American Stranger: Modernisms, Hollywood, and the Cinema of Nicholas Ray

Reconstructs how Ray became a "rebel auteur" in cinema culture.

How does cinema culture imagine one of its favorite figures, the rebel? The reputation of the American director Nicholas Ray provides a particularly notable example. Most famous for Rebel Without a Cause, Ray has since been canonized as a "rebel auteur" and celebrated for seeking a personal vision and signature style under the industrial pressures of Classical Hollywood during its late studio period. In American Stranger, Will S...