Where Film Meets Philosophy

Closely reading the films of Jean-Luc Godard and Alain Resnais, Hunter Vaughan establishes a connection between phenomenology and image-philosophy to analyze the moving image and its challenge to conventional modes of thought. Striving to establish a clear foundation for the recent field of inquiry called ¿film-philosophy,¿ he devises a systematic theory of film¿s philosophical function and its deconstruction of classic oppositional concepts, such as subject and object, real and imaginary, and interior and exterior. After merging Maurice Merleau-Ponty¿s theory of subject-object relations with Gilles Deleuze¿s image-philosophy, Vaughan applies this rich framework to a comparative analysis of Godard and Resnais. Situating the formative works of these filmmakers within a broader philosophical context, Vaughan pioneers a phenomenological film semiotics that reconciles two disparate methodologies and joins them to the achievements of two seemingly oppositional artists.