(Contemporary Approaches to Film and Television Series)

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Contemporary Approaches to Film and Television Series

A complete listing of the books in this series can be found online at wsupress.wayne.edu

General Editor

Barry Keith Grant

Brock University

Advisory Editors

Patricia B. Erens

School of the Art Institute of Chicago

Lucy Fischer

University of Pittsburgh

Caren J. Deming

University of Arizona

Robert J. Burgoyne

Wayne State University

Tom Gunning

University of Chicago

Anna McCarthy

New York University

Peter X. Feng

University of Delaware

Lisa Parks

University of California–Santa Barbara

Jeffrey Sconce

Northwestern University

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B r i t t o n  o n  F i l m

The Complete Film Criticism of Andrew Britton

edited by Barry Keith Grant

with an Introduction by Robin Wood

w a y n e s t a t e u n i v e r s i t y p r e s s

d e t r o i t

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© 2009 by Wayne State University Press, Detroit, Michigan 48201.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced without

formal permission. Manufactured in the United States of America.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Britton, Andrew, 1952–1994.

Britton on film : the complete film criticism of Andrew Britton / edited

by Barry Keith Grant ; with an introduction by Robin Wood.

p. cm. — (Contemporary approaches to film and television

series)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-0-8143-3363-1 (pbk. : alk. paper)

ISBN 978-0-8143-3550-5 (e-book)

1. Motion pictures. I. Grant, Barry Keith, 1947– II. Title.

PN1994.B68 2008

791.43—dc22

2008019046

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To Art Efron, a mentor who taught me so much about criticism,

and Robin Wood, who first showed me how to be a critic of cinema

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Andrew Britton was born in Salisbury, Wiltshire, in the United Kingdom in April 1952. He

graduated in 1974 with a first-class degree in English and American Literature from King’s

College, London, and went on to study as a postgraduate at the University of Warwick with

noted film critic Robin Wood.

Britton’s career as a lecturer in Film Studies began at the same university in 1978, and he

went on to teach at Essex University (1979–85), Trent University, Ontario, Canada (1985–88),

York University, Ontario, Canada (1988–89), and Reading University, England (1992–93).

He was also a guest lecturer at other universities in Britain,Canada, and the United States,

including a term as a visiting professor at Queens University, Ontario, Canada in 1983.

Britton was a member of the editorial boards of the film magazines Framework

and Movie and of the editorial collective of the Canadian magazine CineAction. In 1989–90,

he was involved in program research at the National Film Theatre in London, and in 1991, he

was editor of the official program of the London Film Festival. Britton was also a joint con￾tributor to The American Nightmare: Essays on the Horror Film (1979) and the editor of Talk￾ing Films (1991). His book Katharine Hepburn: The Thirties and After (released in the United

States as Katharine Hepburn: Star as Feminist) was nominated for the British Film Institute’s

Book of the Year Award in 1985.

Britton died of complications from AIDS in April 1994.

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Preface ix

Acknowledgments xi

Introduction by Robin Wood xiii

Part One: Hollywood Cinema

Cary Grant: Comedy and Male Desire 3

A New Servitude: Bette Davis, Now, Voyager,

and the Radicalism of the Woman’s Film 24

The Devil, Probably: The Symbolism of Evil 64

Sideshows: Hollywood in Vietnam 74

Blissing Out: The Politics of Reaganite Entertainment 97

Part Two: Hollywood Movies

Meet Me in St. Louis: Smith, or The Ambiguities 157

Alfred Hitchcock’s Spellbound: Text and Countertext 175

Detour 194

Notes on Pursued 206

The Family in The Reckless Moment 219

Betrayed by Rita Hayworth: Misogyny

in The Lady from Shanghai 232

The Exorcist 243

Jaws 248

Mandingo 252

10 273

The Great Waldo Pepper 277

The Other Side of Midnight 281

Part Three: European Cinema

Sexuality and Power, or the Two Others 287

Contents

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Their Finest Hour: Humphrey Jennings and

