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Issue 0. – Reviving Photogénie


Jean Epstein

We did not call our website Photogénie just because we thought it sounded great. As we have written in our mission statement, “a present-day interpretation of cinephilia can be guided by photogénie in order to reconnect to a tradition in which the fascination with moving images leads to fresh insights. At photogenie.be, we want to combine a sense of wonderment with keen analyses. The connecting principle is the intense perception of cinema. The articles that will be published on this website – on films old and new, cinema past and present – will not try and force this perception to fit preconceived frameworks, but will endeavour to make the viewer receptive to what films can make us see, in an attempt to put the allure of the cinema into words.”

Epstein and his contemporaries are making a come-back, both in academic film studies and in cinephile circles. But what is the relevance of their theories and what can we as present-day cinephiles learn from their aproach to our beloved medium?

Read the essays below.