Observing Film Art: Themes from the Work of David Bordwell

When David Bordwell died in 2024, he left behind a legacy of film scholarship and criticism whose influence is unmatched. Coauthor of a pair of textbooks adopted across the globe and the main force behind a blog read by thousands, Bordwell has influenced generations of film students, filmmakers, and film critics. Observing Film Art examines the breadth of Bordwell’s work through the perspectives of those who knew him best, collaborators, former students, and critics among them. This is the first collection devoted to the work of Bordwell, and it gives equal attention to each facet of his prodigious scholarship, structured to highlight his interest in theory, history, and analysis and criticism. The cornerstones of his approach to film study, including formalism, cognitivism, and historical poetics, are all examined in detail, as are key works, including The Classical Hollywood Cinema (coauthored with Kristin Thompson and Janet Staiger) and Narration in the Fiction Film.