# Challenging the Auteur Theory **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 13, 2006, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562 "2006-09-13T17:00:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Rodgers01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b19c9b/32.png) [@Rodgers01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rodgers01)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2006, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/1 "2006-09-13T17:00:21Z")
Caught this little snippet in Peter Bogdanovich’s IMDB [bio](http://imdb.com/name/nm0000953/bio) (which is very interesting in its own right – guy’s led an interesting life): > [@](#): > > Viewing Daisy Miller alongside The Last Picture Show should be a standard part of the film school curriculum as it tends to debunk the auteur theory. Bogdanovich’s career gives truth to the contention that film is an industrial process and each movie has many “authors,” not just one (the director). If the auteur theory were true, Bogdanovich arguably would have returned to form eventually and produced more good films, if not another masterpiece. What do you think of this? When picking out what movies I’m going to watch, I’m more likely going to look at who directed it than who starred in it, shot it, scored it, etc., so I guess I subscribe to the auteur theory. And generally it works: if I rent a movie by Alfred Hitchcock or Howard Hawks or Martin Scorsese or Preston Sturges, there’s a pretty good chance I’m going to see a good movie. Oh, all of these guys have directed duds, but they’re usually at least _interesting_ duds. And often their good movies can span a whole career, with a lot of different work crews: some of Alfred Hitchcock’s early British movies are among his very best, even though he’d never met or worked with Cary Grant, Jimmy Stewart, Bernard Herrmann, or John Michael Hayes. The point is that Alfred Hitchcock seems to be the key element here, supporting the auteur theory. But then how do you explain the one-hit wonders, the directors who make one or two (or even three or four) great movies, and then make nothing good for the rest of their careers? How do you explain Peter Bogdanovich’s decline? How does Francis Ford Coppola go from making “The Godfather” and “The Conversation” to making “Jack” and “The Rainmaker”? So does the auteur theory work, or not? Or is the system big enough to accommodate both views? ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2006, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/2 "2006-09-13T17:47:00Z")
I tend to think all the really good stuff is auteured and that collaborations water things down (can you name a single great novel, play, symphony or painting that was the result of a collaboration?) but one exception I would make is for comedy. I think comedy is something that lends itself better to ensembles and collective input (especially improvisational contributions) than to a single minded vision. Christopher Guest’s movies, for example, are the result of a talented ensemble with a lot of chemistry and improv chops rather than scripts or visions. ---
**Author:** ![Rodgers01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b19c9b/32.png) [@Rodgers01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rodgers01)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2006, 6:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/3 "2006-09-13T18:06:14Z")
[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic] (can you name a single great novel, play, symphony or painting that was the result of a collaboration?) [/QUOTE] You don’t mention film in there; was that purposeful? Of the mediums you listed, no, I can’t think of a good collaboration. But film is murkier. Take Citizen Kane. Was it great ultimately because Orson Welles was great, or was it great because Orson Welles _and_ Bernard Herrmann _and_ Agnes Moorehead _and_ Joseph Cotton _and_ Herman Mankiewicz _and_ Gregg Toland were great? And does the fact that Joseph Cotton went on to make some crap movies and Agnes Moorehead played a TV witch while Welles made some more interesting stuff change the equation? ---
**Author:** ![lissener](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lissener/32/6139_2.png) [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2006, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/4 "2006-09-13T18:34:04Z")
[QUOTE=Rodgers01] . . . But then how do you explain the one-hit wonders, the directors who make one or two (or even three or four) great movies, and then make nothing good for the rest of their careers? How do you explain Peter Bogdanovich’s decline? How does Francis Ford Coppola go from making “The Godfather” and “The Conversation” to making “Jack” and “The Rainmaker”? [/QUOTE] There are as many answers to this as there are directors whose career trajectory follows a similar path. Why does any artist peak and then decline? Every genius, every artist, has a creative peak. That’s one answer. Another is that every film is different; every filming process is different. What comes together to make “A Christmas Story” work, while the same director goes on to make “Baby Geniuses,” is an extremely complex equation. None of this “disproves” the auteur theory. It only suggests that it is not always the dominant paradigm. There is absolutely no question that the overall vision of some directors is critical the resulting film. Think of some of the schlock that Nicholas Ray and Douglas Sirk turned into masterpieces; no one else would have come up with the same films from the same source materials. Bogdanovich peaked. This is totally irrelevant to the careers of John Ford, Jean Renoir, and Michael Powell. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2006, 6:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/5 "2006-09-13T18:45:45Z")
