The Films of Eric Rohmer : French New Wave to Old Master

Jean-Louis Trintignant) 6.1 "Wife à la Degas" 6.2 "Mistress à la Ingres" 6.3 "Master of the Frame" 6.4 "Caught in a Frame" 8.1 The slightly melancholic Isabelle (Marie Rivière) in Conte d'automne (1998) 10.1 The hands of Jacqueline (Claudine Soubrier) and the law student (Barbet Schroeder) 10.2 Daniel (Daniel Pommereulle) and Adrien (Patrick Bauchau) 12.1 Peripheral Construction Site, El Dorado, in Métamorphoses 12.2 Métamorphoses, industrial materials montage 12.3 "The lowest degree of beings" in Contemplations 14.1 Sabine (Béatrice Romand) and Clarisse (Arielle Dombasle) walk the cobblestone streets, Le Beau mariage (1982) 16.1 La Bruyère reading Descartes 16.2 Perspectival drawing in La Bruyère 16.3 The King in the chapel in La Bruyère This volume has benefited from the support of many people. I would like to thank firstly all of the writers who contributed their good work. André Aciman and Jerry W. Carlson, contributors to this book, shared their deep appreciation for this filmmaker in a team-taught graduate course on Rohmer's films that I was so lucky to have taken. Other volume contributors have far surpassed the work normally expected of them, especially Derek Schilling, who offered his encouragement and feedback over several years. The volume could not have existed without him. Noël Herpe was also extremely supportive well above and beyond writing his own chapter, and his volume, Rohmer et les autres (Presses Universitaires de Rennes, 2007), has been an inspiration as well as a resource. Many friends and colleagues provided invaluable feedback Front Matter....Pages i-viii Introduction....Pages 1-5 Eric Rohmer and Me....Pages 7-19 Front Matter....Pages 21-21 Eric Rohmer and the Legacy of Cinematic Realism....Pages 23-31 Practicing What He Preaches? Continuities and Discontinuities in Rohmer’s Early Film Criticism and His Conte d’automne ....Pages 33-47 Ma Nuit chez Maud and the Moral Imagination: Rhymes, Symmetries, and Variations on an Ethical Theme....Pages 49-62 Front Matter....Pages 63-63 The Fall into Words: From Contes des quatre saisons to L’Anglaise et le Duc ....Pages 65-72 Eric Rohmer’s Magnetic Fluid....Pages 73-88 Imagination and Grace: Rohmer’s Contes des quatre saisons ....Pages 89-99 Auteur Meets Genre: Rohmer and the Rom-Com....Pages 101-113 Front Matter....Pages 115-115 Rohmer/Politics: From Royalism to Ecology....Pages 117-130 On the Class Character of Desire: Romantic Heroics in the Contes moraux ....Pages 131-146 Rohmer’s Realism: Women on the Border of What Is and What Might Be....Pages 147-158 Front Matter....Pages 159-159 The Changing Landscape and Rohmer’s Temptation of Architecture....Pages 161-175 Walking in the City: Paris in the Films of Eric Rohmer....Pages 177-190 Rohmer’s Poetics of Placelessness....Pages 191-201 Front Matter....Pages 203-203 Eric Rohmer, Historiographer....Pages 205-214 Eric Rohmer’s Talking Heads: Listening to the Classical Text in La Bruyère ....Pages 215-228 Triple Agent: Eric Rohmer and the Tumult of the Interwar Years....Pages 229-241 Back Matter....Pages 243-254 Cover 1 Title 4 Copyright 5 Contents 6 List of Figures 8 Acknowledgments 9 Introduction 10 1 Eric Rohmer and Me 16 PART I: Rohmer: Critic and Philosopher 29 2 Eric Rohmer and the Legacy of Cinematic Realism 30 3 Practicing What He Preaches? Continuities and Discontinuities in Rohmer’s Early Film Criticism and His Conte d’automne 39 4 Ma Nuit chez Maud and the Moral Imagination: Rhymes,Symmetries, and Variations on an Ethical Theme 54 PART II: Narration, Frames, Genres 68 5 The Fall into Words: From Contes des quatre saisons toL’Anglaise et le Duc 69 6 Eric Rohmer’s Magnetic Fluid 77 7 Imagination and Grace: Rohmer’s Contes des quatre saisons 93 8 Auteur Meets Genre: Rohmer and the Rom-Com 104 PART III: Politics, Gender, and Class 117 9 Rohmer/Politics: From Royalism to Ecology 118 10 On the Class Character of Desire: Romantic Heroics in the Contes moraux 132 11 Rohmer’s Realism: Women on the Border of What Is andWhat Might Be 148 PART IV: Architecture, Places, and Space 160 12 The Changing Landscape and Rohmer’s Temptation of Architecture 161 13 Walking in the City: Paris in the Films of Eric Rohmer 176 14 Rohmer’s Poetics of Placelessness 190 PART V: Adapting History and Literature 201 15 Eric Rohmer, Historiographer 202 16 Eric Rohmer’s Talking Heads: Listening to theClassical Text in La Bruyère 212 17 Triple Agent: Eric Rohmer and the Tumult of the Interwar Years 226 Notes on Contributors 239 Index 243 Eric Rohmer was a key figure in French New Wave cinema. Contributors to this volume revisit, complicate, and upend accepted readings and interpretations of perennial Rohmerian topics including the important role of language in his films, the influence of the arts, depictions of gender and class, and the roles played by space and place in his films. Eric Rohmer was a key figure in French New Wave cinema. His death in 2010 sparked renewed interest in his diverse body of works that span films, criticism, and television work. Contributors to this volume - a mix of well-known and younger scholars of cinema - visit, revisit, complicate, and at times upend accepted readings and interpretations of perennial Rohmerian topics including the important role of language in his films, the influence of the arts, depictions of gender and class, and the roles played by space and place in his films