When the influential French film theorist Andre Bazin is mentioned, an image of an asymptote, a curve which gradually approaches a straight line but which meets it only at infinity will automatically conjures up in my mind. By that asymptote Bazin actually means a images for the relation between film and reality. (pp 339.
As one of the most sincere and substantial defender of realism in the cinema, Bazin believes that films should represent the reality of ordinary people's life and social change, and the primary function of showing the spectator the real world. By elaborating the objectivity of photography as the rescuer of painting from the obsession of realism, he argued that cinema shared that objectivity in time. (Bazin, 1967:10) Realizing there can only be a representation of reality, and the functions of films as making of 'an ideal world in the likeness of the real world', believing that the essential aim of filmmaking is the representation of the real world, he argues that the film, in order to fulfill its destiny of remaking the real world, will inevitably have to apply certain styles and techniques.
André Bazin on the cover of the third volume of t...
Atelier de Bazin
English: Rene BazinHe claimed that the need to apply artifice to give the illusion of transparency generated a creative tension that was crucial to the work of art. (pp 339. The cinema book) He argued that that films can only be understood through an understanding of their styles. (Bazin, 1980:35) and therefore the techniques and styles are quite crucial.
Characteristic of Bazin's theory is the complication of his argument, as he realized realism has different forms. When we come to the crucial question of: Through which artifice can film fulfill its destiny of remaking the real world? (As there are different applications to different artifices) We have to consider it in a larger context of...