William Rothman (born June 25, 1944) is an American film theorist and critic. Since receiving his Ph.D. in philosophy from Harvard University in 1974, he has authored numerous books, including ''Hitchcock: The Murderous Gaze'' (1982), ''The “I” of the Camera: Essays in Film Criticism, History and Aesthetic'' (1988), and ''Tuitions and Intuitions: Essays at the Intersection of Film Criticism and Philosophy'' (2019).' He was "part of a modern wave of thinkers to apply questions of philosophy to the medium of movies" during the 1980s, and his work contributed to the emergence of the sub-discipline that has come to be known as “

film-philosophy ''Film-Philosophy'' is a peer-reviewed open-access academic journal covering the engagement between film studies and philosophy. The editor-in-chief is David Sorfa. See also * Linguistic film theory Linguistic film theory''The Dualist'Vols. 1– ...

.” Rothman has also written on aspects of film theory and on the writings of

Stanley Cavell Stanley Louis Cavell (; September 1, 1926 – June 19, 2018) was an American philosopher. He was the Walter M. Cabot Professor of Aesthetics and the General Theory of Value at Harvard University. He worked in the fields of ethics, aesthetics, an ...

, an American philosopher who made film a major focus of his work. He is currently Professor of Cinematic Arts in the School of Communication at the University of Miami.

Life

William Rothman received his Ph.D. from Harvard's Philosophy Department, where

was his dissertation advisor. After submitting his dissertation in 1973, he accepted a position as assistant professor in Cinema Studies at New York University. In 1976, a National Endowment for the Humanities grant brought him back to Harvard, "to develop a set of eight courses to the present curriculum in film and to develop new teaching and research tools...to help secure the humanistic incorporation of film into universities." In 1986, Rothman became Director of the International Honors Program on Film, Television and Social Change in Europe and Asia. In 1989, he and his wife, filmmaker Kitty Morgan, wrote and co-produced (with the National Film Development Corporation of India) ''Unni'', a 35mm feature film shot in South India and directed by the Indian filmmaker

G. Aravindan Govindan Aravindan (23 January 1935 – 15 March 1991) was an Indian film director, screenwriter, musician, cartoonist, and painter. He was one of the pioneers of parallel cinema in Malayalam. He was known for his unorthodox way of filmmak ...

. In 1990, Rothman relocated to Florida to be a professor in the Motion Picture Program (now the Department of Cinematic Arts) at the University of Miami, where he served as Director of the Graduate Program in Film Studies for several years. He was the founding editor of the "Harvard Film Studies" series at Harvard University Press, and also served as series editor for the "Cambridge Studies in Film" series at Cambridge University Press.

Writings

Rothman has published critical essays on films ranging from the works of

Alfred Hitchcock Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock (13 August 1899 – 29 April 1980) was an English filmmaker. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in the history of cinema. In a career spanning six decades, he directed over 50 featur ...

and other “classical” directors (e.g., George Cukor, John Ford,

Howard Hawks Howard Winchester Hawks (May 30, 1896December 26, 1977) was an American film director, producer and screenwriter of the classic Hollywood era. Critic Leonard Maltin called him "the greatest American director who is not a household name." A v ...

, Yasujiro Ozu,

Jean Renoir Jean Renoir (; 15 September 1894 – 12 February 1979) was a French film director, screenwriter, actor, producer and author. As a film director and actor, he made more than forty films from the silent film, silent era to the end of the 1960s. ...

, Billy Wilder) to more contemporary filmmakers (e.g.,

Chantal Akerman Chantal Anne Akerman (; 6 June 19505 October 2015) was a Belgian film director, screenwriter, artist, and Film studies, film professor at the City College of New York. She is best known for films such as ''Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 108 ...

, the

Dardenne brothers Brothers Jean-Pierre Dardenne (; born 21 April 1951) and Luc Dardenne (born 10 March 1954), collectively referred to as the Dardenne brothers, are a Belgian filmmaking duo. They write, produce, and direct their films together. The Dardennes b ...

Abbas Kiarostami Abbas Kiarostami ( fa, عباس کیارستمی ; 22 June 1940 – 4 July 2016) was an Iranian film director, screenwriter, poet, photographer, and film producer. An active filmmaker from 1970, Kiarostami had been involved in the production of ...

, Terrence Malick). In Rothman's first book, ''Hitchcock:'' ''The Murderous Gaze'' (1982), his stated goals were to achieve a philosophical perspective on Hitchcock's authorship and to investigate, philosophically, the ''conditions'' of authorship in film. In pursuit of these goals, he performed extended readings, incorporating over 600 frame enlargements of five Hitchcock films. His 1997 book ''Documentary Film Classics'' was part of a revival of scholarly interest in the subject, focusing on historically significant documentaries (from ''Nanook of the North'' and ''Land without Bread'' to ''Night and Fog,'' “direct cinema” films of

Richard Leacock Richard Leacock (18 July 192123 March 2011)
The Telegraph (Lon ...

and

D. A. Pennebaker Donn Alan Pennebaker (; July 15, 1925 – August 1, 2019) was an American documentary filmmaker and one of the pioneers of direct cinema. Performing arts and politics were his primary subjects. In 2013, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sci ...