the British Imperial Myth of World War II 312

Metaphor and Mimesis: Madame de . . . 324

Thinking about Father: Bernardo Bertolucci 344

Living Historically: Two Films by Jean-Luc Godard 358

“Foxed”: Fox and His Friends 376

Part Four: Film and Cultural Theory

In Defense of Criticism 383

For Interpretation: Notes Against Camp 388

The Ideology of Screen 394

The Philosophy of the Pigeonhole: Wisconsin Formalism and

“The Classical Style” 435

The Myth of Postmodernism: The Bourgeois Intelligentsia in

the Age of Reagan 468

Consuming Culture: The Development of a Theoretical Orthodoxy 497

Invisible Eye 512

Notes 517

Bibliography 523

Index 535

v i i i

c o n t e n t s

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i x

I

met Andrew Britton only once, and that was just briefly. It must have been in late 1986 or

early 1987, when I was visiting Robin Wood and Richard Lippe in their Toronto apartment

to deliver (this was before the days of e-mail and the Internet) a final copy of my essay on

Tobe Hooper’s remake of Invaders from Mars for publication in their film journal, CineAction.

Although at that time the journal still had the exclamation mark attached to its name, certainly

the moment had nothing of the drama that Wood describes in his introduction to this volume

of his first meeting with Britton, whom he was taking on as a graduate student. In my case, I

had been chatting amiably with Robin and the other members of the magazine’s editorial collec￾tive when there was a knock at the door. It was Andrew, I believe just arriving or returning from

the UK, for there was an intense and joyful connection that immediately arose between him and

Robin when Andrew entered the room that implied a lengthy separation. I have a mental image

of Andrew’s face, politely saying hello to me when introduced but already looking beyond and

then moving past me, his attention fixed on Robin. The connection between them was so strong,

so palpable, that it seemed to exclude all else, certainly a stranger like myself. There was nothing

for me but to depart, and as quickly as possible, I humbly took my leave.

Although Britton had hardly taken notice of me, I certainly had been aware of him for

years through his writing. The horror film and the American Gothic had long been an inter￾est of mine, and I remember the pleasure I took upon first reading “The Devil, Probably,” his

contribution to The American Nightmare, the landmark book on the horror film based around

the retrospective that Wood programmed in 1979 for the Toronto International Film Festival

(then known as the Festival of Festivals). Periodically, I would come across an essay by Britton,

primarily through CineAction or Movie, and marvel at its erudition as well as the surgical pre￾cision with which he could critique a theoretical argument. Yes, he was merciless in his dissec￾tions, but he also was —there is no other word for it—funny. He possessed an inimitable ability

to demolish a critical position while at the same time demonstrating a remarkably rich sense

of humor. Coming to film studies with a background in literature, as I had—and suspected that

Britton did as well—I particularly admired his ability to move with intellectual ease and assur￾ance between cinema and prose fiction.

In the essay on Invaders from Mars that I discreetly deposited on the table on my way out

after meeting Britton, I compared the film to the 1953 original, directed by William Cameron

Menzies, in order to tease out the implications of what I called “Science Fiction in the Age

of Reagan.” At the same time, Britton was publishing his much more ambitious and impor￾tant piece “Blissing Out: The Politics of Reaganite Entertainment.” His essay was astonishingly

Preface

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comprehensive in scope, monumental even, mine much more modest, but it was only one of a

number of occasions when I took delight in discovering that this distinctive and always inter￾esting critic was on a wavelength similar to mine.

Skeptical of theoretical trends, Britton was a critic who was remarkably attuned to the

nuances of texts, whether cinema or literature. Consider his thorough readings of Meet Me in

St. Louis and Now, Voyager as examples of his ability to provide fresh and compelling interpre￾tations of canonical Hollywood films which have been the focus of much critical attention; by

contrast, the essay on Mandingo shows how Britton managed to discover considerable value

in a movie that otherwise had been completely overlooked by film scholars. Britton was able

to question and resist the ideas of others because he was so persuasively detailed in his own

analyses. Admirably, he did not shrink from exposing flaws even in important works by major

artists, as he convincingly does, for example, in his discussion of Jean-Luc Godard’s Tout va

bien. Britton’s grasp of theory, particularly Marxism and psychoanalysis, was extraordinary.

