New Wave Cinema from Paris to Hollywood

“New wave” was coined by a journalist to refer to an “outburst” of filmmaking in France beginning in 1959. Never a movement, and short-lived in terms of whatever aesthetic uniformity it may have had, its effects spread across various European cinemas and became the emblem for a series of American filmmakers well into the 1970s. We will analyze work by a range of French and other cinéastes, in an attempt to understand what perhaps appears--from the current perspective--as one of the last gasps of “high cultural” production against the reality of corporate necessity and new forms of media. Taught in English. Unlike most other FREN courses above the 600-level, this course is not writing-designated.