| Stanley Cavell(1926-2018)was a contemporary American philosopher and one of the foremost scholars of film studies in English-language philosophy(Anglophone philosophy).Cavell' s philosophy is characterized by its resistance to the split between the Anglo-American and continental traditions,advocating the reduction of the interference of conceptualizing factors with philosophical cognition in everyday life,and insists the inclusion of cultural and artistic studies in the realm of philosophical inquiry.He explored language,skepticism,and interpretation from the perspective of the language philosophy,and made ontological and ethical issues a central issue of universal significance,which he used to integrate into his studies of culture and film.Cavell therefore is considered a contemporary philosopher with the spirit of "humanism" and "modernism".?Cavell inherited the spirit of classic realist film theory to constantly value the significance of real life,and excelled in exploring the relationship between film and human nature,film and the world from a philosophical perspective.He proposed that the inner structure of cinema is inherently ideological and philosophical,and formed an ontology of cinema and a view of genre development based on the characteristics of the medium,giving "philosophical legitimacy" ?to the film medium itself and to the act of interpretation of cinema,which initiated the philosophical turn in film studies,and as such he is generally regarded as an outstanding representative of the philosophical study of film by the academia.At the same time,as a contemporary mainstream philosopher who made important contributions to the film discipline,Cavell played a leading role in the establishment of film as an institutional discipline in the United States.? In the current era with increasingly complex media issues and unprecedented attention on films,"his theories have been an important guide to the practice of film criticism and have influenced and even shaped contemporary Western philosophical and artistic thought".?Cavel's film philosophy was formed at a time when classic Hollywood cinema and New Hollywood cinema were overlapping and when French film theory was entering the American academia in the 1960s and 1970s.Therefore,his argument neutralized New Hollywood cinema's reflection on art forms and classic Hollywood cinema's representation of American life,and greatly contributed to the integration of European film theory with Hollywood film culture.With the analysis of the film medium as the core of his theory,Cavell advocated a view of cinema as philosophy.This view did not receive sufficient attention in the 1970s and 1980s when "film as language" was prevalent,and it was only after the digital film era that it gained traction.It became the main source of the Film as Philosophy school of thought,providing theoretical support for redefining the concept of film ontology;at the same time,his view of film genre is also a guide and practical reference for the highly commercialized contemporary film industry.From an overview of Cavell's film writings,we can find that his film philosophy consists of two main parts:first,film ontology,i.e.,the structure and characteristics of the film medium itself and the meaning it produces;second,the aesthetic presentation of film ontology and meaning,i.e.,genre analysis and criticism of Hollywood films.In order to present Cavell's philosophical thought on film in its entirety,this dissertation takes the core issues of these two parts as the support point,explores the inner connections among them,organizes the views on how to understand the meaning of film scattered in Cavell's writings,and identifies and summarizes his position and characteristics of film interpretation criticism,and uses them as the connection and extension between the main contents of film ontology and genre criticism,forming a complete logical chain.Based on this idea,the general framework of this dissertation is set as follows.The introductory section briefly describes the origin of this study,the purpose of the study,the ideas and the main research methods.Cavell proposes that the internal logic of film itself makes it autonomous and ideological,and this view leads the ongoing philosophical turn in film studies,which is of great theoretical significance;from the perspective of the development process of film theory,Cavell's film philosophy belongs to the contemporary film theory of "ontology 2" stage and has a special status and research value and is worthy of systematic research and study.His film philosophy theory went to public in the early 1970s,but it did not receive much attention from the academic community because of its research perspective and methodology did not conform to the trend of film research dominated by structuralism at that time.After the 1980s,especially after entering the digital age,Cavell's ontology of film,with "projection" as its core,has received more and more academic attention,which precisely reflects the foresight of his film philosophy.However,on the whole,academic research on Cavell's film philosophy is fragmented and lacks a systematic and holistic study of his theory.In this paper,after surveying and compiling domestic and foreign literature,I plan to conduct a theoretical study of Cavell's film philosophy as a whole,and to separately discuss and construct the internal logical relationships among the three main aspects of his film ontology,film genre and film interpretation criticism,so as to