“It takes fun and enhancing the appeal of cinema”

This article considers the study of a device initiated in 2013 by the Rhône-Alpes Region, designed to help independent cinemas in the region to attract a young, non-captive audience.Through the analysis of the objectives of the device and the means of action chosen for the target audience, it examines the sociological motivations of contemporary cultural action in the field of cinema. We see that behind indigenous categories that often claim to be horizontal, neutral or universal (“quality”, “diversity”, “curiosity”, etc.), we find the sharing of beliefs in the existence of vertical hierarchies of cinema (works, modes of distribution, etc.), as well as relationships with cinema (ways of seeing or evaluating films, for example), which are socially situated. The author intends however to translate the particular into general terms. The device studied is indeed an example, among others, of the fact that enlightened eclecticism is the contemporary version of the cultivated model, to be disseminated to categories of the population that are considered to be most exposed to hegemonic attempts by actors endowed with economic power. The transformation of juvenile film practices is at the crossroads of these cultural policy issues and internal struggles in the film industry.