ABSTRACT
One of the most fundamental questions that can be asked about cinema is: what do we see in a film? Both philosopher Robert Hopkins and film theorist Murray Smith have recently drawn on Richard Wollheim’s theory of “seeing-in” to answer this question, but they reach diametrically opposed conclusions. This paper compares and contrasts their applications of Wollheim’s theory to cinema and points to problems with both as well as Wollheim’s original theory of seeing-in. It also addresses what the application of this theory to cinema can teach us about the possibility, or lack thereof, of progress in analytic philosophy of film using philosopher David Chalmers’ definition of philosophical progress as “convergence to the truth.”
