Review

Reviewed Work(s): Realism and the Cinema by Christopher Williams

Review by: Robert Stam
Source: Film Quarterly, Vol. 35, No. 4 (Summer, 1982), pp. 41-43
Published by: University of California Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1212101
Accessed: 18-04-2018 22:05 UTC

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Straub/Huillet's
Straub/Huillet's filmsfilms
as attempts
as attempts
to bring to
to bring toREALISM
REALISM AND THE
ANDCINEMA
THE CINEMA
the film spectator the same alienation effect
sought by Brecht for the theater spectator. Edited
Edited by Christopher
by Christopher
Williams. London:
Williams.
Routledge and
London:
Kegan Paul,Routledge
1980. and Kegan Paul, 1980.

Needless to say, such an uncompromising

position by these film-makers has resulted in Christopher
Christopher Williams's
Williams's
critical anthology
critical
pre- anthology pre
broad attacks from a number of directions. sents
sentsthe the
writings
writings
of more than
ofa score
more of critics
than a score of critic
The classic distribution-exhibition structure and
andfilmmakers-from
filmmakers-from
Sergei Eisenstein
Sergei
to Eisenstein t
does not recognize the validity of these filmsJean-Louis Comolli-who have addressed
and often levels charges of incompetence atthemselves to the vexed question of cinematic
its creators (see Godard's statements on Les realism. Although the book performs a real
Carabiniers in Godard on Godard). The purelyservice by compiling a number of excellent
formalist avant-garde whose interests lie out-articles, including many that had not been
side political concerns denounces the radical readily accessible to Anglo-American readers,
content and form of these films while continu- and although Williams's commentary is not
ing to support a myth of uncommitted artists. unintelligent, it is marred by serious problems
Political film-makers whose work stays at the of format and conception. The whirlwind tour
level of content, rejecting the need for revolu- of this challenging subject leaves the reader
tionary form, dismiss them as individualistic bewildered, feeling rather like a stranger lost
experiments and raise charges of subjectivism, in the suburbs of a sprawling megalopolis and
the same charges which were levelled at Eisen- desperately searching for a center.
stein and which led to his forced abandonment The book's basic organizational map, first
of experimentation. But the line is unflagging. of all, is somewhat baffling. The title of the
Walsh admits that Straub/Huillet's films, first chapter-"Realist Positions"-leads us
Schoenberg's music and Brecht's theater can- to expect a contrasting "Anti-Realist Posi-
not be seen as "populist." In essence, the film- tions," but instead we are given "Discussions
maker must not concede to dominant form of Flaherty." The titles of the last two chapters
simply because this form will allegedly reach-"Forms and Ideologies" and "Aesthetics
more people. and Technology"-seem hopelessly vague. Why,
It must also be said that the essays in this we wonder, are "Aesthetics and Technology"
volume are readings of works which consciouslygrouped together, and why at the end rather
see themselves within this Brechtian theoreticalthan the beginning of the book? The dizzying
position. While many film reviews attempt to effect of this erratic itinerary is compounded
"save" certain films by invoking Brechtian by a constant shuttling back and forth in
theories, many of these attempts are but pan- time-from a sixties Cinethique text to twen-
dering to the concepts and in fact act as a co-ties Epstein, from thirties Grierson to the Soviet
optation of Brecht's very theories. Thus a need twenties-which induces a kind of temporal
emerges for a constant shifting of actualizationjetlag in the reader. Williams offers us neither
of these theories in relationship to dominantstraightforward chronology nor an intelligent
film-making. mapping out of problematic terms such as:
The group of essays makes for pleasant read- "realism," "naturalism," "illusionism," "crit-
ing. Walsh's style is accessible and his discus-ical realism," "socialist realism." Instead, the
sion of Brecht never too ephemeral. The onlyreader, more confused at the end than at the
sour note, the price tag. People have mentioned beginning, loses all sense of the intellectual
the unusually high prices of the BFI series, topography.
which might be attributed to its distributor in At times Realism and the Cinema seems less
the US. Whatever the reason, the $14.50 pricean anthology than an essay in which the quoted
tag seems a little steep. passages are unusually lengthy. Since the type-
-FABRICE ZIOLKOWSKI face used for the quoted authors is irritatingly
similar to that used for Williams's commen-
tary, we often lose track of exactly who is
speaking. The selections themselves seem some-
what arbitrary, and their length often bears
little proportion to their relevance. Bazin's
"William Wyler, or the Jansenist of Mise-en-