That one director can make a bad film doesn’t necessarily disprove the _auteur_ theory – he could’ve had a bad year or something. More’s the pity. While I think a project _maestro_ is often essential to a huge undertaking, I can’t grant the director such absolute credit. It’s not just the work of other people contributing, as noted above. No, my sympathies go to the poor, overlooked screenweriter. Without a good screenwriter, as Harlan Ellison said, the director, actors, and everyone else would be standing around waitying for divine guidance. Case in point: **Charade** was a great comedy-mystery. Peter Donen directs. George Kennedy, Walter Matthau, Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn. Screenplay by Peter Stone. Next year, **Mirage** is a Hitchcockian thriller. George Kennedy, Walter Matthau, Gregory Peck. Edwark Dmitryk directs. Script by Peter Stone again. Next year, **Arabesque**. Not so great. Stanley Donen directing again, regory Peck again. Peter Stone’s name isn’t on it. There are three screenwriting credits, and the last one is a pseudonym of Stoone. That twells me they probably brought him in to polish up what they had. I’d watch Charade over and over again, but even th promise of Sophia Loren wont persuade me to watch **arabesque** again. Richard Matheson’s scripts have been good, pretty much whoever directs them. Likewise William Goldman, and Robert Bolt. One could argue that it’s up to the director to choose a good script, but the screenwriter is as much the creative artist as the director. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2006, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/6 "2006-09-13T18:52:10Z")
First of all, you (and the writer of the article) is getting the auteur theory wrong. That’s not unsual: the basic principle as stated by Andrew Sarris has been completely misconstrued for years. Sarris did not say that the director is not automatically the “auteur” of the film; he specifically gave examples of films that had no auteur (e.g, “Casablanca”), and spoke of films where the script was more important than the director (he called these “filmed but not directed”). What he _did_ say was that great directors put their stamp on their films. The films deal with common and similar themes. For instance, Hitchcock often deals with ordinary men put into extraordinary situations; Orson Welles often deals with extraordinary people in ordinary situations. Howard Hawks deals with competent people. In addition there are technical similarities: Hawks usually films people at eye level; Eisenstein uses montage almost exclusively; Ophuls uses camera movement, and Hitchcock uses both fairly equally. Also, since film is a visual medium, it’s the visual element that’s foremost. A screenwriter can write the script, but the director determines what it looks like. As an example, consider Hank Quinlan’s entrance in **Touch of Evil**. You could write that scene (“Quinlan exits the police car. He is extremely fat, mountainous and blubbery”), but it’s the visual that is memorable. But, you say, Welles wrote the script. That’s different. Many other directors don’t. That’s a misunderstanding coming from reading the credits. The top directors (Hitchcock, Ford, Hawks) may not be credited with writing the script, but they are involved in picking the material, hiring the writer, accepting the script, and adding their own lines and touches to it on set. There’s the famous story of Raymond Chandler trying to write a script for **Strangers on a Train**. Chandler said Hitchcock kept telling him how to write it, and how the entire situation was impossible: no one would believe that Bruno had not planned in advance to meet Guy on the train. But, if you see the film, it’s quite clear – all visually – that it’s a chance meeting (they show two pairs of shoes – Bruno’s going first onto the train and sitting down and Guy arriving several minutes later, so it’s clear the meeting was random). But the key element here was that Hitchcock was working with the writer on the script in its formative stages. He never took credit, but he was involved. (Nowadays, nearly all film scripts are rewritten by the director.) Indeed, one of the better confirmations of the auteur theory was a book a few year ago that tried to do for film writers what Sarris had done for directors in his landmark (and also misunderstood) book **The American Cinema**. The author charted screenwriters careers, movie by movie in the same way Sarris had done with directors. And you know what? Whenever a top screenwriter worked with a good director, the result was a good movie, and whenever the same screenwriter worked with a weak director, the result was at most, a so-so film. Yes, film