It’s not the ‘art’ of a film that makes it ‘arthouse’. That quality can be found as readily in many other, less feted genres, as any passionate champion of zombie-horror gore or Dwayne Johnson’s acting will tell you. The difference is that arthouse is art, and knows it.
These are films which proudly aim beyond mere money-making for multinational media conglomerates. They push at the boundaries of the form, explore its edges and insist that film-going isn't just for entertainment, it should be an experience, too. Is ‘arthouse’ a genre, then? Like the western or the rom-com? If so, it’s one that often overlaps with others. Many of these films could also be categorised as ‘independent’ or ‘slow cinema’ or ‘experimental’ – and for a brief period in the 1970s, ‘arthouse’ was also a serviceable euphemism for European porn flicks.
Elsewhere, English-language Hollywood product still dominates, but here it is the foreign-language film which comes out on top. Because foreigners are always arty, aren’t they? Especially the French, who have no direct translation for ‘arthouse’, referring instead to "film d’auteur". Indeed these auteurs – or filmmakers – are particularly important in arthouse, because more than any other kind, these films are a direct, soul-to-screen expression of one individual’s artistry.