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 Scene" is quoted at great length, but not "On- idea that Marxism is traditionally hostile to the
tology of the Photographic Image" or "The cinema would come as a surprise to Lenin and
Evolution of Film Language." Eisenstein, not to mention Pudovkin, Bela
There are other lacunae. Since the discus- Balazs, and Fidel Castro.
sion of realism antedates the cinema, the book Despite these flaws, Realism and the Cinema
might usefully have included or at least cited is not without value. Many selections-Colin
such classic literary discussions of realism as MacCabe on the classic realist text, Patrick
Auerbach on "the representation of reality," Ogle on the technological supports of realism,
Lukacs on "typicality," Jakobson on "progres- Comolli on direct cinema-are brilliant and
sive realism" and Barthes on the "reality-effect." informative. And Williams himself offers valid
The total absence of women writers, mean- insights along the way, even if that way itself
while, contributes to an atmosphere of Hawks- perpetually threatens to detour into irrele-
ian male camaraderie, as if both realism and vance. He makes a useful distinction between
film theory were exclusively masculine do- the naive realism of Grierson and Zavattini,
mains. Without proposing either tokenism or who come close to denying conventions or pre-
quotas, we can speculate that Suzanne Langer tending they do not exist, and the more sophis-
on film and dream, Constance Penley on "The ticated realists like Eisenstein, Vertov and
Avant-Garde and its Imaginary," and Claire Bazin who are aware of cinematic mediation.
Johnston on "Womens' Cinema as Counter Both share a commitment to truth: "The most
Cinema" would have been as relevant as most committed realists call on some idea of aesthe-
of the articles included. The absence of the tics; the anti-realists are anti-realist because
work of Christian Metz, finally, both from his they believe it is more truthful, in one sense
earlier "Bazinian" period of "On the Impres- or another, to be so."
sion of Reality" and from the later Language Williams also rejects the simplistic equation,
and Cinema, seriously mars the anthology. so fashionable in the late sixties, of "anti-
The later work, especially, could take the dis- illusionist" and "politically progressive," an
cussion to a higher plane since it argues that equation that led to the bizarre leftist blessing
all films-realist, anti-realist, fiction, docu- of insufferable deconstructed bores like Medi-
mentary-are cinematically, esthetically, and terranehe on the one hand and the reflexive
culturally coded artifacts rather than simulacra pranks of Jerry Lewis on the other. He equally
of the real world.
discards the obverse notion, argued by Roland
The books's discussion of Brecht is similarly Barthes and others, that realism, no matter
myopic. Williams laments that "Brecht did not how progressive its intentions, is irremediably
have enough interest in film to think his ideas bourgeois. (The case of the arch-mimeticist
through very far." Brecht did think through Balzac, from whom Marx learned more than
his ideas on the theater, however, and those from "all the historians, economists and statis-
ideas inspired film-makers as diverse as Nagisa ticians put together," shows that realism is not
Oshima, Jean-Luc Godard, and Glauber necessarily reactionary, while reflexive self-
Rocha, not to mention animated discussionmocking TV commercials demonstrate that
in the pages of innumerable film journals. anti-illusionism per se is not intrinsically pro-
Williams accuses Brecht of taking "the tradi-gressive.) The question of realism and anti-
tional Marxist view that [cinema] is a drug, realism,
a Williams points out, is not one of
permanent seduction of the working class away"strictly opposed polarities, glaring at each
from their true interests"-a statement which
other across unfathomable aesthetic and polit-
simultaneously caricatures both Brecht and
ical divides" but rather one of interpenetrating
Marxism. In fact, Brecht had a lifelong enthus-and mutually nourishing opposites. He also
iasm for the cinema. He used film fragments scores a certain pseudo-Brechtianism that
within his theatrical presentations, and drew
equates distanciation with a lack of pleasure:
inspiration from Eisenstein and Chaplin in the "The pleasures that narrative provides need to
formulation of his notions of epic theater. Hebe recognized, and indeed shifted toward the
scripted Kuhle Wampe and certainly did not centre of discussion rather than deplored or
regard the cinema as intrinsically narcotic,condescended to."
although he might have regarded a certain Realism and the Cinema as a whole, unfor-
cinema as functioning in that way. And the tunately, does not maintain the level of its
