Traces That Resemble Us

Twice, at least, as he had just completed Passion, Jean-Luc Godard expressed the same idea. Filmmakers, as a rule in the early 80s, do not have the sense of the history of cinema; they no longer have a sense of the past.' Interpreting this as the nostalgia of a bygone age-that of the Nouvelle Vague, when directors films in relation to the history of cinema (to quote Godard's own words)2-would be a mistake. It is interesting to notice, however, that in twenty years Godard's views have changed. In 1962, Godard actually mentioned that the works of filmmakers coming from Cahiers du Cinema were merely films of cinephiles, and he declared somewhat pompously: We are the first film-makers who know that Griffith has existed.3 Speaking of films made only in relation to the history of cinema and of films of is not exactly the same. The cinephile joins together the spirit of the collector and the competence of the connoisseur, but a connoisseur who would only collect within his memory. The population of cinephiles resembles the outlaws of Fahrenheit 451: their juxtaposed memories constitute the richest film library that one can imagine. In this population the individual who is endowed with the most extensive memory is sure to arouse admiration (and jealousy). Henri Langlois was such a man, a living legend, all the memory of the cinema. Similarly, for the generation of Werner Herzog and Wim Wenders, Lotte Eisner was the living memory of a vanished German cinema. Langlois's memory (about which a number of almost mythological anecdotes exist) was beyond suspicion: in his case the relation to the past was a happy one. The problem of the historian, as opposed to the connoisseur is precisely that he or she must rely on other people's memories, and therefore the relation to the past is disturbed. The past, far from being obvious

Art · Biology · Passion · Passion fruit · Cinema and Media Studies · Horticulture · Italian Fascism and Post-war Society · Memory, Trauma, and Commemoration · Psychology · Social Psychology

• Introduction a une veritable histoire du cinema

  Jean-Luc Godard, Jean Andrews•Camera Obscura Feminism Culture…•1982

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