Page "Formalist film theory" Paragraph 11

First, it was created to redeem the art of film itself.

By arguing that films had auteurs, or authors, Truffaut sought to make films ( and their directors ) at least as important as the more widely-accepted art forms, such as literature, music, and painting.

Each of these art forms, and the criticism thereof, is primarily concerned with a sole creative force: the author of a novel ( not, for example, his editor or type-setter ), the composer of a piece of music ( though sometimes the performers are given credence, akin to actors in film today ), or the painter of a fresco ( not his assistants who mix the colours or often do some of the painting themselves ).

By elevating the director, and not the screenwriter, to the same importance as novelists, composers, or painters, it sought to free the cinema from its popular conception as a bastard art, somewhere between theater and literature.