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 best
bestinsights.
insights.
The main
Theproblem
main problem
derives from
derives from
lengthy
lengthy essay,
essay,
in whichinhewhich
surveys the
he entire
surveys the en
Williams's
Williams's somewhat
somewhat
passive methodology:
passive methodology:
historical
historicaltrajectory
trajectory
of thinking
ofabout
thinking
films about f
"The method of this book is to take a number and
anddreams,
dreams,and describes
and describes
how many different
how many differ
of, I hope, fairly representative statements by film-makers and schools have used dream-like
filmmakers, critics and theoreticians, and to film styles. It is clear, from the interest stirred
place them side by side so as to bring out their up by Kinder's journal Dreamworks, that the
similarities and contradictions." This minimal issues here (for film and for other arts) are
montage of theories betrays the same mimetic lively ones. What neither Petric's introduction
fallacy criticized elsewhere in the book-the nor any of the individual articles quite does,
naive neorealist or cinema verite faith that one however, is to bring into sharp focus what I
need only register phenomena in their diversitytake to be the central issue in the new under-
for the truth to emerge. This intellectual passivitystandings of the dream process being urged by
is echoed by a weary and listless tone, as if the people like Hobson. Unless I misunderstand
author himself were tired of pondering thetheir position, these researchers have estab-
issues raised. Our guide through the quag-lished that the neural machinery automatically
mires of cinematic realism, we come to suspect,throws up a mass of random, jumpy imagery.
is neither completely in control of his subject The "work" part of the dreamwork lies in the
nor terribly excited about his chosen territory. brain's effort to integrate this imagery into the
-ROBERT STAM semi-coherent patterns we actually experience
subjectively. So far, however, there seems to be
no workable theory of how this integrating
FILM AND DREAMS
process actually operates. It is easy, of course,
An Approach to Bergman to sympathize with Hobson's desire to escape
Edited by Vlada Petric. South Salem, NY: Redgrave, 1981. the symbol-mythology and repression-spotting
of Freudian interpretation. But it's one thing
Of all modern film-makers, Bergman is that
to say thesomebody else's mechanism doesn't
most attuned to the dreamlife and related
work,psy-
and quite another to propose a mechanism
chological phenomena, so it's not hard todoes.
that ima-One reason the matter is of electric
gine a whole book devoted to the dream aspects
interest to film people is that the process, what-
of his work. But this collection of essays,
everderiv-
it is, must curiously parallel the work a
ign from a 1978 conference at Harvard, actually
film viewer does in integrating the material
has a number of different foci. In its pages by
presented a successive shots, and not only in
relatively hard-line Freudian interpretation ofmontage context that Petric empha-
the dense
the dreams in Wild Strawberries (by Jacob
sizes. We know that viewers must learn to
Zelinger) can sit beside Allan Hobson's formu-
"read" the conventions by which film-makers
lation, based on neurophysiological link
studies,
disparate shots. It may be that we also
which utterly denies all Freudian dream mech-
have to learn to dream. The problem is prob-
anisms in Bergman or in real dreams either.
ably more difficult than the dramatic-explica-
There are also several articles, such as Marsha
tion problem Freud and his followers took it
Kinder's complex piece, tracing parallels be-
to be. But pretending it's solved, or isn't there,
tween the different phases of dreaming sleep
will not profit us much.
and film structures: in this case, the opening -ERNEST CALLENBACH
sequence of Persona. Other articles explore
dreamlike aspects of one or another Bergman TOWARD A STRUCTURAL
film. Also included are an account of an exper-
PSYCHOLOGY OF CINEMA
iment at the conference by Dusan Makavejev,
By John M. Carroll. The Hague and New York: Mouton, 1980.
who spliced end to end a series of nonverbal
sequences from Bergman films, and an acute curious to know what contribution
Anyone
explication of Makavejev's much maligned transformational-generative grammar can
Sweet Movie by Stanley Cavell. Theremake are to
even
film study is strongly encouraged to
a couple of articles on insanity andread psycho-
this book. The book will not provide the
pathology in Bergman. final answer but it gives enough of an indica-
This multi-ring intellectual circus is tion
presided
to either whet or satisfy most readers'
over by Vlada Petric through hiscuriosity.
opening

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