An Introduction to French Cinema: It's Hard to Get Aquainted

So, I'm yet to start this series because I'm yet to find a decent guide to help me along. My plan of attack is to watch some things in a historically chronological order, whilst also watching some contemporary stuff at the same time.

Problem is, I've not idea where to begin. There's an awesome-looking book on Book Depository called Studying French Cinema, but it's still three weeks away from release. So I'll have to wait on that one. I've looked at a couple of others such as French Cinema by Charles Drazin, but one review I read said that he sort of gives up on giving films made after 1959 (ie, after Luc Godard's Breathless) the attention they deserve. So that sort of doesn't work for me, because I'd like a book that thoroughly covers both old and new history. Especially new, because the broad Film History book I have right now has a decent amount of French film beginnings ... but it's pretty hefty reading and I'm only up to 1912 or something, so mentions of accessible French titles has so far been scarce.

I went into Newtown today in hopes that some of the bookshops that import from overseas would have something I could purchase, but in four shops I only found one second-hand book, and it was about comparing French films with their American remakes and studying the influence that the French film industry has on America. So that was no good.

It frustrates me how difficult it is to get books about the history of other countries here. Like, as if I want to read about Australian history (film or otherwise)! Who does that? It's no wonder bookshops here are failing and people are buying more things online. I can't find anything I want in an actual shop. Trying to find research material for Eloquence was (and still is) a bit of a nightmare; when looking for specific British history one can find only broad world history books or general overviews of the history of Britain, which isn't helpful because that means I'm buying a book for $30 and only getting like $5 of relevant reading material. So again, most of my books on the 19th-century have arrived in the mailbox from the UK. Obviously, when I go there I will be taking an empty suitcase and buying books.

As for film sections themselves, most of the space is taken up by Hollywood (obviously) with a few dodgy-looking titles about Australian film or about one specific person like Martin Scorcese (who is awesome, but in this case irrelevant).

So, this series will continue with content that is ACTUALLY ABOUT A MOVIE ... later on. Once I work out what the heck I'm doing. Meanwhile, I'm going to watch Public Enemies and pretend I'm cultured because Marion Cotillard is in the movie. Hehe.

P.S When I was in Newtown today there was a big crew of 30+ people shooting some kind of short film or a show. I stood around like a lost idiot and watched them for a bit, but they were all busy and I couldn't really ask them what was going on. I imagined they were from Sydney Film School, even though I knew they couldn't be because the crew was too big and very professional. Moral of this story: I'm excited for film school to start. One more month!

French Cinema

I know, I know. I need to start blogging regularly again! I've been dying to but I've been kinda lacking on the content front. So now, I have a topic. Thus I am blogging now to remind myself of said topic so that I  remember to research it and write about it. 


French Cinema. 


Currently, my experience of French Cinema extends only as far as French actresses in Hollywood films (Marion Cotillard, Mélanie Laurent), Le Voyage dans la lune (A Trip to the Moon) by George Méliès,  À bout de souffle (Breathless) by Jean Luc-Godard, and The Artist, by Michel Hazanavicius.


All of this experiences have been rather incredible, actually. So I have come to the conclusion that the French know what they're doing when it comes to film (well, I ought to know that, seeing as France is home to only the most prestigious film festival on the planet). Therefore, I have decided to begin a blog series which shall be entitled An Introduction To French Cinema. So while I learn about all this amazing stuff, you can learn too!


One reason I'm choosing France over any other place in the world to begin my foreign film exploration is because France is probably the most important to the film industry. The film industry was basically born in France and the cinematograph was invented there, so quite obviously there's a lot of history to explore. I bought this book called Film History: An Introduction, and it's quite amazing and I plan to read it cover-to-cover, no matter how long that takes. It's got loads in there about French cinema among other industries, of course. 


Anyways! By publishing this post I have now committed to this project ... I'm not really sure exactly what I'm doing, so I guess it'll be a nice little adventure. Wish me luck :)