May 14, 1985

I remind you that the hypothesis I proposed to you was exactly this: in the classical image, the sound element is a “specific” component of the visual image. Even off-screen, it is still located in relation to the visual image. By the same token, it is a dependence on the visual image, whereas in the modern image, the sound image and the visual image have acquired a kind of autonomy. But we must pursue this, and we must immediately ask ourselves: what are the consequences of such a hypothesis?

Seminar Introduction

As he starts the fourth year of his reflections on relations between cinema and philosophy, Deleuze explains that the method of thought has two aspects, temporal and spatial, presupposing an implicit image of thought, one that is variable, with history. He proposes the chronotope, as space-time, as the implicit image of thought, one riddled with philosophical cries, and that the problematic of this fourth seminar on cinema will be precisely the theme of “what is philosophy?’, undertaken from the perspective of this encounter between the image of thought and the cinematographic image.

For archival purposes, the English translations are based on the original transcripts from Paris 8, all of which have been revised with reference to the BNF recordings available thanks to Hidenobu Suzuki, and with the generous assistance of Marc Haas.

English Translation

Edited

Jean-Luc Godard’s Detective, 1985

 

Deleuze suspends discussion of cinematographic speech acts for this special session on technical and technological matters, but also recalls the operative hypothesis, that the modern visual image is no longer defined through the inclusion of an out-of-field or an exteriority in relation to the seen image and filled with sound elements, with visual and sound images have gained their autonomy, or “heautonomy”. Relying on Béla Balázs’s work regarding the first stage of speaking cinema, Deleuze wonders if one can speak equally of sound framing and sound montage, of the role of technical advances in this alternative, and of possible transformations of cinema music in this process. However, this technical session includes Dominique Villain on sound framing, with various interventions (particularly Richard Pinhas) on related topics, notably on details of sound technology (microphones, filters, stereo). Then, Deleuze asks Pascale Criton to respond to the previous interventions, interrupted by Pinhas’s particular objections, discord causing Deleuze’s confusion about how the session unfolded. [Much of the development corresponds to The Time-Image, chapter 9.]

Gilles Deleuze

Seminar on Cinema and Thought, 1984-1985

Lecture 22, 14 May 1985 (Cinema Course 88)

Transcription: La voix de Deleuze, Nadia Ouis (Part 1), VU Cong Minh (Part 2) and Claudie Zémiri, correction : Marie Descure (Part 3); additional revisions to the transcription and time stamp, Charles J. Stivale

English Translation Forthcoming

Notes

For archival purposes, based on the excellent transcription work of the Paris 8 group, the transcript augmentation (notably, assigning names where possible to the participants intervening in discussion) occurred for this site in June 2020. The augmented version of the complete transcription with time stamp was completed in September 2021. Additional revisions were added in February 2024.

Lectures in this Seminar

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