, ethnographic films of Jean Rouch and Robert Gardner, and personal documentaries by

Alfred Guzzetti Alfred Guzzetti (born 1942) is a maker of documentary and experimental films and tapes. His work has been shown at the New York Film Festival, the Margaret Mead Festival, and other festivals in London, Rotterdam, Germany, Spain and France, as well ...

Ross McElwee Ross McElwee is an American documentary filmmaker known for his autobiographical films about his family and personal life, usually interwoven with an episodic journey that intersects with larger political or philosophical issues. His humorous an ...

and Edward Pincus). Rothman has also written on and edited collections of the writings of Cavell, which, according to scholar David LaRocca, have "helped the inheritance of Cavell’s relationship to film and thinking about film." Rothman's later work focused on the implications of the affinities between Cavell's way of thinking and that of Ralph Waldo Emerson, a moral and philosophical outlook Cavell named “Emersonian perfectionism.”

Books

* ''Hitchcock—The Murderous Gaze'', Harvard University Press, 1982 * ''The “I” of the Camera: Essays in Film History, Criticism and Aesthetics'', Cambridge University Press, 1988; Expanded edition, 2004 * ''Documentary Film Classics'', Cambridge University Press, 1997 * ''Reading Cavell’s “The World Viewed”: A Philosophical Perspective on Film'' (with Marian Keane), Wayne State University Press, 2000 * ''Cavell on Film'' (editor), State University of New York Press, 2005 * ''Jean Rouch: A Celebration of Life and Film'', Schena Editore and Presses de l'Université de Paris-Sorbonne (editor), 2007 * ''Three Documentary Filmmakers: Errol Morris, Ross McElwee, Jean Rouch'' (editor), State University of New York Press, 2009 * ''Hitchcock—The Murderous Gaze'' (expanded edition), State University of New York Press, 2012 * ''Must We Kill the Thing We Love? Emersonian Perfectionism and the Films of Alfred Hitchcock,'' Columbia University Press, 2014 * ''Looking with Robert Gardner,'' State University of New York Press (co-editor), 2016 * ''Tuitions and Intuitions: Essays at the Intersection of Film Criticism and Philosophy,'' State University of New York Pres''s,'' 2019 * ''The Holiday in His Eye: Stanley Cavell’s Vision of Film and Philosophy,'' State University of New York Press (scheduled publication, November 2021)

Selected Keynote Addresses, Special Lectures, and Other Professional Activities

* “Cavell’s Two Takes on ''The Philadelphia Story'',” ''La pensée du cinema'': International Conference in Honor of Stanley Cavell, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, Paris, 2019 * “''Pursuits of Happiness'': Cavell in Transition,” “The Thought of Movies” Conference, University of California at Santa Barbara, 2019 * “Cavell Reading Cavell,” “The Thought of Movies” Conference, Boston University, 2019 * “Alfred Hitchcock’s Signature Motifs,” video essay for Criterion Collection DVD of Hitchcock's ''The Lodger'', 2017 * “Silent Cinema in China,” Columbia Global Center, Paris, 2017 * “Pursuing ''Pursuits of Happiness'',” Colloquium “''À la recherche du bonheur''. ''Stanley Cavell, le cinéma et la vie ordinaire'',” Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, Paris, 2017 * “Film, Philosophy, Education,” the Gregynog Conference on the Philosophy of Education, Wales, 2016 * “Dardenne, Levinas, Cavell,” Film-Philosophy conference, Edinburgh, 2016 * “Levinas and Cavell,” the annual Wittgenstein Lecture, ''Centre de philosophie contemporaine de la Sorbonne'', ''Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne'', 2016 * “Emerson, Film, Hitchcock,” Colloquium on Philosophy and Film, Åbo Akademi University, Finland, 2015 * “Seeing the Light in ''The Tree of Life'',” International Colloquium on Film and Philosophy, Lima, Peru, 2014 * “Television Drama Then and Now,” the Annual George Brandt Lecture, University of Bristol, UK, 2014 * “''Marnie'': Hitchcock’s Last Masterpiece,” closing evening address at the New York International Film Festival, 2012 * “Suspense and Temporality in the Films of Alfred Hitchcock,” Conference on Suspenseful Times and the Moving Image, Tel Aviv University, 2010 * “Moral Perfectionism and the Films of Alfred Hitchcock,” Conference on Philosophy and Criticism,” The University of Sydney, August 2010 * “The Universal Hitchcock,” the Annual Daphne Mayo Lecture, University of Queensland Art Museum, Brisbane, Australia, 2010

References

__FORCETOC__ {{DEFAULTSORT:Rothman, William 1944 births Living people American film critics Film theorists Harvard University alumni University of Miami faculty

Life

Writings

Books

Selected Keynote Addresses, Special Lectures, and Other Professional Activities

Further reading

References