Auteur Theory

Recently during one our conversations, Dr. Morris brought up something called auteur theory. I can describe it best as the belief that the director is the author of his film, and they hold complete creative control over it. In auteur theory the director is the original copyright holder and receives almost all credit for the film. A film by an auteur director is easily distinguishable as the auteur's film. Films by the same auteurs usually have similar themes, scripts, camerawork, and characters. Some famous auteurs are Stanley Kubrick, Alfred Hitchcock, Quentin Tarantino, and Wes Anderson. I've decided that this will be the unifying factor for all of the directors that I'm studying. It feels good to have something as a sort of base, rather than just picking directors that I personally enjoyed.