is a collaboration, but who makes the final decision on the set? The cinematographer may decide to shoot a certain way, but it’s the director who ultimately says, “that looks good.” Same with the actors: the director decides which take is the best (and usually tells the actors what he expects). Same for editing: a great editor can put the film together, but the director gets the final decision. So, ultimately, the director is the one most responsible for the final product. And an auteur director puts a strong stamp of his personality on the film. But there are auteurs other than the director. Charlie Kaufman is a good example of a writer/auteur. And the one-hit wonders can be directors who aren’t really auteurs (though, not always: Coppola made a bad misstep with **One from the Heart** and then had trouble getting the control he needed). There are plenty of times where directors are just hired guns with no meaningful input. Someone like Joe Johnston comes to mind – but note Johnston’s **October Sky** , which clearly shows something of the director’s personality. (Bob Fosse made a very clever dig at those who think a director is unimportant in **All That Jazz** : it shows Joe Gideon working obsessively on getting a scene exactly right, and later shows a critic lambasting the film, saving praise for the very scene Gideon keeps recutting and re-editing – because it let the actor perform without the director’s interference.) But the auteur theory, in its original form, did not say that the director is always the auteur, just that the great directors are. ---
**Author:** ![lissener](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lissener/32/6139_2.png) [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2006, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/7 "2006-09-13T18:58:17Z")
Still, the director has the final say on the screenplay. There’s no question that some writers are way better than other writers, but the director is the one who signs off on every word in the script. Granted, with the names you mention, he/she’s less likely to need to change anything, but it’s the director’s “vision” that is ultimately responsible for what works or doesn’t. A great director can make a great film with a bad screenplay; it’s far rarer to end up with a good film with a good writer and a bad director, although there are plenty of examples where the tragedy of a bad movie is made even worse when you can tell that the script was better than the director. A good director can save a bad script; a good script can not save a bad director. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2006, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/8 "2006-09-13T19:09:44Z")
[QUOTE=CalMeacham] Case in point: **Charade** was a great comedy-mystery. Peter Donen directs. George Kennedy, Walter Matthau, Cary Grant and Audrey Hepburn. Screenplay by Peter Stone. Next year, **Mirage** is a Hitchcockian thriller. George Kennedy, Walter Matthau, Gregory Peck. Edwark Dmitryk directs. Script by Peter Stone again. Next year, **Arabesque**. Not so great. Stanley Donen directing again, regory Peck again. Peter Stone’s name isn’t on it. There are three screenwriting credits, and the last one is a pseudonym of Stoone. That twells me they probably brought him in to polish up what they had. I’d watch Charade over and over again, but even th promise of Sophia Loren wont persuade me to watch **arabesque** again. [/quote] True, but look at Stone’s career: **Charade** was great; **Sweet Charity** was also very good, as was **Taking of Pelham One Two Three** and **Father Goose**. Nothing else is particularly notable, and the only top directors he worked with were Donen and Bob Fosse – probably his two best films. Now let’s look at Stanley Donen’s resume: **On the Town, Singin’ in the Rain, Royal Wedding, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, Funny Face, The Pajama Game, Damn Yankees, Charade, Bedazzled** (the original), **Two For the Road** and **Movie Movie**. Lots of classics there. Sure, there were flops ( **Lucky Lady** ), but Donen’s is clearly involved in more good and great films than Stone. You’re basing your analysis on the assumption that the director merely shoots the script as given to him. But the top directors take the script and reimagine it: the same script in the hands of a different director is going to get a different final result. ---
**Author:** ![Rodgers01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b19c9b/32.png) [@Rodgers01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rodgers01)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2006, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/9 "2006-09-13T19:21:38Z")
[QUOTE=RealityChuck] Indeed, one of the better confirmations of the auteur theory was a book a few year ago that tried to do for film writers what Sarris had done for directors in his landmark (and also misunderstood) book **The American Cinema**. The author charted screenwriters careers, movie by movie in the same way Sarris had done with directors. And you know what? Whenever a top screenwriter worked with a good director, the result was a good movie, and whenever the same screenwriter worked with a weak director, the result was at most, a so-so film. [/QUOTE] Great post. Can you remember what book this is? ---
