Realism has become one of the most contested terms in the
history of cinema. Cinematic realism is neither a genre nor a
movement, and it has neither rigid formal criteria nor specific
subject matter. But does this mean that realism is simply an
illusion, and that, as Werner Herzog has declared: "the so
called Cinéma Vérité iśrité?" Probably not, as realism has been
an extremely useful concept for asking questions about the
nature of cinematographic images, the relation of film to
reality, the credibility of images, and the role cinema plays in
the organization and understanding of the world. Realism, at the
very least, has been a productive illusion.  In film history,
realism has designated two distinct modes of filmmaking and two
approaches to the cinematographic image. In the first instance,
cinematic realism refers to the verisimilitude of a film to the
believability of its characters and events. This realism is most
evident in the classical Hollywood cinema. The second instance
of cinematic realism takes