What Cinema Is! uses Andre Bazin to answers his famous question, exploring his 'idea of cinema' with a sweeping look back at the near century of Cinema's phenomenal ascendancy. Written by one of the foremost film scholars of our time, this provocative volume establishes cinema's distinction from the current enthusiasm over audio-visual entertainment, without relegating cinema to a single, older mode.Examining cinema's institutions and its social force-but always through the qualities of key films-What Cinema Is! testifies to the power of something that didn't even exist before 1895. From the artfilms cherished by cinephiles after WWII and that reached a zenith in the euphoria of the "new wave", to a technologically 'expanded cinema' practiced by hybrid cineastes of late, Andrew traces the long nerve of an idea that has made cinema supremely alive to (and in) our times.