**Author:** ![C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/b2d939/32.png) [@C\_K\_Dexter\_Haven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C_K_Dexter_Haven)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2006, 7:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/10 "2006-09-13T19:26:14Z")
I’m with **Reality Chuck** on this. Auteur theory doesn’t mean that only Great Directors can make a good film; nor does it mean that good directors must always make good films. Shakespeare wrote some plays that, let’s face it, are duds. And there are productions of Shakespeare plays that are just embarrassing. The production of a play involves many different people and different skills – it’s an “industrial process,” if you will. The only diff between a play and a movie is that the movie production exists as one-time fixed and permanent, while each performance of a play is different. Nonetheless, we assign the playwright the primary credit or blame when we want to discuss the art behind a play. (We may assign different responsiblities when we discuss a specific production.) Auteur theory certainly recognizes that there are many talents involved in making a movie. In many cases, however, we can see within the films of a single director, recurring themes, including style, poetry, visual vocabulary, the camera’s phraseology, sense of drama, etc. So, it’s easiest to talk about films as if there were one creative mind at the helm. Auteur theory is basically a model, a format, to facilitate discussion and analysis. Hitchcock is probably the leading example of the auteur theory: his films all have similar themes, styles, sense of drama, etc. No one would deny that Jimmy Stewart brings a huge contribution to REAR WINDOW, and it would be a very different film if (say) Cary Grant played that role. Similarly, the cinematography, music, screenwriter, editor, etc all have significant roles to play in making a great movie. And it is certainly legitimate to analyze the films of Jimmy Stewart from an artistic perspective (good luck), or ditto a cinematographer or screenwriter. But when you stand back, you wind up saying that REAR WINDOW bears the stamp of Hitchcock’s art. Hey, Rembrandt may have drawn on paper that someone else made, but that doesn’t mean the drawing isn’t Rembrandt’s. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2006, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/11 "2006-09-13T19:49:19Z")
> [@](#): > > You’re basing your analysis on the assumption that the director merely shoots the script as given to him. Where do you get that from? I’m arguing that a good script is needed. I don’t deny that a good director is also needed, any more than a good director needs a good script. > [@](#): > > But the top directors take the script and reimagine it: the same script in the hands of a different director is going to get a different final result. Again, agreed, but even a top director isn’t going to turn a bad or average script into something great. > [@](#): > > True, but look at Stone’s career: Charade was great; Sweet Charity was also very good, as was Taking of Pelham One Two Three and Father Goose. Nothing else is particularly notable, and the only top directors he worked with were Donen and Bob Fosse – probably his two best films. > > Now let’s look at Stanley Donen’s resume: On the Town, Singin’ in the Rain, Royal Wedding, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, Funny Face, The Pajama Game, Damn Yankees, Charade, Bedazzled (the original), Two For the Road and Movie Movie. Lots of classics there. Sure, there were flops (Lucky Lady), but Donen’s is clearly involved in more good and great films than Stone. In the first place you’re ignoring **Mirage**. And what was **1776**? And you’re also ignoring his theater work ( **1776** on stage, **Titanic** ), if you’re trying to try and make a case for one’s lifetime achievements. But sheer numbers don’t make the case. In any event, neither Stone nor Donen have any reason to be ashamed of their resumes. My point is that when Donen tried to pull off a Stone-like thriller without full cooperation of Stone it didn’t turn out so hot. ---
**Author:** ![vibrotronica](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/a9a28c/32.png) [@vibrotronica](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vibrotronica)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2006, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/12 "2006-09-13T20:04:20Z")
I’m a director (albiet as small-time as it gets), and my $0.02 is that the most important decisions the director makes is whom to work with. Pick good people, make sure they’re on board and understand every aspect of the project, and get the hell out of their way. Directed collaboration is the way to go. Film is an inherently collaborative medium, but somebody’s got to drive the bus, so to speak. > [@](#): > > can you name a single great novel, play, symphony or painting that was the result of a collaboration? In writing class in college, my professor made us read the manuscript of _The Waste Land_ before Ezra Pound got ahold of it. The moral was “If T.S. Eliot needed an editor, you need an editor.” It was horrible. I would say that that poem, arguably the best English poem of the twentieth century, is the product of a collaboration. Likewise, many of Warhol’s masterpieces came out of the Factory, a group of artists working together (directed collaboration). Fresco painting, such as the Sistine Chapel, required dozens of artists working together. And what about The Beatles? Paul and John worked much better together than they did seperately because they acted as editors for each other’s excesses. Stephen King’s early novels, where the publishers had an editor looking over his shoulder, were the picture of economy. Now that he’s “too big to edit”, he’s damned near unreadable. Likewise, look at Neal Stephenson’s _Snow Crash_ compared to the monstrosity that is _The Baroque Cycle_. ---