His critiques of Screen’s theoretical views and Wisconsin formalism are the most convincing I

know. Yet, although he was adept with theory, he was less a theorist than a critic. By this I do

not mean to suggest that theory and criticism are mutually exclusive, and Britton’s work dem￾onstrates as well as anyone’s how they might work together.

I became involved in this book at Robin’s suggestion. It was his initial idea to gather

together his former student’s essays on film and criticism, and he entrusted the task to me as

an editor of some experience. Because of my familiarity with Britton’s work and my shared

opinion of its value, I agreed without hesitation to take on the job. Happily, my editorial labors,

apart from the detective work involved in tracking down incomplete or missing references,

have been a pleasure, for Britton’s prose, for all its critical complexity, is at once remarkably

elegant and supple. He left little for even the most assiduous editor to do beyond converting

spelling and punctuation to American English, adding release dates to film titles, and the like.

Occasionally I have added an endnote or parenthetical explanation of an unfamiliar term.

In a way, my one personal encounter with Andrew Britton seems metaphoric of his

place in the history of film studies. He was undeniably brilliant, but like all brilliant lights,

he burned intensely and all too quickly. He produced this remarkable series of essays in just

fifteen years, appearing for a brief moment on the critical horizon, and then he was gone.

Although he seemed to have burst on the scene already a sophisticated and fully developed

critical intelligence, he was not afforded the opportunity and time to grow as a film critic and

produce the sustained body of work I have no doubt he would have. It is my hope, though,

that the publication of this book will give to Britton’s film criticism and theory the recogni￾tion it so clearly deserves.

Barry Keith Grant

St. Catharines, Ontario

x

p r e f a c e

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x i

As the volume editor, I am grateful to a number of people for helping to make this

book happen. Annie Martin, Acquisitions Editor at Wayne State University Press,

provided her unwavering support for this project from the beginning. Professors

Hilary Radner and Alistair Fox of the Department of Media, Film and Communication at

the University of Otago in Dunedin, New Zealand, were wonderful hosts during the summer

of 2007 and generously allowed their graduate students to work on this project. Two of those

students, Ph.D. candidates Bronwyn Polashek and Pamela Fossen, devoted their research skills

to tracking down many of the incomplete references in the original essays. Kristin Harpster

Lawrence at Wayne State University Press ably oversaw the book’s production, David Alcorn

of Alcorn Publication Design provided the excellent design and packaging of the book, and

Linda O’Doughda was astonishingly diligent in her copyediting of the manuscript.

My own Department of Communication, Popular Culture and Film at Brock University

in St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada, provided me with the necessary time to complete the

manuscript. Justine Cotton, a Humanities and Social Sciences Reference Librarian at Brock,

helped me track down some of the most mysterious references. Richard Lippe generously

gave me access to his impressive stills collection, as did my colleague Jim Leach to his per￾sonal library. Andrew Britton’s sister, Vanessa Fox, provided the information for her broth￾er’s biography. Malisa Kurtz provided invaluable assistance preparing the index, and Dan

Barnowski applied his technical expertise to digitally scan and prepare all the essays from

their original sources. Finally, thank you to Robin Wood, at whose suggestion this book came

to be and without whom it would have been impossible.

Thank you to the following journals for permission to reprint material which was origi￾nally published in their pages:

CineAction. “Cary Grant: Comedy and Male Desire,” 7 (December 1986): 36–51; “A New

Servitude: Bette Davis, Now, Voyager and the Radicalism of the Woman’s Film,” 26/27 (Winter

1992): 32–59; “Meet Me in St. Louis: Smith, or the Ambiguities,” 35 (August 1994): 29–40 (this

essay first appeared in Australian Journal of Screen Theory 3 [1977] 7–25); “Alfred Hitchcock’s

Spellbound: Text and Countertext,” 3/4 (Winter 1986): 72–83; “Their Finest Hour: Humphrey

Jennings and the British Imperial Myth of World War II,” 18 (Fall 1989): 37–44; “In Defense of

Criticism,” 3/4 (January 1986): 3–5; “The Philosophy of the Pigeonhole: Wisconsin Formalism

and ‘The Classical Style,’” 15 (Winter 1988/89): 47–63; “The Myth of Postmodernism: The

Bourgeois Intelligentsia in the Age of Reagan,” 12/13 (August 1988): 3–17; “Consuming Culture:

The Development of a Theoretical Orthodoxy,” 19/20 (May 1990): 11–19.

