Audiovisual production: between “art and industry”. What can we teach when we teach to make films?

Abstract

The paper starts by characterizing audiovisual production, and cinema in particular, as the art form of the industrial era, in order to explore some of the problems posed by this characterization, and the conception of films as works of art and merchandises. We immediately refer to the concept of director, to raise some of the disputes involving the process of formation of an audiovisual producer, the knowledge that s/he should dominate and the ways of access to such knowledge. Finally, in this context, we make some considerations regarding the discussion about the relationship between the theoretical and practical training of an audiovisual director or filmmaker –and, why not, almost any artist or professional in general–.