Includes bibliographical references (pages 468-473) and index
pt. 1: The invention of motion pictures and the silent era of film -- France at the turn of the twentieth century -- The invention of the cinématographe -- George Méliès and the adventure of the film studio -- Growth of a national cinema: Charles Pathé and Léon Gaumont -- The invention of genres: Louis Feuillade and Max Linder -- Avant-garde cinema, French impressionism, and surrealism: Louis Delluc, Abel Gance, Marcel L'Herbier, Luis Buñuel, and René Clair -- pt. 2: The golden age of French cinema -- The style of the 1930s --The "talkies" -- French cinema and economic recession -- Verbal cinema or filmed language? Marcel Pagnol -- Beyond filmed theater: toward poetic realism -- Artists and masters of poetic realism: Jean Gabin, Arletty, Marcel Carné, Jean Renoir, and Jean Vigo -- Cinematography and the poetics of images -- pt. 3: French cinema of the occupation -- France in 1940 -- The exodus of French cinema celebrities -- French cinema and Vichy -- Propaganda and censorship: the case of Henri-Georges Clouzot -- Working conditions under the occupation: Marcel Carné -- Resistance and liberation -- pt. 4: The postwar era -- The fourth republic and postwar France -- The Blum-Byrnes agreements -- The prestige of French cinema or cinema of prestige? Jean Cocteau -- A certain tradition de qualité -- Comedy à la française: Claude Autant-Lara -- Film noir or film d' ambiance: Henri-Georges Clouzot, Jacques Becker, and René Clément -- Toward a new cinema: Robert Bresson, Jacques Becker, and René Clément -- pt. 5: The years of the French new wave -- France during and after the events of 1958 -- The signs of change: Louis Malle -- Les cahiers due cinéma and the Auteur theory -- The emergence of the new wave: Claude Chabrol, François Truffaut, Alain Resnais, Jean-Luc Godard, and Agnés Varda -- The return of commercial movie successes -- pt. 6: French cinema of the 1970s -- May '68: a new cultural era -- Economic assessment of the French cinema -- The "scandal" of the Cinémathèque française -- Political cinema as a new genre: Louis Malle, Joseph Losey, and Costa-Gavras -- The last days of the French polar: Jean-Pierre Melville and Henri Verneuil -- The humanists' school: Claude Sautet, François Truffaut, and Eric Rohmer -- The storytellers: Bertrand Blier and Bertrand Tavernier -- pt. 7: The cinema of the 1980s -- France is the 1980s -- French cinema of the 1980s: over one thousand films produced -- Transformations in the French film industry -- A new partner: television -- The old school of filmmakers: François Truffaut, Bertrand Tavernier, Bertrand Blier, and Maurice Pialat -- The super productions: Claude Berri and Jean-Jacques Annaud -- New directors for a new generation: Jean-Jacques Beineix and Luc Besson -- The rebirth of popular comedies: Coline Serreau and Claude Zidi -- pt. 8:The last decade and beyond -- French society in the 1990s -- The improving health of French cinema -- A unique financial-aid system -- French television -- French cinema abroad -- New artists, new creators: Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Marc Caro -- The epics: Régis Wargnier and Claude Berri -- Period dramas: Patrice Chéreau, Alain Corneau, Jean-Paul Rappeneau, and Patrice Leconte -- The return of comedies at the box office: Jean-Marie Poiré and Francis Veber -- The new French cinema: Le jeune cinéma: Mathieu Kassovitz and Eric Zonca -- The digital revolution and the high-definition system: Pitof
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"To a great extent, the story of French filmmaking is the story of moviemaking. From the earliest flickering images of the late nineteenth century as well as the many important technical innovations - which in France sometimes preceded, and often paralleled, the work of Edison and early British, German, and Russian inventors and artists - through the silent era, the Surrealist influence, the Nazi Occupation, the glories of the New Wave, on into the 1990s and beyond, Remi Lanzoni examines a large number of the world's most beloved films against the backdrop of their often turbulent times." "A final chapter considers the increasingly competitive business dynamic of contemporary French filmmaking as well as French television, the digital and high-definition revolution, and all the latest artistic and popular trends. This sweeping history is further enhanced by some ninety stills and other artwork, including rare, archival photographs of the personalities who have created, and still do, a grand international tradition."--Jacket