The Global Auteur

As we plunge into the second century of cinema, this terrific collection of essays reckons with not only the persistence of auteurism but its resurgence in the context of global cinema. Framed by the editors’ superb introduction, The Global Auteur features a brilliant roster of scholars whose essays, ranging across an admirably broad range of filmmakers, finally helps us to understand the work of art cinema in our era of digital reproduction. * Gregory Flaxman, Associate Professor of English and Comparative Literature and the Director of Global Cinema Studies, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, USA *
Once a dramatic new critical perspective and later declared a moribund leftover of romanticism, auteurs and auteurism today have become—as this outstanding and wide-ranging collection reminds us—more vibrant and complex than ever before. * Timothy Corrigan, Professor of Cinema Studies, English, and History of Art, University of Pennsylvania, USA *
This ambitious collection fills a glaring gap in studies of cinematic authorship in the twentieth-first century. It was about time for the creative contribution of the film director to be reassessed from a global perspective, away from hierarchical canons and in light of the radical changes entailed to film production by the widespread use of the digital technology. In the age of social media, where the individual merges into the general and anyone can ‘author’ a film, the role of the battered but resilient auteur may be, as the editors rightly say, more crucial and relevant than ever. * Lúcia Nagib, Professor in Film, University of Reading, UK *