart from picayune academic and disciplinary grounds, why Bordwell feels the desire to discard that part of Film Studies (and film criticism for that matter) that intersects with speculative theories about the world. It's part of why we care about cinema in the first place, right?

[Michael Kerpan]

As I understand Bordwell's pique against grand theorists -- he rightly (I think) notes that many of these theorists build their grand edifices on rather flimsy factual foundations. Too much of the support they cite for their theories is based on clear-cut mis-readings/mis-rememberings of the what is actually shown (and "uttered") in the cinematic examples they cite. Bordwell's notion seems to be -- how can the broad theories have value if the supporting evidence is so weak?

[burritoboy]

"empirical data about specific films, and the cinema in general, and concrete historical arguments about the development of these styles."

I don't generally buy Bordwell. He's merely importing Anglo-Saxon myths about science, fact/value distinction and so on from the usual Anglo-Saxon academic culprits (analytical philosophy, science triumphalists, neoclassical economics, etc)and using them to immaturely beat up on cartoon versions of theorists.

[HarryTuttle]

Michael,
Do we need more than these names (Rivette, Sontag, Bazin) to get an idea of the gap of standards he has in mind? They had rigor, insights and pertinence to the matter of cinema, and now criticism has lost this level of quality. Filmbrain, and others here, pointed that Bordwell doesn't demonstrate anything... but maybe it's not his job to engage in a thorough audit of today's criticism. Although, I agree, it would be helpful if someone took on the challenge, and get into specifics we could use as reference and guidelines to evaluate our own writing.
Anybody interested here? We could open a roundtable on the state of criticism and the role of film bloggers. Lots to talk about there!

Girish is so true about the importance of discussion to complete a personal experience of art. The global sharing on the internet goes beyond the neighborhood, as meeting with different national cultures and perspectives/theories of cinema benefit from each other, especially in the informal matter of spontaneous criticism, on the fly, without the education and researches of academics.
Articulating one's opinion of a film is the first step. Interactivity and mutual enrichment really expand the narrow tunnel between the film and our individual affect to a new dimension. And this dimension is accessing the meaning of Art, not as a mere emotional stimulus but an enlightment.

[HarryTuttle]

So many Michaels here... I replied to M. S. Smith in my comment above.

Is there a school of film criticism? I wonder what they teach in film studies... theories and terminology that is quickly unlearnt, because it sounds too elitist to the public. If the array of film concepts and technical vocabulary was a little wider maybe film reviewing would read deeper and less redundant showing a larger variety of "angles of attack" outside the usual formula:
plothole check / production value / cast quibbles / nod to the soundtrack / nod to the cinematographer.

Popular reviewing wants to anihilate the critical jargon, categories and genre labels... which is exactly what studios want! Without complicated critical references one movie can always be taken for what it 's worth, and the good sides highlighted for the fans waiting for a promising pitch.

Serious criticism should stop to review films one by one like consumerist products. Comparative studies is the only standards filmmakers can be held accountable for, if only their own oeuvre.

John Pitts,
Cinema is young indeed, but there is no reason why today's critics should be any less good than ones 40 years earlier. Besides film criticism was not born ex-nihilo, it owes to Drama criticism and Art criticism.
You're right though that there is always one critic to spot an emerging artist of cinema, but the concern is that so many critics swim in familiar waters and are afraid of novelty. This is not excusable in the era of lightspeed information. And the general disinterest for great art films has more tragic consequences such as preventing great filmmakers to find financial backing... films we will never heard about.
Film criticism and theories, like cinema, are evolving all the time. Scholar statements are not cast in stones... We evaluate with what we know today (well some reviewers in the press could update their ideologies coming from the long gone golden age of star system and plot-movies)

Filmbrain,
you make a good point about filmmakers interviewed on promotional venues like TV and gossip magazines instead of cinema-related criticism. Are there filmmakers out there who feel cheated by this PR deal? Wouldn't they want to be interviewed by someone who actually understood what he meant to put in the film? Are there bloggers who get enough "mediatic relevance" to be able to interview some major figures?
If bloggers will never compete with the audience/readership influence, it's on the content depth, unlimited time and length that TV/press cannot offer them that bloggers should bet.

