Papers by Joseph Hardwick
Un.siting French Studies
Australian Journal of French Studies, Apr 11, 2023
Keeping it together and falling apart in Simone de Beauvoir's La Femme rompue
Thevague nouvelleand theNouvelle Vague:The Critical Construction ofle jeune cinéma français
Modern & Contemporary France, Feb 1, 2008
One of the commonplaces in critical writing on the 1990s movement known as le jeune cinéma frança... more One of the commonplaces in critical writing on the 1990s movement known as le jeune cinéma français is the idea that it constituted a new ‘New Wave’. At the same time, the critical reception of the 1990s and 1960s ‘new waves’ could not be more different, with le jeune cinéma français being seen invariably as aesthetically inferior to its 1960s ‘antecedent’. This article examines the two key discursive mechanisms used to link le jeune cinéma français to the Nouvelle Vague, those of political commitment and ‘auteur’ cinema. It is argued that the mechanisms used to construct le jeune cinéma français as a distinct cinematic category become increasingly divorced from the kinds of films actually being made and that it is this discursive disjuncture which is, in part, responsible for its negative critical reception.
Australian Journal of French Studies, Apr 1, 2017
The transnational in French cinema has largely been examined in terms of the industry's relation ... more The transnational in French cinema has largely been examined in terms of the industry's relation to Hollywood. This article, through a reading of the French-Israeli coproduction Tu n'aimeras point (2009) by Haim Tabakman, will ask what the transnational means when Hollywood is not in the frame. Three kinds of "trans" will be discussed. The first is how the transnational is read in writing on French cinema. The second is translation: how the film travels to reach a wider audience. The third is the transformative. Eyes Wide Open recounts several months in the life of Aaron, a kosher butcher whose life in transformed when he welcomes the outsider Ezri as his apprentice. In reading Tabakman's film in relation to transnational genres, it will be argued that the film can teach us something about the French transnational through the themes it explores: stagnation and mobility, hospitality and hostility. 1 For example, the film is described as: "un film germano-franco-israélien" by Wikipédia
Australian Journal of French Studies, 2016
Distance and proximity: two concepts which refer to the space, literal or metaphoric, between two... more Distance and proximity: two concepts which refer to the space, literal or metaphoric, between two things, two beings, two moments in time. The terms mean to stand apart and to be near; yet, the literal and ostensibly spatial nature of the terms quickly yields to their many figural uses. The easy slippage between the literal and metaphoric, the spatial and temporal, means that the two terms, however banal and transparent they may appear at first, belie a hidden complexity which invites us to see similarity in difference, and difference in similarity. This article explores how the two terms function across time in French and Francophone Studies in Australia and presents the complexities that arise in the articles gathered together in this special number of AJFS. Distance and proximity: two concepts which refer to the space, literal or metaphoric, between two things, two beings, two moments in time. Etymologically, the words derive respectively from the Latin terms distare, to stand apart, and proximitas, or nearness. Yet the literal and ostensibly spatial nature of the terms quickly yields to their many figurative uses: for example, to signal an affective or relational éloignement or rapprochement, as in un cousin lointain, une amie proche, prendre ses distances, or again, to signify relative danger or safety, as in garder à distance, garder proche, à une distance sûre, dangereusement proche. Moreover, it is not just the spatial but the temporal that is so often inscribed in these terms: un passé lointain, un futur lointain, un futur proche. The easy slippage between the literal and metaphoric, the spatial and temporal, means that the two terms, however banal and transparent they may appear at first, belie a hidden complexity. Not only is each term marked by the other, but they are perhaps not as far apart as we think: "in the long term, proximity creates a strange kind of distance", writes Quebec journalist
So Over the Rainbow? The Singular Plurality of Martineau and Ducastel’s Drôle de Félix
BRILL eBooks, 2011
Hexagonal Variations provides an essential overview of key debates about contemporary French soci... more Hexagonal Variations provides an essential overview of key debates about contemporary French society and culture. Concise, challenging and comprehensive, its chapters each address the processes of change and redefinition that characterise France today. ...
