Abstract
Stanley Cavell considers the modern stroller, or the flâneur, as foreshadowing the emergence of films. Film theorists have argued that the emergence of film and the flâneur can be attributed to the alienation and estrangement that modernism brings to society. This form of estrangement encourages a distanced view of the world along with a desire to view the world as a child. Despite the fact that the flâneur shares a lot of characteristics with the film audience, they are fundamentally different in how they understand the form of alienation endemic to modernity. In this paper, I examine the origins of the flâneur and film to better understand the similarities and differences between the flâneur and the film audience, arguing that while the flâneur deliberately alienates himself in order to participate in this form of estrangement, the film audience is conditioned to participate in this estrangement.
Highlights
On December 28,1895, the Lumiere Brothers presented the first silent short film on Paris to the world
I examine the origins of the flâneur and film to better understand the similarities and differences between the flâneur and the film audience
With the introduction of films, people could view artists’ representations of objects through their paintings and objects in themselves as captured by the camera. This allowed for viewing things as they really were without having to worry about the artist’s interpretation; the photographic image or the film showed the objects as they appeared in “reality.” Film critic and theorist Andre Bazin writes that despite the effort of baroque art to give a “dramatic expression to the moment, a kind of psychic fourth dimension that could suggest life,” the human obsession with realism of movement was only satisfied by films (Bazin 11)
Summary
On December 28,1895, the Lumiere Brothers presented the first silent short film on Paris to the world. In attempting to answer this question, Stanley Cavell, in his book The World Viewed, argues that the origin of a modern figure, namely, the flâneur, can provide us with some insight as to why films appear natural to us.
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