On the History of a Film Aesthetic Concept: Découpage

Unlike editing, découpage does not take place after the film has been shot, but before. The French term refers to the breakdown of a scene into a sequence of shots. In order to translate the written screenplay into film language, cinematographers and directors employ a genuinely cinematic way of thinking-a thinking in sequences of moving images and sounds, including the camera setups, movements, and shot sizes. Découpage is thus crucial in shaping a film's specific form. Using the tools of conceptual history, Guido Kirsten traces the term's evolution from its emergence in the 1910s through the eventful film history of the twentieth century until its recent rediscovery. By differentiating layers of meaning and discussing important shifts in the concept's evolution, this book improves the understanding of key film theoretical texts, whose meaning has been distorted by mistranslation, and shows how a deeper reflection of découpage promises to enrich the analysis of contemporary moving image media.

Guido Kirsten teaches film and media studies. His research interests include: aesthetics of moving images, representations of social class, and the history of film theory. He is the author of Filmischer Realismus (2013) and co-editor of Christian Metz and the Codes of Cinema (2018) and Precarity in European Film (2022).

Preface, Introduction, Chapter 1: From the Emergence of Varieties of the Concept to the Question of Authorship, Chapter 2: The Further Development of the Concept in Sound Film and Découpage as écriture, Chapter 3: The Gradual Displacement of the Concept, Chapter 4: The Revival and Reevaluation of Découpage, Conclusion, Index