Directors

Too much power to the director?

As the description of this group suggests, cinephiles, geeks, critics, scholars all tend to associate films with their directors. Intellectually, though, I think we all understand that film authorship is more complicated than that, and I often wonder how much any given film "belongs" to the director as opposed to any or all of the other people involved in its making. My wife, Anne-Marie, and I have our movies organized, broadly, into "behind-the-camera" and "in-front-of-the-camera" movies. Most of the films in the former category are organized by director, but some, like Charlie Kaufman's movies, are organized by writer (all of the latter films are organized by actor, though some we identify with one or two stars, while others are identified by their ensembles). We don't have any films organized by production designer, or photographer, or costume designer, or editor which, I suspect, says as much about how we think about movies as it does about the actual nature of film authorship.

So, I am left with a series of questions about directors and the amount of credit (or discredit) they deserve for a film. Do some directors exercise more control over their films than others? What makes one director an "auteur" and another a hack? Are there films that others would identify more with actors, or writers, or photographers, etc. than with their directors? Is identifying films by director an oversimplification of the filmmaking process? Does it depend on the film? On the director?

Re: Too much power to the director?

Re: Too much power to the director?

ShaunHuston:

So, I am left with a series of questions about directors and the amount of credit (or discredit) they deserve for a film. Do some directors exercise more control over their films than others? What makes one director an "auteur" and another a hack? Are there films that others would identify more with actors, or writers, or photographers, etc. than with their directors? Is identifying films by director an oversimplification of the filmmaking process? Does it depend on the film? On the director?

I would say "yes" to all of your questions, except for the one that doesn't warrant a "yes" or "no" answer.

I would say the question about how much credit a director deserves is really how much creative control were they given with the film?  That's not even to say how much cretive control did they take over the film, but specifically how much was available to them.  Because some directors have a style where they give up control.  They chose people to work with that they trust and let them do what they want.  Or maybe they set up a situation where people get to have collective input.  It depends on the type of movie that is being made and what method should be used to get the desired effect.

There may be situations where a director wants to have a lot of control, but because there are other interested parties involved (usually there to make sure the decisions made are profitable rather than artistic) they do not have total control.  In this case we can't give the director much control.

Sometimes a director might have a lot of control and not be that good but just be lucky to get a good script or situation.  Or a director might be good and not have much control but also be lucky to get a good script or situation.  Or they might be either of those situations but be unlucky for the opposite reasons.

What is fantastic about movies is there are so many different ways to make them.  And I think our assigning of roles and procedures has kept us from finding the full potential.  Yet people are still on their way.  And I do still think there needs to be some leader who can look at the whole project and make sure it all fits together.  And I still do think that the director is the most important role in general, and that great directors will always be improtant in great films.

I guess you can also understand that I could consider in certain situations that people in other roles have taken the role of director in certain situations.  In an improvised movie the actors and cameraman may be directing themselves on the spot in a way.  And there are other examples.  When you have a person who is the director/writer/lead actor/editor/other you can see that person is very much in charge and blurs the lines.

Re: Too much power to the director?

The director's credit in a movie is only slightly more-involved than the owner's credit on a sports team. Now, the degree to which that applies--of course--varies according to the team and -to the movie; although I guess the director can be seen as more of a lynchpin for all the actors, -producers, -writers, -editors, -cameramen and -caterers for the movie.

He's the Ideal President of the movie---The Buck Stops There ... he's the movies mast-sculpture (no matter who's starring, the director feels the first blast of the storms' waves).

It's sort of like a farmer: if he is a skilled producer, he can turn the worst crop for profit (by making sure it becomes fruitful and multiplies); but even he would rather have the best equipment and -seed to work with!

Re:Too much power to the director?

It seriously does depend on the film being made and the people making them.

Take, for example, Akira Kurosawa. If you read up on him you'll find almost horror stories about how much he dictated what was being shot. He'd wait for the right weather, he'd try and get rivers to flow upstream (I really don't know if that in particular is true) but the lengths he would go to composing shots is really astounding, and not very common nowadays. For example, a close-up wasn't just a close-up, he'd use activity in the environment (wind, light reflecting off water) to reflect the situation or the thoughts/emotions of the subject being shot. Seven Samurai, considered his classic, took over a year to actually film, from what I understand. But yes, as a director Kurosawa took his position very seriously and though some at the time might have thought he overvalued it, it really paid off in the end. Of course, the Japanese actor famous for working with Kurosawa the most was Toshiro Mifune. You can say they were both famous for what each of them brough to each film they made together. Mifune's skill as an actor was supposedly hard to come by in Japan, very few matched (or superceded) what he was capable of during the filmmaking process. In that sense, I'd say I recognize films like Throne of Blood and Yojimbo for both Kurosawa and Mifune.

You also have directors like Ridley Scott (a personal favorite of mine) who directs films with a very visual appearance, with many shots looking very polished in their light and dark contrasts. If you read up on him, however, you'll find he hasn't worked with the same director of photography on any two films (or at least among his major films). At the same time you have Christopher Nolan, who has only just recently become famous after directing films like Batman Begins and Memento. You look up his work and you'll see he's been working with the same director of photography all along, Wally Pfister. I can only assume Nolan appreciates the look Pfister can create for any given shot, and figures that is all he needs and doesn't need to work with any other D.o.P. With that specific look Nolan can experiment with it and utilize it to its full potential. With that I remember Nolan's films not jsut for Nolan, but for a lot of other contributors from Wally Pfister to the writers, etc. Meanwhile, I remember the film The Patriot, not for the performances or Roland Emmerich's directing (ahem), but for Caleb Deschanel's cinematography, his deep blues during evenings and rich reds and oranges from flames and candlelight.

A director without a clear vision is risking untimely doom on the success and the essence of the film itself. The director quite literally directs, he determines the style of the film, what is shot, etc., but the final product is the collaboration of everyone ultimately under the guidance of the director. The "auteurs" question is a difficult one. I don't really know if anybody can answer that one.

Re:Re:Too much power to the director?