auteur

[oh-tur, oh-tœr]

noun

plural

auteurs 

1. a filmmaker whose individual style and complete control over all elements of production give a film its personal and unique stamp.

auteur

/ ɔːˈtɜː /

noun

1. a director whose creative influence on a film is so great as to be considered its author

Other Word Forms

• auteurism noun
• auteurist adjective

Word History and Origins

Origin of auteur¹

1960–65; < French: literally, author, originator < Latin auctor. See author

Word History and Origins

Origin of auteur¹

French: author

Example Sentences

In the 60 years since the arrival of the auteur theory on the shores of America, all that has changed, and “Hitchcock/Truffaut” was at the crest of the wave.

Read more on The Wall Street Journal

"AI is not going to make a film," the US indie auteur tells AFP.

Read more on Barron's

You couldn’t fit all these legends into the movie if you treated each one like a genius auteur.

Read more on Los Angeles Times

When the actor got the part in Frankenstein, he was finishing Australian auteur Justin Kurzel’s miniseries, The Narrow Road to the Deep North, about World War II military prisoners in a Japanese labor camp.

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These are times so surreal that even one of cinema’s most nostalgia-obsessed auteurs felt compelled to return to the present, if only to offer some sympathy.

Read more on Salon