Final Exam Flashcards
There are various ways to think about and analyze movies such as:
Interracial couples
Anti-Asian prejudice
The power of presentation
Entertainment as a pleasure able smokescreen …
Disturbing issues can be reinforced or contemplated
We can also learn a great deal not only from what we see in a film but…
Also from what they DO NOT see
Name as many Critical lenses as possible
Formal structure
- Cinematography, sound and editing
Narrative structure
Authorship
Genre
Series, sequels and remakes
Stars v.s actors
Reception
Gender, race and class
- Class Myths
Changes in how films are made and viewedNever stop questioning — you run the danger of accepting easy/obvious truths and blind yourself to very important issues…
Intersectionality
Gender roles
Marginalization
People respond differently to films depending on their….
Gender Race Class Sexual orientation Etc..
What is film about?
- Narrative -
Narrative is the way in which the story event of a movie are organized
Feature films -
Narrative 1st, everything else is secondary
The Classical Hollywood Style -
Moving from one important event to another
Classic Hollywood Narrative Style
Film’s plot should have a clear forward direction.
Everything in movie must contribute toward the resolution of goals
Private v.s Public goals…
Private - frequently a heterosexual romance
Public - accomplishment of an important deed or the attainment of something valuable
Hollywood movies don’t need happy endings. They just need to clearly resolve their goals…. one way or another!
Plots v.s Subplots
Example: Main - dramatic plot
Subplots - comic and romantic
—-Not all films conform to this pattern
Story and Plot
Story — events that must be Narrated (chronological order)
Plot — the arrangement of those events as they were told
- (Occur in the order the filmmakers choose to present them)
- (These choices often reveal a great deal about the meaning of
the film).
Flashback (structure)
Creates a plot with added suspense.
Since the 1940s, flashbacks have been common devices used to structure plots
Plot structure -
Presenting story events out of temporal order and from the perspective of various characters show not only what we learn, but also when we learn it and from whom
Free Motifs
Free Motif - aren’t essential to the retelling or explaining of a Narrative. Not to say that they aren’t important, but the chronological make up of the narrative wouldn’t be altered by inclusion or exclusion of a free motif.
Fatal attraction - images of slaughtered animals (typically gives aesthetic complexity and thematic meaning to a film).
Psycho - birds and mirrors = taxidermy and duality
(Norman and Marion (literal and figurative)
Bound Motif
Cannot be removed from the narrative without radically changing the chronological essence of the story. It’s absolutely necessary for telling the story.
Fatal Attraction - the pet rabbit
Motifs
result from the repetition of visual images or sounds in a manner that forms a perceptible pattern.
Narrative Truth
Understanding narratives thru how they reveal their “TRUTH”
Delays…
Snares…
Answers…
Delays… to sustain spectator interest, answering questions @ different rates…
Snares…being mislead
ANSWERS are simply just answers
Flashbacks normally reveal …
What “really” happened but they can be duplicitous
Classical Narrative films -
Operate on the assumption that there is a truth to every story and that revealing that the truth is the goal of storytelling
Narratives employ various references to the “real” world; Connections between the “truth” of life and the truth we learn at the end of the movie …
The effects of (changing) cultural assumptions
Aliens throughout cinema
Formal properties…
- visual-
- aural elements of a film
Repeat viewings
Ex: Star Wars Pre-Release
(Spectacle and visual effects
Visual Images
Scenes that can be so vivid that we remember these equally as well as the story, sometimes even more so.
Also, how the story is told is inseparable from, and as important as, the story itself.
Departures from the stylistic Norm
Stylistic features that are unusual for the time of their release.
Ex: Schindler’s list, Bonnie and Clyde, Carrie
B/W, slo-mo, image and sound, simultaneous split-screen
Visual style and narrative effect
The story and the manner in which it’s told is inseparable.
Psycho - shots and editing
- How the subject is represented is “primary”
- The subject matter is “secondary”
How filmmakers compose shots, use color, shape and light =
Important part of our experience of their work(s)
Film criticism can increase our awareness of the awareness of the stylistic features of movies…
Awareness of technique and how it affects (repeated) viewings of the film
Common Stylistic Techniques…
- Invisible Style
- shot/reverse-shot editing
- cutting on action/reaction
- establishing shots
- the 180-degree rule
Shot/reverse-shot editing…
A pattern whereby first a shot shows 1 character and then there is a cut to a reverse shot that shows us a nearly opposite view, typically another character who is talking to or interacting with the 1st
Determined by dialogue
Cutting on action/reaction
Action replaces dialogue, reaction replaces the responsive line of dialogue.
One character draws their arm back, we cut to another character getting hit and staggering backward
Establishing shots
AKA Master Shots
Extreme long shots that shows (or establishes) the entire space in which the ensuing scene will take place
Most Hollywood scene begin/end w/ establishing shots
More Departures from Stylistic Norms
Comic use of Space
Variations of shot/reaction-shot patterns
Long takes, moving camera, the deep focus cinematography
Structuring Screen Space
- Offscreen space
- frame (line)
- spatial aspects of film form are simple enough but can be used in sophisticated and complex ways.
Offscreen space (6 potential areas)
Spaces at the left, right, top and bottom of the image
The space behind the camera
The space beyond the horizon
Frame (line)
The sides of an image
We presume that space extends beyond the frame of a scene
Color and Sound
Can be structured to create formal complexity
Free motifs
+ Become part of character and/or thematic development
To become attentive film viewers, we have to sharpen both our looking and listening skills
