Divining the Real: The Film Theory and Criticism of Andre Bazin

Abstract

Bazin was ... a species of transcendentalist, a kind of cinematic Hegel, who proposed to discover the nature of filmic reality, as much by investigating the process of critical thought as by examining the artistic objects of sensory experiences themselves.... Still, for all its erudition, Bazin's work was aimed, not only at scholars, teachers, and critics of film, but also at educated or cultivated moviegoers and students of the cinema at all levels.