Auteur's Theory

The theory shows that a film reflects the director's personal creative vision and gives them a signature style, as if they were the main role. The production of the film as part of an industrial process, the auteur's creative voice is distinct enough to shine through other interference and the overall process.A film is treated as a work of art, and the auteur, as the creator of the film.

Auteur theory has influenced film criticism since 1954, when it was advocated by film director and critic François Truffaut. This method of film analysis was originally associated with the French new wave and the film critics who wrote for the French film review periodical Cahiers du cinema. Auteur theory was developed a few years later in the United States through the writings of The Village Voice critic Andrew Sarris. Sarris used auteur theory as a way to further the analysis of what he defines as serious work through the study of respected directors and their films.
André Bazin and Roger Leenhardtt presented the theory that it is the director that brings the film to life and uses the film to express their thoughts and feelings about the subject matter as well as a worldview as an auteur. An auteur can use lighting, camerawork, staging and editing to add to their vision.
One of the ironies of the auteur theory is that, at the very moment Truffaut was writing, the break-up of the Hollywood studio systems during the 1950s was conducted uncertainty and conservatism in American cinema, with the result of fewer of the sort of films Truffaut admired were actually being made.

Genre theory focuses on:

• generic similarities.
• how texts are determined by historical and social contexts.
• how texts emerge as a commercial product from the industry.

Auteur theory focuses on:

• individual stylist features.
• how texts are determined by artists creativity.
• how texts emerge as a part of an artists body of work.

I like the idea of the director having an influence through the whole making of the film e.g. production. I would like to put my own style on my short film to make it more unique and different to other films but still attracting a mass audience. I will have a main role with filming, directing and making the overall film as I am doing all of it myself which I find easier as I don't have to rely on others and can just concentrate.