The manifesto idea is tempting.

[Filmbrain]

The global sharing on the internet goes beyond the neighborhood, as meeting with different national cultures and perspectives/theories of cinema benefit from each other, especially in the informal matter of spontaneous criticism, on the fly, without the education and researches of academics.

Harry -- this is an excellent point, and one that deserves greater consideration and exploration. It's still too soon to tell the long-term effects (if any) that the internet and blogging will have on film criticism. Yet all of us are building archives of conversations that are, as you say, made up of voices from all corners of the globe, with different educational, social, economic (etc.), backgrounds. Will these conversations outlast us? As the net grows larger, will they still be around for future generations to Google (or whatever it is they'll be using)? Will somebody one day study the links (literal, figurative, and HTML) between Girish, HarryTuttle, and Matt Clayfield (for example)? Or to one day trace the roots of the phenomenon that found critics worldwide writing about a particular film or filmmaker on a particular day?

The spontaneity you mention is a key factor -- for not only is film criticism changing from uni- to bidirectional, it's now happening in (almost) real-time.

[Also, Harry, is that Leo Charney article you mentioned in the L'Enfer post online anywhere?]

[Filmbrain]

Harry (again) -

To answer a few questions from your last post -- I do believe that when a filmmaker is sitting in front of an audience (s)he would prefer to have a moderator that knows what they were talking about. Someone like Kent Jones is really the ideal. He raises excellent points/questions on his own, but also leaves plenty of room for the audience. Yet far too often it's hosted by somebody whose knowledge of the film and filmmaker is limited to what was found in the press kit.

As for bloggers, well, though I certainly don't have any "mediatic relevance" (great expression!), I was honored to have been asked to sit on a panel with three prominent directors at the NY Korean Film Festival. My feeling is that we might start seeing more of this.

The manifesto idea is tempting, though I'm honestly of two minds about it.

[HarryTuttle]

I read the Leo Charney article in print (for once!), it's in the canadian revue CiNéMAs (1996, vol. 6 - N° 2/3), "Common People with Common Feelings" : Pauline Kael, James Agee, and the Public Sphere of Popular Film Criticism", unfortunately it's not part of the few online issues. Maybe I'll quote some parts if we get a roundtable somewhere.

I'm confident the blogs will eventually get the attention of academics (like Matt Clayfield studies vblog!), isn't there an whole internet archive backup?
What worries me is the multitude and chaos of online publishing and search queries. If you want a blogathon you just have to google your topic and you get thousands of more or less relevant articles... the problem is the selection within a reasonable time. With press you know what you get from the cover. Internet is a time waste machine limbo.
A good example of the development of the specific nature of an online critical community is the Wikipedia project (it's live, self-critical, supervized, multi-headed, updated daily, organic, self-alimented, free, public domain). A cinema form of this would be awesome.

Your blog seems to get quite a "mediatic relevance" if we consider this ;)
And you were invited at this film bloggers panel too (last november?)
For instance, what is the presence of Korean filmmakers in the american press outside of the big blogbusters? It's their interest to conquer a niche, maybe through blogs if the networks don't want them. Especially since DVDs can be ordered online, the film lover who read about an unreleased film is not dependent on local distributors to distribute it. The global DVD market will give more power to blogger who are instaneously reactive (Studios and press have editorial delays).

I was thinking written interviews published online. Bloggers are not tied to the marketing schedule and can focus on filmmakers who are not busy with an ongoing promotional trail. Bloggers don't have to worry about pleasing sponsors or audience. In return I guess the filmmakers would want their interview to reach enough people... that's the problem.

Yes, the manifesto sounds too academic/formal, but asserting the specific assets of blogs and the mischievous examples of print criticism would help strenghen the blogger identity.

[msic]

Michael Kerpan wrote:

"As I understand Bordwell's pique against grand theorists -- he rightly (I think) notes that many of these theorists build their grand edifices on rather flimsy factual foundations."

