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

• auteurist adjective
• auteurism noun

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

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.

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Hawke has spent his career carefully choosing which auteurs he works with.

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“People want to feel the freedom of the filmmaker or the auteur. What they appreciate is that we were jumping from a fifth floor to make this film. So for the next one —”

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He also recalled the time that he was able to have the training staff of the NHL’s Toronto Maple Leafs come right to the hotel room of Spanish auteur Pedro Almodóvar to reset his back.

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