systematically analyze and present the main views and theoretical framework of his film philosophyThe second chapter elaborates Cavell' s views on the ontology of the film medium.After comparing Cavell' s view with Bazin' s "ontology of the photographic image," the first section focuses on the difference between the "photographic" and"projection" devices.After focusing on the difference between "photography" and"projection" devices,the essay summarizes Cavell's ontological description based on"a series of automatic projections of the world" and points out that his ontology of cinema is based on "projection" devices and the phenomenological relations they generate.The second section analyzes the characteristics of the film medium from the core concept of the "automatism" of film,explaining that film is "automatic","unidirectional" and "self-referential".The third section analyzes the real world presented by the film medium,pointing out that the world in Cavell's films is a phenomenological space.The content of this section is a central part of Cavell's film theory,and the ideas in it are reflected in his later practice of film criticism.The third chapter analyzes Cavell's views on the interpretation of cinema.This chapter is a transitional section from film ontology to film criticism,and its function is to present how Cavell combines the ontological properties of the film medium with the act and experience of viewing film,providing a theoretical basis for understanding his later studies of Hollywood film.It begins with a discussion of how film produces meaning for the viewer,noting that film produces meaning through the cognitive acts of "acknowledgement" and "empathic projection" and points to Cavell's dual reliance on intuitive and argumentative approaches in his interpretation of film.Although Cavell does not systematically argue that film texts and philosophical texts are identical,he seeks to illustrate the philosophical nature of the act of film interpretation from a methodological perspective.The third section illustrates the ethical character of Cavell's film interpretation,pointing out that his interpretation and criticism are ultimately bounded by the local reality of existence,and his universal philosophical pursuit is anchored in concrete ethical relations.Chapter 4 discusses Cavell's view of "cinema as a medium".Cavell's generalization of film genres is in fact a presentation of the self-development of the cinematic subject in its cultural environment.By introducing Cavell's interpretation of the concept of "genre genre",his perception of "genre as media",and analyzing his criticism of "the comedy of remarriage" and "melodrama of the unknown woman",this chapter presents the practicality and theoretical foresight of Cavell's view on film genre and explores the social and cultural dimension of Cavell's cinematic interpretation which further reveals how Cavell value "humanity"Chapter 5 and the conclusion analyzes the acceptance,theoretical significance and limitations of Cavell's film theory.First,it is pointed out that Cavell's film theory has not become mainstream due to the influence of historical context and academic discourse system,as well as the limitation of his own presentation style.However,the cross-disciplinary system also makes Cavell's theory have its own position and value.Cavell's understanding of the film medium itself fits well with the current context of the film industry and film research,and is a reference for understanding the increasingly new forms of video media.It brings a broader methodological scope and interpretation to contemporary film theory research.The concluding section first briefly reviews the main content of this paper.Then,it concludes that the paper has achieved some results in clarifying Cavell's concept of film ontology,summarizing Cavell's views on the properties of film medium,analyzing Cavell's view of film interpretation through his ethical thought,and evaluating Cavell's film philosophy as a whole.In this paper,Cavell's ontology of cinema is translated into an understanding of cinema as a whole and an exploration of the functionality of film apparatuses.This is the core point for a comparison with the"photographic" ontological viewpoint.On the basis of the significance given to the film apparatuses,this paper summarizes the characteristics of film medium,and uses them as an important reference for further understanding Cavell's film interpretation and criticism.At the same time,the humanistic features in his interpretive criticism have their own unique ethical sources,which are explained in this paper with film-critical cases.In addition,the paper evaluates Cavell's film philosophy in a comprehensive manner,and includes his controversial methodology as part of his film philosophy,pointing out that his intention is not to set any judgmental standards,but to create a path of thought that leads from film to philosophical perception.Finally,it is pointed out that this paper has not yet placed Cavell's film philosophy in the comprehensive context of the parallel development and intertwined influence of film theory and philosophical theory,and that the scope of Cavell's film philosophy still needs to be further defined;in addition,a horizontal comparison between Cavell and other scholars in the film philosophy school will also help to clarify the originality and inheritance of his views,which is also the direction and goal of my future research. |
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