**Author:** ![Charlie\_Tan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/charlie_tan/32/12582_2.png) [@Charlie\_Tan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Charlie_Tan)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2006, 9:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/13 "2006-09-13T21:13:48Z")
[QUOTE=RealityChuck] it shows Joe Gideon working obsessively on getting a scene exactly right, and later shows a critic lambasting the film, saving praise for the very scene Gideon keeps recutting and re-editing – because it let the actor perform without the director’s interference.) [/QUOTE] Denial, anger, bargaining, depression acceptance. 'Twas his producer (played by the guy who played the father on ALF), not a critic. But I think that today, the producer is the auteur. In television, it’s clearly the showrunner’s vision that dominates, and the showrunner is almost always the producer. He (it’s almost universally a man) might direct and/or write a key episode during a season, but there’s clearly a vision and idea that comes from the showrunner. The same might be argued for movies. Films produced by **Bruckheimer** , \*\*Silver \*\* or the **Weinstein Bros**. carry the marks and ideas by the producer. \*\*Bryan Singer \*\* wields creaticve influenc on House M.D. and the **Scott Bros**. (as producers) on Numbers. You might argue that the only artistic vision Joel Silver has are a lot of explosions. But he still has a vision and all the movies he producs carry that mark. So in the end, it’s not the director, screen writer or actor who decides, it’s the guy signing the pay checks.ac ---
**Author:** ![lissener](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lissener/32/6139_2.png) [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2006, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/14 "2006-09-13T22:35:17Z")
There are, as you point out, some producers who wield considerable creative control over their projects. But that is not, I think, the norm, as you suggest. Those producers are considered pretty old-school, because it’s not since the studio system was in place, in the first half of the century, that producer-as-creative-driver was the norm. The producers you name are more in the mold of David O. Selznick, Val Lewton, or Irving Thalberg. The majority of today’s producers are more businesmen than artists. That’s my overall impression anyway. Where’s **Cervaise**? This is one of his areas of expertise. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Rieux](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@Dr.Rieux](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Rieux)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2006, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/15 "2006-09-13T23:29:35Z")
“Not only do I not believe in the auteur theory, I don’t personally know any directors who believe in it.”–William Goldman (Adventures in the Screen Trade) ---
**Author:** ![Charlie\_Tan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/charlie_tan/32/12582_2.png) [@Charlie\_Tan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Charlie_Tan)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 5:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/16 "2006-09-14T05:34:24Z")
[QUOTE=lissener] The majority of today’s producers are more businesmen than artists. [/QUOTE] Sure, but the majority of directors are hacks, not auteurs. There a directors who, having gained clout and made enough money, leave the day-to-day grunt work of directing to someone else, checking only the dailies, but deciding what should happen, every inch of the way. When I first heard of V for Vendetta, I assumed (one of the) Wachowskis would direct and it was not until the crdits rolled that I realized that someone else had done the job. Shamalan is certainly an auteur, but his work wouldn’t hurt if there was a producer who was in creative controll, and not just looking for the business angle. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 10:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/17 "2006-09-14T10:53:16Z")
