Faces and Masks René Magritte, The Cinema, and the Human Countenance

This article focuses on comparisons between the theoretical/aesthetic concerns of R. Magritte and those evinced in cinematic works. I focus on Magritte’s rendition of faces and masks in relation to the theme of Franju’s Eyes Without a Face (1960) and Judex (1963), and Ophuls’ Le Plaisir (1952). Magritte’s œuvre is privileged within modernism for its “resonances” in the history of cinema given his focus on such concepts as the frame, voyeurism, word vs. image, all highly relevant to film.