Cinema and Experience: Siegfried Kracauer, Walter Benjamin, and Theodor W. Adorno (Weimar and Now: German Cultural Criticism)

Weimar and Now: German Cultural Criticism #44

by Miriam Bratu Hansen, Edward Dimendberg (Editor)

Siegfried Kracauer, Walter Benjamin, and Theodor W. Adorno―affiliated through friendship, professional ties, and argument―developed an astute philosophical critique of modernity in which technological media played a key role. This book explores in depth their reflections on cinema and photography from the Weimar period up to the 1960s. Miriam Bratu Hansen brings to life an impressive archive of known and, in the case of Kracauer, less known materials and reveals surprising perspectives on canonic texts, including Benjamin’s artwork essay. Her lucid analysis extrapolates from these writings the contours of a theory of cinema and experience that speaks to questions being posed anew as moving image culture evolves in response to digital technology.

Genres: Film, Philosophy, Theory, History, Art, Sociology, Nonfiction

406 pages, Hardcover

First published September 4, 2011

About the author

Miriam Hansen was a film historian who made important contributions to the study of early cinema and mass culture.

Reviews

[nick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hansen's glosses on the Frankfurt School are liable to make your head hurt—essays and concepts you thought you knew get exploded, complicated, taken apart and put back together. But when you recover from the overload, these thinkers become workable ("actual") in new ways. In that sense they're less glosses than extensions, redemptions. Call it necromancy: forcing the dead to speak for the future.

[Mary Billyou · Rating 5 out of 5]

big fan of kracauer!

[Bill · Rating 3 out of 5]

I learned more concepts and vocabulary in the first 20 pages than I did in the past 20 books.

The insight into critical theory and into film theory was of personal interest to me. (Plus I loved Kracauer's "From Caligari to Hitler" when I read it in college -- so I was motivated to revisit that pleasant experience.)

In the final analysis (as Harvey Goldberg constantly said) the book KO'd me. I re-read the first 20 pages and found them much more understandable the second time, but I threw in the towel and admitted that I don't have sufficient foundation to really make use of this book. Or, as Miriam might have written: I don't have the discursive horizon for the book's immanent value.

Some day I'll get back to it though!!!

4 stars for dense content; 2 stars for how much I "liked" it.

[Nathan L · Rating 5 out of 5]

Considering its depth, this book is not the easiest read for someone new to film studies--especially those who are unfamiliar with the primary cinema-related texts of Kracauer, Benjamin, and Adorno. However, I hope that doesn't discourage anyone from picking it up. It is an excellent survey of three very interesting thinkers and will likely become a must read for any serious film scholar.