Mapping of a Medium in Decline
Types of Cinephilia
4 Film History Nerd Cinephilia
Auteurist-genre-centered (older generation), genre-mode-of-production-centered (younger generation). Used to be the default mode of any serious engagement with moving images, "film history" as prime term of reference, subscribes to the notion of a fixed canon + various extensions. Was always more interested in production and cultural context than auteurist-modernist types, more recent practitioners distance themselves even further from primacy of individual impression. Identification with cinema as a whole, not parts of it. Center vs periphery bias often, yet not always implicit.
Still dominant in most cinematheques and similar insitutions of a more traditional type. Discourse not necessarily tied to institutions. The more populist wing used to be self-sufficient (see commercial players like Criterion Collection, TCM etc), probably increasingly less so.
Used to be mostly enthusiasts and journalists, now mostly academics and a few choice enthusiasts. Some anti-woke sentiment present, especially in older generation, yet mostly bubbling under the surface. General political alignment same as mainstream academia (liberal, left).
Heir of classic auteurism and generalized film enthusiasm of the rats of the cinematheque type.
Source of the majority of worthy historiography and probably scholarly literature in general in the field. Writing mostly integrated in conventions of contemporary academia, yet less annoyingly so than in some quarters (see: Radical Cinephilia). Often fearful of intellectual and stylistic experiments of any kind. Mostly adverse to the kind of polemics classic auteurists cultivated.