Cette thèse explore les masculinités comme un terrain pluridisciplinaire pour penser les rapportsde pouvoir. A partir d’un rapprochement entre les films musicaux et les mélodrames réalisés parJacques Demy et Vincente Minnelli, ce travail examine les performances masculines dans lecontexte de l’après-guerre. Cette période de transformations sociales voit l’avènementd’une culture filmique transatlantique qui interroge et remet en cause les normes liées au genreet à la sexualité. Articulant approches esthétique et actorale, l’étude de la mise en scène met aujour la production de discours genrés ambivalents, historicisés en fonction des spécificités socio-culturelles propres aux cadres de production hollywoodien et français. Le film musical et lemélodrame, dans leur esthétique camp, se révèlent des lieux de négociations identitaires où seconstruit un rapport inédit au politique. On montre ici que les deux cinéastes, réunis par leur stylemélodramatique analogue, imaginent et rêvent des modèles de masculinités alternatives fondéessur des valeurs empathiques. Devant la caméra, la vulnérabilité, les émotions et les grandssentiments deviennent des armes politiques pour refonder et réinventer la communauté. / This thesis explores masculinities as a multidisciplinary field for thinking power relations. By connecting musical films and melodramas by Jacques Demy and Vincente Minnelli, this work examines male performances in the post-war context. This period of social transformations has given rise to the emergence of a transatlantic film culture that questions and challenges normsrelated to gender and sexuality. Articulating aesthetic and cultural studies approaches, the study of mise en scène brings to light the production of ambivalent gendered discourses, historicized according to the specific socio-cultural aspect of Hollywood and French film production environments. Musical films and melodramas, through their camp aesthetics, reveal themselvesas spaces of identity negotiation where an unprecedented rapport with politics is constructed. Both filmmakers, united by their similar melodramatic style, imagine and dream about models of alternative masculinities based on empathic values. In front of the camera, vulnerability, emotions and strong feelings become political weapons to refound and reinvent the community.

The purpose of this thesis is to evaluate and refute Yvonne Griggs’ claims that the films “House of Strangers” (1949) and “Broken Lance” (1954) are as Griggs deems “genre-based adaptations” of William Shakespeare’s “King Lear.” I argue that the films, although they have some essential elements of “King Lear,” lack intentionality and reception, pivotal components in determining viability as a Shakespearean film adaptation. Using Griggs’ book as my critical background, I will show that these films are better classified under their respective genre categories, Western and film noir, not as “King Lear” genre adaptations. I will also suggest criteria for determining the level of canonicity of a “King Lear” film adaptation. Popularity of films does not determine validity, and a film does not need purported Shakespearean provenance to validate its ratings. Some films, like these, merely reference or pay homage to Shakespeare through use of essential elements of “King Lear”; here, I deem such affinities to be more unintentional than intentional.