Well, if we're talking about misreadings or poorly fact-checked examples from the films themselves, then sure. That's fair game to debunk. But there can also be useless oneupmanship and dick-measuring in academe that obscures the value of the larger points.

Bazin made factual errors, like citing Eisenstein's three-shot standing stone lion to OCTOBER instead of POTEMKIN. But he didn't have video, plus, it didn't really effect his analysis. If citing a continuity error or a plot hole in a film seems like a cheap shot (and in most cases it is, unless it demonstrates a pattern of overall apathy on the part of the filmmaker), why should it matter if provocative ideas emerge from "productive misreadings" of films?

Also, there's the whole question of "arguing in different registers," and what counts as evidence for the research-program at hand. You will never be able to "prove" that Freud was right about the existence of the unconscious, for example, because really, psychoanalysis is less a science than a philosophical narrative about desire. As such, it may provide compelling explanations for a number of social phenomena, including cinema. To hold it to a standard of evidence of the sort Bordwell demands doesn't make sense.

And Bordwell knows this. His main argument for his method is that it is modest, only claiming what can be proven empirically and historically. That's fine. I just don't see why this necessitates throwing out the so-called Grand Narratives of theory. One doesn't have to necessarily apply Theory in a doctrinaire, cookie-cutter fashion. It can be supple. But Bordwell tends to take the worst examples of the practice (i.e., what goes on in grad school) and hold them up as emblematic. That's like judging "The Cinema" by sophomore-year student videos.

[James]

"Can I admit that I've never even heard of Bordwell before this discussion began? I'm sure he makes some legitimate points, but I agree with the above poster who says his writing is so weak in and of itself that it casts doubt on his ability to make value judgements about other critics."

You are basing this judgement on a ONE page mini op-ed piece in a magazine? Seriously, Bordwell has written an ENTIRE book on the subject of film criticism called "Making Meaning" which is very detailed as well as a dozen other books and he is by far the best academic scholar of film. His writing is consistently clear, informed and intelligent. Go to his website and read his online essays at least before you pass judgement on his writing especially as you've never even heard of him. He is also a very kind, humble, and generous man unlike so many other academics I've encountered.

Btw, speaking of Leo Charney, who I also know, Leo has said to me that not only is Bordwell our great film scholar, but really the only film academic worth studying with despite the fact that Leo has written the kind of scholarship that Bordwell often criticizes. Of course, Bordwell is now unfortunately retired from teaching.

I have nothing but positive things to say about Bordwell and if you spent all of your time around academics like I do you'd realize what an amazing breath of fresh air and sanity Bordwell represents. I don't always fully agree with him, but he has my undying support.

[HarryTuttle]

For whoever interested in this article of Leo Charney I cited above, check these few quotes here.

[Ben]

Before everyone who tries to pass judgement on Bordwell, may I suggest people go reading his books or writings from his website. All he wants is for people to base film criticism more on facts than just opinions. All the clever word plays and puns get tiresome and the over reliance of interpretation or "making meaning" indicates the critics are sometimes not doing their homework. Sontag was right, "against interpretation," indeed. I agree with James that Professor Bordwell is a kind and humble man who is far from having any elitist attitude towards his readers. I had the good fortune of meeting him at a post-viewing discussion (Tati's"Play Time") at a local cinematheques and he couldn't be more generous in sharing ideas and recommendations for films. As formal as he can be in his writing he can talk with the enthusiasm of a fanboy - his book on Hong Kong cinema dispel the notion that he's always serious. I once wrote him an email anonymously about Hou Hsiao-Hsien and he actually took the time to write back with his ideas. I honestly don't think he was addressing his CinemaScope piece at bloggers or intended to step on any toes on bloggers. Go read his writings. You might like it and if you don't, read again - just like film viewing. And if you still don't like it, it's ok, too.

Re: "Let's face it, the next Pauline Kael will be blogging, not working for The New Yorker."

The world has already too many Pauline Kaels without the internet. Film criticism would be healthier if we have less Kael clones. How'bout the next Manny Farber?

[professional essay writers]

burritoboy, I totally agree. They didn't sound too convincing for me. I think he should follow your advice