Film essay

Film Form
Form
• more simply, form organizes the different
time spaces and how they’ll be ordered and
presented.
• this creates it a general system of
relationships among the parts of a film.
• for example, Hitchcock’s Psycho arranges
scenes mainly to create suspense,
anticipation and curiosity that will be
resolved in the succeeding scene. Citizen
Kane is more like a jig-saw puzzle. The plot is
segmented into a series of stories, each told
from a different character’s point of view.
The effect is complexity of perspective.
Four types of meaning
• referential – The concrete, historical setting to which the film
refers. (e.g. Wizard of Oz: Kansas, 30s Depression era)
• explicit – The overt moral of the film; what the characters assert.
(e.g. “There’s no place like home”)
• implicit – Beyond what is explicitly stated; viewer interprets the
theme. (e.g. Dorothy’s desire to flee her family is overcome as she
accepts returning home and ‘growing up’.)
• symptomatic – The socio-cultural context in which the film was
made instils levels of meaning sometimes beyond what the
filmmaker’s had intended. Films are embedded with ideology. (e.g.
Home & family is the last refuge in an increasingly money-oriented
world. This belief would be particularly strong during the 1930s
Depression).
Is form a container?
• form vs. content: can we think of form as a container for
the content, which is the substance of the film? -NO!
• form is also the way artistic presentation of story
elements fulfills and/or thwarts viewer expectations.
 e.g. (linear or non-linear, flashbacks, etc.), as well as using patterns
of repetition and variation (ABAB, ABCBA, ABACAD) of motifs,
characters, and tropes.
• form may include everything from subject matter to plot
to editing to lighting, etc., inasmuch as the relationships
among them all contribute to a general pattern of
meaning.
Segmentation
• a segmentation breaks the film down into
clusters of scenes that form something like a
whole act.
• segmentations can help us determine a film’s
temporal and spatial arrangement, as well as the
general ordering of viewer knowledge,
anticipation, & expectation.
Narration
• linear chronology
• non-linear chronology
• flashbacks & flashforwards
• puzzle narratives
• narrative perspectives
• parallel plots
Narrative Perspectives
• first-person: that all events in a story are being relayed by a single
perspective. e.g. thru voice-over
• narrative frame: a context or person positioned outside the story to
bracket the film in a way that indicates the story’s audience, its social
context, or the period from which the story’s understood.
• third-person: sees events ‘objectively’ as though from outside the story
• omniscient: camera roams freely and knows all.
• restricted: camera roams a little, but mainly stays tethered to one or two
characters.
Range vs. depth
• range: how far the camera roams from a single
character’s perspective. Is the camera ‘tethered’
to one or two characters, or does it roam freely?
• from less to more: 1st person > 3rd person
restricted > 3rd person omniscient
• depth: the degree to which a perspective delves
into subjective thoughts and perceptions of a
character (e.g. adopts their POV, voice-over,
internal monologue)
Superior position
• surprise vs. suspense
• suspense is when you know what is about to happen and
you’re tensely awaiting the moment
• we don’t know when or what to expect with surprise
• • a superior position is when the audience knows more
than the character does, and so we watch their behaviour
differently.
Memento
(Christopher Nolan, 1999)
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