'Georges Franju' is the fullest study to date of this little-known French director, the co-founder of the Cinémathèque française, and the first book on him in English since 1967.
Born in 1912, but only enjoying his real debut as a director in 1948 with his notorious documentary about Parisian abattoirs 'Le Sang des bêtes', Franju went on to make thirteen more courts métrages and eight longs métrages, including his horror classic 'Les Yeux sans visage'. Ince takes a new approach to Franju's films, investigating the areas of genre and gender, and grouping the films thematically rather than chronologically. A chapter on Franju's cinematic aesthetics offers a new synthesis of existing writings, combined with the author's responses to the films. A full introduction and conclusion set Franju's directorial career in the context of his lifelong commitment to France's cinema institutions.
'Georges Franju' will be essential reading on Franju, and of great interest to researchers, academics and students in film studies
Series Editors' Foreword
Acknowledgements
Preface
Introduction
1. Documenting modernity: Franju's cinema in the age of the 'court métrage'
2. Beyond 'cinéma fantastique': The genres of Franju's 'longs métrages'
3. 'Mise en scène' and the art of the real: Franju's cinematic aesthetics
4. Surviving the reign of the father: Gender, the family and eroticism
Conclusion
Filmography
Select bibliography
Index
Kate Ince is Senior Lecturer in French and Gender Studies at the University of Birmingham