ABSTRACT
This chapter investigates the consequences of Rohmer's conversion to Kant on the main tenets of his film theory. The concept of appearance for appearance's sake, which was already of primary importance before his conversion, underwent substantial revision thanks to the influence of Kantian notions of beauty, of nature, and, specifically, natural beauty (as outlined in the Critique of Judgement). Particular attention has been devoted to the intricacies of Kant's unity of nature, in that they string together three of Rohmer's key assumptions, namely that cinéma is essentially an art of movement, that by the same token it is a narrative art, and that by pushing mechanism to the extreme cinéma can attain freedom.
