The digital technologies questioned the identity of cinema, whether it is according to the constructivist perspective proposed by Gaudreault/Marion or according to the essentialist point of view defended by Aumont or Bellour. We propose a return on thses debates by putting them on the opposite page with the evolution of the theorization of the cinematic reception, and the passage from the paradigm of collective dimension, prevailing before World War II, tothe one that puts forward the individual experience of the spectator, after World War II.