Acknowledgments

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x i i

Movie. “Sideshows: Hollywood in Vietnam,” 27/28 (Winter 1980/Spring 1981): 2–23; “Bliss￾ing Out: The Politics of Reaganite Entertainment,” 31/32 (Winter 1986): 1–42; “The Exorcist,” 25

(Winter 1977–78): 16–20; “Mandingo,” 22 (Spring 1976): 1–22; “10,” “The Great Waldo Pepper,”

and “The Other Side of Midnight,” 27/28 (Winter 1980/Spring 1981): 105–8, 66–70, and 73–77,

respectively; “Metaphor and Mimesis: Madame de…,” 29/30 (Summer 1982): 93–107; “Thinking

about Father: Bernardo Bertolucci,” 23 (Winter 1976/77): 9–22; “The Ideology of Screen,” 26

(Winter 1978/79): 2–28.

Framework. “The Family in The Reckless Moment,” 4 (Autumn 1976): 17–24; “Sexuality

and Power, or the Two Others,” 6 (Autumn 1977): 7–11, 39; and 7/8 (Spring 1978): 4–11; “Living

Historically: Two Films by Jean-Luc Godard,” 3 (Spring 1976): 4–15.

“Detour” and “Betrayed by Rita Hayworth: Misogyny in The Lady from Shanghai” ap￾peared originally in The Movie Book of Film Noir, ed. Ian Cameron (New York: Continuum,

1993), 174–83 and 213–21, respectively; and “Notes on Pursued” in The Movie Book of the Western,

ed. Ian Cameron (London: Studio Vista, 1996), 196–205. (The original, longer version of this

essay appeared in Framework 2, no. 4 [1976]: 4–15.) “The Devil, Probably: The Symbolism of

Evil” and “Jaws” appeared originally in The American Nightmare, ed. Robin Wood and Richard

Lippe (Toronto: Festival of Festivals, 1979), 34–42 and 54–57, respectively. “Foxed: Fox and His

Friends” appeared originally as part of “Fox and His Friends: An Exchange of Views by Bob

Cant and Andrew Britton” in Jump Cut 16 (1977): 22–23. “For Interpretation: Notes Against

Camp” appeared originally in Gay Left 7 (Winter 1978/79): 11–14. “Invisible Eye” appeared origi￾nally in Sight and Sound 1, no. 10 (ns) (1992): 27–29, and is reprinted here with the permission

of the British Film Institute.

a c k n o w l e d g m e n t s

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x i i i

Introduction: Andrew Britton and the

Future of Film Criticism

by Robin Wood

“Our superior, gentlemen. Our superior in every way.”

–Professor Carrington in Howard Hawks’s The Thing from Another World

Andrew Britton was, and remains, quite simply, the greatest film critic in the English

language. But he was not, like Hawks’s monster from outer space, an “intellectual car￾rot.” His greatness lies as much in his humanity as in his intelligence. His neglect (I

am tempted to say “suppression”) within most contemporary film studies programs is easily

accounted for by that single word “humanity.” Humanity has not seemed to enter very much,

over the past two decades, in the academic world of film studies (an absence that, to my mind,

partly discredits it, though it has come up with the occasional usable discovery). In its place we

have had “theory.” Theories can be useful (I have drawn on a number in my time), but when

they become an end in themselves, they generally lose their utility. Over the last decade of

academic film studies, we have witnessed many theories which come and go, the latest replac￾ing the previous rather as in the fashion world. “Oh, Madam, we’ve just got this new theory in.

