What's the French New Wave?

We have discussed about The French New Wave of directors that emerged from the late 1950s to early 1960s. To be exact is from 1959 to 1964 according to David Bordwell and Kirsten Thompson's book Film Art.

The new generation of filmmakers at that time were mostly from Japan, Italy, Brazil, Canada, England, United States, and Spain. They were born before WWII and some of them were trained in film schools. Above these countries was France, where the most influential group appeared.

There was a film journal called Cahiers du cinema that contains the critics of the most respected French filmmakers like Francois Truffaut and Jean-Luc Godard. Francois Truffaut noted "I consider an adaptation of value, only written by a man of the cinema. Aurenche and Bost are essentially literary men and I reproach them here by being contemptuous of the cinema by underestimating it." Aurenche and Bost, whom Truffaut was pertaining to were the leading scriptwriters at that time. While Jean-Luc Godard addressed 21 major directors and said, "Your camera movements are ugly because your subjects are bad, your casts act badly because your dialogue is worthless; in a word, you don't know how to create cinema because you no longer even know what it is." Like directors Truffaut and Godard, Claude Chabrol, Eric Rohmer, and Jacques Rivette were also one of the contributors in the journal. 

The Auteur Theory (authors) were also introduced. According to Film Art by Bordwell and Thompson, the auteur did not literally write scripts but they stamp their personality on studio products. 

Having the journal and writing their own criticisms didn't stop the young filmmakers. By 1959, Jacques Rivette filmed 'Paris Belongs to Us, Gordard made 'Breathless', Chabrol made 'Les Cousins', and April Truffaut filmed 'The 400 Blows' that won the Grand Prize at the Cannes Festival. 

Because of the unique styles of these directors, they were give the nickname la nouvelle vague or the New Wave. 

The casual look was the distinct quality of the New Wave films and the New Wave directors admired the Neorealists like Rossellini.