Classical Realist Texts: American Films between 1916 and 1960 - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

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Classical Realist Texts: American Films between 1916 and 1960

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Title: Classical Realist Texts: American Films between 1916 and 1960


1
Classical Realist Texts American Films between
1916 and 1960
  • Montage

2
Table of Contents
  • 1. Mise-en-scéne in classical American films
  • 2. Montage in classical American films

3
Mise-en-scéne in classical American films
  • Mise-en-scene ought to be motivated as narrative
    is. The chain of cause and effect dictates
    mise-en-scène (what and how to shoot).
  • e.g. When a character is a hero, he may be placed
    in the centre of the frame. When he walks into a
    room, the camera also moves with him. When he is
    walking in the darkness, no strong light is cast
    on his face.

4
Mise-en-scéne in classical American films
  • F.W. Murnau, Sunrise A Song of Two Humans (1927)
  • Travelling shot from a tram
  • Motivated when the characters and the vehicle on
    which they are on move, the camera moves.

5
Montage in Classical American Films
  • As mise-en-scène, montage must help a narrative
    move on without distracting the attention of the
    viewer from it.
  • Smooth flow from a shot to the next shot
  • CONTINUITY Editing

6
Montage in Classical American Films
  • Continuity editing
  • PURPOSES
  • To tell a story coherently and clearly
  • To map out the chain of actions in an
    un-distracting way

7
Montage in Classical American Films
  • GRAPHIC CONTINUITY
  • Shot-Reverse Shot
  • The figures are balanced and symmetrically
    deployed over shot-reverse shot.
  • The overall lighting tonality remains constant
    over shots.

8
Continuity Editing
9
Continuity Editing
10
Montage in Classical American Films
  • EYE-LINE MATCH
  • Shot A presents someone looking at something
    off-screen shot B shows us what is being looked
    at by him/her. In neither shot are both looker
    and object present.

11
Montage in Classical American Films
  • Eye-line match
  • Alfred Hitchcocks Rear Window (1954)
  • In one shot Jefferies looks through his camera
    and in the next shot what he is watching is shown.

12
Montage in Classical American Films
  • 180-DEGREE RULE
  • Two characters (or other elements) in the same
    scene should always have the same left/right
    relationship to each other.
  • The axis of action (or centre line, 180º line) is
    assumed between two characters. Then, this axis
    of action determines a half-circle, or 180º area,
    where the camera(s) can be placed to present
    action.

13
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15
Montage in Classical American Films
  • Examples of the scenes which blatantly ignore the
    180-degree rule
  • Jean-Luc Godard, A bout de souffle (1960)
  • Ozu Yasujiro, Tokyo Story (1953)

16
Montage in Classical American Films
  • TEMPORAL CONTINUITY
  • Time, like space, is organized according to the
    development of the narrative.
  • ORDER, FREQUENCY, DURATION

17
Montage in Classical American Films
  • ORDER
  • Continuity editing typically presents the story
    events in a 1-2-3 order.
  • With the exception of occasional flashbacks.
  • Christopher Nolans Memento its narrative told
    in a backward 3-2-1 order

18
Montage in Classical American Films
  • FREQUENCY
  • Classical editing also typically presents only
    once what happens in the story.
  • Non-classical montage
  • Sergei Eisensteins Battleship Potemkin (1925)
  • Spike Lees Do the Right Thing (1989)

19
Montage in Classical American Films
  • DURATION
  • In the classical continuity system, story
    duration is seldom expanded or shortened. The
    story time is equal to the film time.
  • Story time is extended in the famous Odessa Steps
    scene in Sergei Eisensteins Battleship Potemkin
    (1925)

20
Montage in Classical American Films
  • JUMP CUT
  • A device to compress (dead) time. (A man enters
    a large room at one end and must walk to a desk
    at the other end. Jump cut eliminates most of
    the action of traversing the long room.)

21
Montage in Classical American Films
  • Unobtrusive jump cut - a cut which does not make
    the viewer aware of it.
  • Excess dead time must smoothed over either by
    cutting away to another element of the scene or
    by changing camera angle sufficiently so that the
    second shot is clearly from a different camera
    placement.

22
Expressive Montage
  • Obtrusive, jugged jump cut
  • An action is abruptly interrupted without it is
    completed.
  • Jean-Luc Godard, A bout de souffle (1960)
  • Lars von Trier, Dancer in the Dark (2000)
  • One of the avant-gardes favourite expressive
    techniques.
  • Making artificiality evident.

23
Expressive Montage
  • Cross cutting
  • Alternates two or more lines of actions taking
    place in different places simultaneously.
  • Cross cutting could be employed to enhance
    reality and truth effects, but is generally
    associated with more formalist editing.
  • Edward Yans Yi, Yi (A One and a Two, 2000)
  • Francis Ford Coppola, Godfather

24
Expressive Montage
  • David Lean as a master editor
  • Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
  • Formative editing jumping thousands of miles in
    space over two shots

25
Expressive Montage
  • The most audacious editing
  • 2001 Space Odyssay
  • Time travels million years in one editing.
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