November 2009, nr 315
I have always believed there are two kinds of cinephiles. The first kind is the more public, and the better known: the critic-cinephile. This is the person who writes, speaks, teaches, publishes; the person who sorts through films, connecting and analysing them. Traditionally, our culture of training and learning has elevated the critic, and become nervous when his or her position is threatened by the changing scheme of things - hence the many forums and discussions (some of them rather old-fashioned) at the present time on 'the function of criticism'. Film critics (as we hear constantly at the moment) are an imperilled species, on the verge of extinction - and many smart people take this to be one symptom of a general crisis in culture.
But I wonder whether this is really true. For there is another kind of cinephile who has always existed alongside the critic, and in fact far outnumbers him or her: what I call the cheerleader-cinephile. This cheerleader is not an analyst, not usually a teacher or broadcaster. Perhaps they are not very gregarious at all. Where a critic always seeks conversation (or an opportunity to deliver a monologue) after a film screening, the cheerleader may slink away in rapt silence. Where a critic hoards serious books, the cheerleader prefers accumulating colourful posters, postcards, even celebrity signatures (at least if the celebrity is, say, Anna Karina).
And where a critic tries to write serious books (if anybody will publish them anymore), the committed cheerleader is more prone to work for or start up a specialist DVD distribution company, just as they used to buy (and cautiously lend out) rare 16mm prints. The cheerleader is more like the art lover who actually buys paintings and adores them on their wall, rather than the art critic who runs off to nut out an appreciation of the work stored in memory or reproduced in a glossy magazine.
I am not using this word cheerleader in the derogatory way that Harold Bloom wielded it in his 1994 book The Western Canon - as a term for those who barrack for fashionable causes. No, cheerleader-cinephiles cultivate a life-long support for the pieces of cinema that they deeply, devotedly love - and the audiences for Film Festivals and Cinematheques the world over would be far smaller without them.
What has the Internet done to the universe of film appreciation? It has not necessarily decimated the critics - but it has definitely increased the visibility of the cheerleaders. In fact, perhaps 80 per cent of the best websites (blogs, magazines, etc) devoted to cinema are cheerleading in nature. Cheeleaders write little, but they link a lot, to texts and to images; sometimes, they also perform the invaluable labour of cross-cultural translation.
This does not mean that we think any less of critics today, or pay less attention to them. The Jonathan Rosenbaums or Roger Eberts (take your pick according to taste and sensibility) effortlessly retain their authority as experts, historians and pundits - in fact, their circle of influence has expanded far beyond what an Andrew Sarris or a Serge Daney enjoyed in their mainly local, parochial milieux of New York or Paris in the '60s, '70s or '80s. What has changed is simply the economy or balance of the cinephile community, at least as it presents itself publicly to the contemporary, wired world. Hail to the cheerleaders!
To be continued...
Adrian Martin
