The Medium Matters! In Defense of Medium-Specificity in Classical Film Theory

Abstract

Abstract The doctrine of medium specificity holds that a medium can do something that other media cannot, or that they cannot do as well, and it has a long history in the theory, criticism, and practice of the arts. The first film theorists, who today are often referred to as classical film theorists, embraced medium specificity in their attempt to demonstrate that film is a legitimate art as great as, or perhaps greater than, the other arts. They believed that, in order for cinema to be accepted as a genuine art, they had to show that cinema can do certain things better than the other arts or that the other arts couldn’t do at all. Thus they set about identifying specific features of film that putatively distinguished it as a medium from other media. Today, medium specificity is a controversial doctrine, and has been subjected to powerful, sustained criticism by Noël Carroll, who has targeted its use in classical film theory. Yet, medium specificity has recently enjoyed a resurgence in film theorizing due, in part, to the advent of digital filmmaking. In this chapter, I claim that Carroll’s hostility to medium specificity in classical film theory is due to the unwarranted conflation of medium specificity with a related but logically distinct doctrine, namely, medium essentialism. Once the two are untangled, I show, medium specificity can be defended against its detractors such as Carroll, whose real and legitimate target, I suggest, is medium essentialism.