Everyone will be wearing it soon. You really mustn’t be seen without it.” And of course, academ￾ics will simply have to keep up. I have never, at any stage in my career, considered myself an

“academic” in this sense, and I’m fairly sure Andrew felt the same, although we both taught in

universities.

I have received hints recently, from various sources, that “theory” is on the way out: a star￾tling pronouncement. Could it mean that film studies teachers will have to start watching mov￾ies again? Or watching them as something more than “examples” illustrating the latest theory?

If this is indeed the case, this is the ideal moment for the rediscovery (for many, no doubt, the

discovery) of Andrew Britton. I want to say at once to any academic or nonacademic with a

serious interest in the cinema—and I hope this will not be mistaken for “false modesty”—it is

more important to read this book than to read my own collected writings. It is my hope that its

publication will initiate no less than a new era in film studies.

There are a number of reasons for Andrew’s neglect, which the present edition of his

collected writings is intended to remedy. One reason is surely his quite devastating attacks on

certain aspects of film theory: attacks which, to my knowledge, were never answered (because

they couldn’t be?) but were merely ignored, in the hope that they would go away or be forgotten.

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(See the essays in part four of this book, “Film and Cultural Theory”). Another is that, in his

relatively short life, he produced only one book, and his essays (spread over a number of differ￾ent publications) have never before been collected. The book, ostensibly a study of Katharine

Hepburn, has never been recognized for the major work it undoubtedly is. In my opinion, its

release was mishandled, especially in its American edition published after Andrew’s death,

when, against my protests, its original title, Katharine Hepburn: The 30s and After, was changed

to Katharine Hepburn: Star as Feminist, despite the fact that its author states very firmly that

Hepburn could not be considered a “feminist” although her career is of interest to Feminism.

It is, in fact, a book that should be compulsory reading for anyone seriously interested in the

Hollywood cinema. It goes far beyond any narrow star study, with brilliant sections on genre,

the “meanings” of stars, the phenomenon of cinematic partnerships (Tracy/Hepburn, Astaire/

Rogers, Bogart/Bacall), along with detailed readings of Hepburn’s major films.

Andrew and I

When I first met Andrew I had recently begun a new life. I had returned to England from

three years at Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, Canada, with a broken marriage and a

new partner, John Anderson, who abandoned an extremely promising position with Universal

Pictures in Toronto to live with me. I rapidly discovered that the world of film study had been

transformed during my absence. Everything I stood for was passé, and semiotics (a word I had

never encountered during my time in Canada) had taken over. I also discovered that I had in

the meantime been set up as The Enemy (together, of course, with numerous others): I was

branded an “anti-intellectual,” a relic of a now discredited humanism. After a year of despair in

London I applied (without much hope) for a new film studies position at Warwick University,

to initiate its first film studies program.

To my amazement, I was accepted: my first real ego boost since returning to England.

John and I moved to Coventry (the nearest city); John bought a house with his savings (my

own income going largely for child support), and he and I started a new life. After a year or so

there was another source of amazement: a graduate student from Australia, Tom Ryan, now

a distinguished figure in the Australian film community, wanted to come and study under

me. I couldn’t understand why. Everything, then, was semiotics, the rudiments of which I was

struggling to grasp, though more for the sake of understanding what was going on than from

any sense that I might “join the club.” Everyone who was progressive was into semiotics, and I

had always thought of myself, in some sense, as “progressive.” However, I readily (if with some

trepidation) accepted my first graduate student guessing (correctly, apparently) that semiot￾ics was as unfamiliar in Australia as it was in Canada. Tom moved in as our lodger. Another

applicant soon turned up, however, this time British. I accepted him in fear and trembling, little

knowing that he would transform my life.

I remember the morning I was to meet Andrew at Coventry station. It was very strange.

I arrived early (I’ve always been afraid of keeping people waiting). I watched all the passengers

emerge, scrutinizing all the faces to make out what I was letting myself in for. They dispersed, I

waited. At last there was just one very tall, very dark-haired, slightly forbidding young man left.

We looked at each other. We looked away. I looked at my watch. We looked at each other again.

x i v

i n t r o d u c t i o n

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