Poetic Realism in Cinema

Part 2 of "Faces of Contemporary Realism"

Paul Klee, Rhythms Stricter and Freer, 1930.

Cinema has a stormy relationship with the real. An even more regular staple of filmic criticism than the four-star review is the bromide that a film didn’t feel “realistic.” This might mean that characters were shallow or exaggerated; in the case of modern kab…