How The French New Wave Changed Filmmaking Forever

INTRO

“He immediately talked about, kind of, the French New Wave portrait of youth.” - Greta Gerwig

“The beginning of Jules and Jim, the first three or four minutes influence the style of Goodfellas and Casino and Wolf of Wall Street and so many.” - Martin Scorsese

“Godard was so influential to me at the beginning of my aesthetic as a director, of, like, wanting to be a director.” - Quentin Tarantino

Throughout the decades, there have been many defining film movements in cinema. Some have had a longer lasting impact than others. Out of all of them I’d say one of the most influential of these movements was the French New Wave, which took place from the late 50s to the late 60s. Its impact can still be seen to this day.

During this time various directors emerged who made films that could broadly be classified by their similar philosophy and approach towards experimentation and style. 

Many of these directors began their careers as film critics and cinephiles who wrote for the magazine Cahiers du Cinéma where they rejected mainstream cinema and came up with a sort of film manifesto that encouraged experimentation and innovation. 

In this video I’ll outline four things from this film movement that are still present in how movies are made and thought about today, which were responsible for altering the course of filmmaking forever.

AUTEUR THEORY

“An Inquisition-like regime ruled over French cinema. Everything was compartmentalised. This movie was made as a reaction against everything that wasn’t done. It was almost pathological or systematic. ‘A wide-angle lens isn’t used for a close up? Then let’s do it.’ ‘A handheld camera isn’t used for tracking shots? Then let’s do it.’” - Jean Luc-Godard

In 1954 director Francois Truffaut wrote an article for Cahiers du Cinéma called ‘A Certain Tendency of the French Cinema’, wherein he described his dissatisfaction of the adaptation and filming of safe literary works in a traditional, unimaginative way. 

Up until then movies were largely credited to the actors who starred in them, or to the studios and producers involved in their funding and creation.

Instead, the cinema of the French New Wave put forward the idea that the real ‘author’ or ‘auteur’ of a movie should be the director. They should be the primary creative driving force behind each project by creating a visual style or aesthetic specific to them. Their themes, tone, or overall feeling from their films should also be consistent and identifiable across their overall body of work. 

If you could glance at a film and immediately tell who the director behind it was - that was a sign it was created by an auteur. 

A film by Quentin Tarantino will have ensemble casts, non-linear storylines, chapter divides, mixed genre conventions and pay homage to the history of cinema.

A film by Wes Anderson will have fast-paced comedy, childhood loss, symmetrical compositions, consistent colour palettes and highly stylised art direction. 

This idea was revolutionary as it encouraged directors to tell stories through their own distinctive voice, rather than acting as craftsmen that followed the same rules and chiselled out each film the same way for a studio.

All it takes is watching a few trailers or the credits in a film to tell that auteur theory is still alive and well. Many movies use the name of the director as a selling point, even more so than the actors in some cases.

If we turn to short form filmmaking, a huge number of directors of commercials or music videos get hired by clients and agencies because they want their film told in a specific style associated with that director. 

You hire The Blaze to direct if you want a character-focused, wildly energetic, passionate, personal journey told with a fluidity of movement.You hire Romain Gavras to direct if you want a carefully coordinated, composed, concept driven set piece.

But this French New Wave idea of the director as an auteur is just the first thing that had an undeniable impact on how cinema today is created.  

LOW BUDGET

“I really like Band Apart. In particular it really kinda grabbed me. But one of the things that really grabbed me was that I felt I almost could have done that. I could’ve attached a camera to the back of a convertible and drive around Venice boulevard if I wanted to.” - Quentin Tarantino

In their more financially risky pursuit to break free from the constraints of the traditional mould of French cinema and create their own inventive styles as auteurs, many French New Wave directors had to work within a low budget lane.

This was also influenced by the financial restraints of post-World War Two France.  

Rather than seeing it as a disadvantage, a lot of the movies that came out of this period used their lack of resources to break conventional rules and form their own style - which we’ll get into more a bit later.

They took some cues from the Italian Neorealist movement that preceded it, which cut costs by shooting on location and working with non-professional actors in rural areas.

Likewise, many French New Wave films worked on location, with a bare bones approach to lighting and homemade, DIY camera rigs. This allowed them to work quickly, unencumbered by large crews and introduced a more on-the-ground aesthetic to the filmmaking. 

This further democratised filmmaking and made it more accessible than ever before. It showed that big studios were not always needed to produce great cinema.

This democratisation of filmmaking expanded further throughout the years, until it exploded even more with the introduction of low budget digital cinema cameras. 

There’s a reason that many low budget indie films today still use French New Wave films from this period as a primary reference and inspiration for, not only what is possible to achieve with limited resources, but also the kind of look and style that comes with it.  

VISUAL STYLE

“All these films had been very different of what had been French cinema. What was in common was to use a lot of natural light, sometimes use non actors, natural sets, a sort of speed in the inspiration and the work. That is what was in common.” - Agnes Varda 

What emerged from this rejection of cinematic tradition in a low budget environment were a burst of films that broke existing filmmaking ‘rules’ and had a vigorously experimental style.

Part of this was informed by a documentary-esque approach to cinematography that free-ed the actors up to move and improvise. Like documentaries, these films were largely shot at real locations, relied on using mostly natural light (which allowed them to shoot 360 degrees in a space), using a reactive, handheld camera and sometimes employed non-professional actors who they’d get to improvise dialogue, blocking and actions.

All this went against the more formal conventions that were previously expected of traditional studio films that were shot in studio sets, off a rigid dolly, with perfect, artificial lighting and precise blocking of a pre-approved screenplay.

In this way the French New Wave paved a path that made it OK for future filmmakers to work in a rougher, more naturalistic style and broke down the very notion that cinematography needs to conform to specific rules.

EXPERIMENTATION

“I think a lot of it has to do with the relentlessness of the voice over and the rapid speech and also the pace of the music under it.1:23 “It feels like there’s a sense of freedom. Anything could happen at any moment…Narrative is completely fractured I think.” - Martin Scorsese

French New Wave directors saw exciting possibilities for using film as a medium - more like painters or novelists did - which could not only be used to tell stories but also to translate their thoughts or ideas by experimenting with form and style. 

Much of this was done in the edit.

Whereas older films may have used a traditional, linear story, various scenes and exposition to unpack characters, films like Jules and Jim used voice over, fast paced music and snappy editing to immediately introduce characters and their relationships in a more fractured way that compressed time into a montage.

Directors like Godard broke down the medium even more into a self conscious, post modern vision by having characters literally break the fourth wall and talk directly into the camera, face to face with the audience.

Instead of attempting to suspend disbelief, Godard made his audience very aware that what they were watching was something constructed by an artist. 

Breathless also went against a universal rule of cinema and used jump cuts, a technique which cuts forward in time using the same shot, without changing the angle or shot size. The effect is an abrasive ‘jump’ forward in time. 

This technique influenced future filmmakers by tearing down the idea that the rules of cinema should be strictly followed. This post modernism that was pushed by the French New Wave has now seeped into every kind of contemporary visual art - including how many YouTube videos are now edited.