I find the auteur theory to be useless as a way of analyzing films, but if you really want to make the theory work for the case of Peter Bogdanovich and _The Last Picture Show_, here’s a simple way to do it: Bogdanovich didn’t really direct the movie by himself. Despite the fact that Polly Platt (who was married to Bogdanovich at the time) is listed as just the production designer in the credits for the film, she was apparently actually the co-director of it. She was standing next to Bogdanovich all the time that he was directing, and they talked about each scene just before they shot it. I believe she was also involved in the writing and editing of the film. (Bogdanovich says that he, and not the credited editor, was responsible for most of the editing decisions.) As it turns out, the marriage was crumbling as the film was being made. Bogdanovich was having an affair with Cybill Shepherd during the production, and he moved in with her afterwards. Despite the tension that must have existed between Bogdanovich and Platt at the time, they both did the best film work of their careers so far. If you want to make a case for the writer being the auteur of the film, consider the fact that Larry McMurtry wrote the novel on which the movie is based. He was also the co-writer of the screenplay for _Brokeback Mountain_ (and several other fine movies). I think McMurtry has the best feel for modern working-class life in the Great Plains of any American writer working today. ---
**Author:** ![lissener](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lissener/32/6139_2.png) [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/18 "2006-09-14T16:41:57Z")
[QUOTE=Charlie Tan] Sure, but the majority of directors are hacks, not auteurs. . . . [/QUOTe] That’s perfectly true. But it doesn’t contradict or disprove–or even really challenge–the auteur theory. Some people dye their hair. Most people don’t. The second statement does not in any way alter the factual nature of the first. ---
**Author:** ![lissener](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lissener/32/6139_2.png) [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)\ **Post date:** [September 14, 2006, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/19 "2006-09-14T16:54:25Z")
[QUOTE=Wendell Wagner] I find the auteur theory to be useless as a way of analyzing films, but if you really want to make the theory work for the case of Peter Bogdanovich and _The Last Picture Show_, here’s a simple way to do it: Bogdanovich didn’t really direct the movie by himself. Despite the fact that Polly Platt (who was married to Bogdanovich at the time) is listed as just the production designer in the credits for the film, she was apparently actually the co-director of it. She was standing next to Bogdanovich all the time that he was directing, and they talked about each scene just before they shot it. I believe she was also involved in the writing and editing of the film. (Bogdanovich says that he, and not the credited editor, was responsible for most of the editing decisions.) As it turns out, the marriage was crumbling as the film was being made. Bogdanovich was having an affair with Cybill Shepherd during the production, and he moved in with her afterwards. Despite the tension that must have existed between Bogdanovich and Platt at the time, they both did the best film work of their careers so far. If you want to make a case for the writer being the auteur of the film, consider the fact that Larry McMurtry wrote the novel on which the movie is based. He was also the co-writer of the screenplay for _Brokeback Mountain_ (and several other fine movies). I think McMurtry has the best feel for modern working-class life in the Great Plains of any American writer working today. [/QUOTE] Critical thought is descriptive, not prescriptive. There is no rulebook of auteurism that a director either follows or transgresses. Each individual director works in his/her own individual way, and the auteur theory is a theory–not a hypothesis, but a system of thought, like gravitational theory or evolutionary theory–that some critics use in trying describe–not prescribe–how some directors work. As such, it is helpful in discussing some directors, but not so much with others. There is no question that some directors have an overall artistic vision that guides their work. The critical shorthand for describing this one approach–among many possible approaches–is “auteurism.” ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [September 15, 2006, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562/20 "2006-09-15T02:44:38Z")
lissener writes: \> Critical thought is descriptive, not prescriptive. There is no rulebook of \> auteurism that a director either follows or transgresses. Each individual director \> works in his/her own individual way, and the auteur theory is a theory–not a \> hypothesis, but a system of thought, like gravitational theory or evolutionary \> theory–that some critics use in trying describe–not prescribe–how some \> directors work. As such, it is helpful in discussing some directors, but not so \> much with others. So in other words, there’s no way to test whether auteurism works at all. If it fails to explain a particular film or the work of a particular director, you just ignore the auteur theory and say that it doesn’t work for that particular film or director. Now that’s one way to make sure that any theory you absolutely insist on holding onto despite the fact that you’ve discovered flaws in it can’t be falsified. When all else fails, just call the flaws in your theory places where the theory doesn’t apply. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/challenging-the-auteur-theory/372562.md?page=2)