Masculine Singular is an original interpretation of French New Wave cinema by one of France's leading feminist film scholars. While most criticism of the New Wave has concentrated on the filmmakers and their films, Genevieve Sellier focuses on the social and cultural turbulence of the cinema's formative years, from 1957 to 1962. The New Wave filmmakers were members of a young generation emerging on the French cultural scene, eager to acquire sexual and economic freedom. Almost all of them were men, and they "wrote" in the masculine first-person singular, often using male protagonists as stand-ins for themselves. In their films, they explored relations between men and women, and they expressed ambivalence about the new liberated woman. Sellier argues that gender relations and the construction of sexual identities were the primary subject of New Wave cinema.Sellier draws on sociological surveys, box office data, and popular magazines of the period, as well as analyses of specific New Wave films. She examines the development of the New Wave movement, its sociocultural and economic context, and the popular and critical reception of such well-known films as Jules et Jim and Hiroshima mon amour. In light of the filmmakers' focus on gender relations, Sellier reflects on the careers of New Wave's iconic female stars, including Jeanne Moreau and Brigitte Bardot. Sellier's thorough exploration of early New Wave cinema culminates in her contention that its principal legacy-the triumph of a certain kind of cinephilic discourse and of an "auteur theory" recognizing the director as artist-came at a steep price: creativity was reduced to a formalist game, and affirmation of New Wave cinema's modernity was accompanied by an association of creativity with masculinity.

In The Battle of the Sexes in French Cinema, 1930-1956, Noel Burch and Genevieve Sellier adopt a sociocultural approach to films made in France before, during, and after World War II, paying particular attention to the Occupation years (1940-44). The authors contend that the films produced from the 1930s until 1956-when the state began to subsidize the movie industry, facilitating the emergence of an "auteur cinema"-are important, both as historical texts and as sources of entertainment.Citing more than 300 films and providing many in-depth interpretations, Burch and Sellier argue that films made in France between 1930 and 1956 created a national imaginary that equated masculinity with French identity. They track the changing representations of masculinity, explaining how the strong patriarch who saved fallen or troubled women from themselves in prewar films gave way to the impotent, unworthy, or incapable father figure of the Occupation. After the Liberation, the patriarch reemerged as protector and provider alongside assertive women who figured as threats not only to themselves but to society as a whole.

Masculine Singular is an original interpretation of French New Wave cinema by one of France's leading feminist film scholars. While most criticism of the New Wave has concentrated on the filmmakers and their films, Genevieve Sellier focuses on the social and cultural turbulence of the cinema's formative years, from 1957 to 1962. The New Wave filmmakers were members of a young generation emerging on the French cultural scene, eager to acquire sexual and economic freedom. Almost all of them were men, and they "wrote" in the masculine first-person singular, often using male protagonists as stand-ins for themselves. In their films, they explored relations between men and women, and they expressed ambivalence about the new liberated woman. Sellier argues that gender relations and the construction of sexual identities were the primary subject of New Wave cinema.Sellier draws on sociological surveys, box office data, and popular magazines of the period, as well as analyses of specific New Wave films. She examines the development of the New Wave movement, its sociocultural and economic context, and the popular and critical reception of such well-known films as Jules et Jim and Hiroshima mon amour. In light of the filmmakers' focus on gender relations, Sellier reflects on the careers of New Wave's iconic female stars, including Jeanne Moreau and Brigitte Bardot. Sellier's thorough exploration of early New Wave cinema culminates in her contention that its principal legacy-the triumph of a certain kind of cinephilic discourse and of an "auteur theory" recognizing the director as artist-came at a steep price: creativity was reduced to a formalist game, and affirmation of New Wave cinema's modernity was accompanied by an association of creativity with masculinity.

English summary: The author explores the entire work of fiction by the filmmaker Jean Gremillon. After directing a number of documentaries during the 1920s, many now lost, he had his first substantial success with the dramatic feature Maldone in 1928. Over the next quarter-century, he directed twenty more feature films, of which he is best known for five made between 1937 and 1944. This volume showcases the consistency, richness, and especially the modernity of these movies. During his time, Gremillon was the only one to propose diverse and complex female characters, as well as a subtle exploration of the relationships between men and women. French text. French description: Apres les debuts remarquables dans les annees 1920 (Maldone, Gardiens de phare), Jean Gremillon tourne au debut du parlant La Petite Lise, Dainah la metises, puis s'exile avant de retrouver le succes avec Gueule d'amour en 1936, L'Etrange Monsieur Victor, Remorques, Lumiere d'ete et Le Ciel est a vous (1944). Ces quatre films temoignent d'une maitrise remarquable tant dans la direction d'acteurs que dans la mise en scene visuelle et sonore. Son dernier film de fiction, L'Amour d'une femme (1954), exprime un engagement qu'on peut qualifier de feministe. Gremillon meurt prematurement en 1959. Genevieve Sellier explore l'ensemble de l'uvre de fiction du cineaste en montrant sa coherence, sa richesse et surtout sa modernite: a son epoque, Gremillon est le seul a proposer des figures feminines aussi diverses et aussi complexes, et une exploration aussi fine des relations entre hommes et femmes.