Aesthetic evaluation and film

Andrew Klevan is Associate Professor of Film Studies at the University of Oxford. He is the author of Barbara Stanwyck (2013), Film Performance: From Achievement to Appreciation (2005) and Disclosure of the Everyday: Undramatic Achievement in Narrative Film (2000).

• IntroductionPART I: What is evaluative aesthetics?1.1 The origin and definition of aesthetics1.2 The aesthetic attitude1.3 Aesthetic taste1.4 Sensory immediacy1.5 Aesthetic pleasure1.6 Seeking agreement1.7 Imagination1.8 Aesthetic appreciation1.9 Form and style1.10 Aesthetic qualities1.11 SpecificityPART II: What is aesthetic criticism?2.1 Evaluation2.2 Understanding and interpretation2.3 Perception2.4 Experience2.5 Particularity and responsiveness2.6 Description and analysis2.7 Close reading2.8 Comparison, category, and context2.9 Intention, achievement, and skill2.10 Evaluative criteria2.11 Reasons, argument, and objectivity2.12 Subjectivity, contingency, and the relationalPART III: The aesthetic evaluation of film3.1 Medium3.2 Constraint3.3 Convention3.4 Choice and expectation3.5 Encouraging perceptual activity3.6 Prominence3.7 Pattern3.8 RelationA note on pedagogyBibliographyFilmographyIndex

‘This book is a Film as Film for our times. But it is also more than that. Film and cultural studies are increasingly focused on knowing the price of everything in their disciplinary turns towards media-industry studies, and a book that brings genuine and rigorous illumination to questions of value and the skills of evaluation is more necessary than ever. Andrew Klevan’s study of evaluative aesthetics and the practices of aesthetic criticism and evaluation of film succeeds magisterially in its aim of being sufficiently general to apply to all types of films, as well as to cultural forms beyond cinema and screen media, too. It also affords great clarity, perspicacity and detail to its central concepts and cinematic concerns. The chapters on film-focused examples of aesthetic criticism – “the practical wing of evaluative aesthetics” – are more than worth the cover price alone. A complete and, above all, deeply useful tour de force on behalf of the film-critical endeavour.’Professor Catherine Grant, Birkbeck, University of London‘I cannot overestimate how important and timely this book is for the still-nascent discipline of film aesthetics. The study does a remarkable job in carving out a space for scholarly work in criticism and aesthetic evaluation, both in general and specifically in relation to film, setting out the essential concepts and principles of this field with incisive reference to key thinkers and critics. One particular strength is the clarity with which concepts are outlined and illustrated with examples of criticism. Another is the way those textual examples are concisely and deftly queried, refined or built upon, so that the book becomes not just an overview but a model of critical engagement in itself. This will make it essential reading for students taking classes in criticism and aesthetics, and a touchstone for academics working in the area of film style.’ Dr Alex Clayton, University of Bristol