Continuum: Journal of Media & Cultural Studies, Mar 1, 2005
In 1994, the prestigious French film journal Cahiers du cinéma featured a six-page article writte... more In 1994, the prestigious French film journal Cahiers du cinéma featured a six-page article written by journalist Serge Grünberg on the state of the Australian film industry, a relatively rare extended cross-cultural examination of Australian cinema and cinematic culture by a French film critic (Grünberg, 1994, pp. 72-77). The article in Cahiers was seen to be of such significance that an English translation of it in its entirety was published by Australia's Metro magazine shortly after (Grünberg, 1994/1995, pp. 27-31). Several months later, Metro also published an essay by Australian French studies academic Amanda Macdonald entitled 'French film-crit takes a holiday: Les Cahiers do desert-island discourse'. Macdonald's article offered a very persuasive and detailed critique of both Grünberg's examination of the Australian film industry and its translation of the ways in which they 'participate[d] in a longstanding French discursive habit of mythologising Australia as the vast desert island of the South Pacific' (Macdonald, 1995, p. 57). Grünberg's article is nonetheless noteworthy in that it underlines the potential benefits to be derived from closer cultural exchange between the French and Australian film industries, not only because of the reliance of both on government subsidies but significantly because of the artistic potential evident in the films of emerging young Australian directors which Grünberg believed would be of interest to French cinemagoers (Grünberg, 1994, p. 77). It is perhaps no coincidence that he was particularly interested in the work of young Australian filmmakers at the time, because up and coming directors in France had similarly become responsible for a considerable slice of
Speaking ill: The language of sickness in Albert Camus' The Plague
Le je(u) de l'actrice : role-play and rebirth in Roch Stephanik's Stand-by (2000)
Essays in French Literature and Culture, Nov 1, 2013
Roch Stephanik's 2000 film 'Stand-by' recounts the story of Helene, a thirty-somethin... more Roch Stephanik's 2000 film 'Stand-by' recounts the story of Helene, a thirty-something woman so traumatised by her husband's dumping her before they are to board a flight to Buenos Aires that she cannot bring herself to leave Orly airport. In the months that follow, Helene transforms herself into Helena, a prostitute who takes her clients to nearby airport hotels. In this article, I will read Helene in relation to other mobile urban women in French literature and cinema, from Baudelaire's flaneur poetry to the mobile cinematic characters in films such as Agnes Varda's 'Cleo de 5 a 7' and Claire Denis's 'Vendredi soir'. More specifically, I will examine the recurrent motifs of glass and/or mirrors in 'Stand-by' and in those two films, and their relationship to notions of mobility, identity and transformation. I will argue that Orly airport functions not as a space of transit, but as a space of transition and of re-birth. With reference to the work of Ross Chambers, Marc Auge and Michel de Certeau, I will examine how role-play is a major factor in Helene's self-empowerment, a transformation which will eventually allow her to leave the airport on her own terms.
Australian Journal of French Studies, Sep 1, 2004
Since 1997, three studies have been published in France on le jeune cinéma français, a term used ... more Since 1997, three studies have been published in France on le jeune cinéma français, a term used to read together the significant number of French films directed by up and coming film-makers since the beginning of the 1990s. In the books by Claude-Marie Trémois 1 and René Prédal, 2 and the collection of articles edited by Michel Marie 3 devoted to this topic, le jeune cinéma français is seen as a loose grouping of films which show quite a deal of diversity in terms of subject-matter, themes and cinematic style. As Jean-Pierre Jeancolas has written, le jeune cinéma français "n'est pas une école, pas un bloc, mais un mouvement aux contours flous, dont la définition, les critères de définition, varient d'un commentateur à l'autre". 4 Generally, though, the age of the director is used as a defining criterion for inclusion in the group, with Prédal pointing out that the majority of debut films since the 1990s have been directed by jeunes cinéastes, 5 while the margins of Marie's collection of essays include a dictionary of filmmakers born from the late 1950s onwards. 6 The films similarly feature young protagonists and tend to be intensely personal, with Prédal using terms such as "(d)es films à la première personne, un cinéma du moi exacerbé" 7 to designate a certain strand of films within the grouping, indicating that the question of identity is one of their primary concerns. Because of their intimate nature, they have also been seen as a particular kind of auteur cinema, with all three major studies of le jeune cinéma français insisting on the auteur approach to varying extents. The word auteur here is really to be understood in two different
Undressed to kill: knowing, reading and connecting in Alain Guiraudie’s <i>homme fatal</i> thriller <i>L’Inconnu du lac</i>
French screen studies, Mar 4, 2022
Be my guest: Invitation to a re-reading of Simone de Beauvoir's L'invitee
Reframing the Periphery: Narrative Authority and Self-Reflexivity in Mathieu Kassovitz’s <i>La Haine</i> 1I gratefully acknowledge the support of Barbara Hanna, Juliana de Nooy, the UQ Arts article development scheme and the Nottingham-Trent University visiting scholars program in the preparation...
Australian Journal of French Studies, May 1, 2015
This article takes a narratological approach in examining how Mathieu Kassovitz’s La Haine (1995)... more This article takes a narratological approach in examining how Mathieu Kassovitz’s La Haine (1995) establishes itself as an authoritative voice in framing the banlieue. It argues that framing is essential in establishing the film’s narrative authority, the idea that it is recounted from a position of experience. To do so, the film juggles two contradictory narrative impulses: a sense of critical distance which propels the film to its finale; and an emphasis on what Ross Chambers would call loiterliness, as the film tracks the wanderings of its trio of protagonists. By concentrating on three key storytelling sequences—the opening and closing voiceovers, as well as a story told by an elderly Jewish man which will be read self-reflexively—it will be argued that the key means through which the film adopts an insider’s perspective is through its affinity with Hubert, a character often overlooked in writing on the film.
<i>(Rétro)projections</i> : French Cinema in the Twenty-First Century. The Bodily and the Political
Australian Journal of French Studies, Sep 1, 2008
Un.siting French Studies
Australian Journal of French Studies
Dealing with difference: The transition to university french
Undressed to kill: knowing, reading and connecting in Alain Guiraudie’s homme fatal thriller L’Inconnu du lac (2013)
French Screen Studies, 2022
Speaking ill: The language of sickness in Albert Camus' The Plague
Keeping it together and falling apart in Simone de Beauvoir's La Femme rompue
Regards troublants. Texte, intertexte et cadrages generiques dans Nettoyage a sec d'Anne Fontaine (1997)
To pay tribute to the work of Professor Anne Freadman, twenty-three specialists explore the quest... more To pay tribute to the work of Professor Anne Freadman, twenty-three specialists explore the question of genre. This volume focuses on teaching, and in particular the teaching of indigenous or foreign languages, semiotics, linguistics, and literature.
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Papers by Joseph Hardwick