Improvising Cinema / Gilles Mouëllic

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Mouëllic, Gilles, Author.

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource (1 online resource (200 p.))

Place of Publication:

Routledge [Imprint] Dec. 2025 Philadelphia : Taylor & Francis Group Abingdon : Taylor & Francis Group [Distributor]

Summary:

This spirited volume explores the history and diversity of improvisation in the cinema, including works by Jean Renoir, Jean-Luc Godard, and Nobuhiro Suwa. Gilles Mouëllic examines improvisational practices that can be specifically attributed to the cinema and argues in favors of their powers as instigators of unprecedented forms of expression. Improvising Cinema reflects both on the permanence of attempting improvisation and the relationship between technology and aesthetics. Mouëllic concludes preservation becomes even more invaluable in the case of improvisation, as the creative act exists only within the brief time span of the performance.

Contents:

Introduction

1. Writing and improvisation

A selection of models...and their limitations

Emptiness or overflow

Writing the unpredictable

The script as matter

2. Creation in action

A collective adventure

Renoir and the actor, Rossellini and the world

On the fringes of the New Wave

3. The influence of Jean Rouch

Godard as improviser?

Fabulation and improvisation

Ritual and overflow in the cinema of Rabah Ameur-Zaïmeche

Improvised tangents: from documentary to fiction

4. Acting cinema

The body filmed, the body filming

Disinhibition in focus (1): play

Disinhibition in focus (2): dance

Improvising/sculpting: un couple parfait (2005), by Nobuhiro Suwa

5. The temptation of theatre

A seminal stalemate

Theatricalities

Montages

6. The rules of the game

Directing from the inside (1): the director and actor

Directing from the inside (2): delegations

Rohmer and directing actors: a model of improvisation?

7. Filming jazz

City rhythms: modern jazz in films noirs

More pointers from the small screen...

John Coltrane, in the frame

An experiment in collective improvisation: quatre jours à ocoee (2001), by Pascale Ferran

Conclusion

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 187-190) and index

ISBN:

1-04-079045-3

9781003697848