Movies and Meaning- Pearson New International Edition

by Stephen Prince

  The time component of movies has several aspects. Running time designates the duration of the film, the amount of time it takes a viewer to watch the film from beginning to end. Most commercially released films are called feature films , which means that they typically run from 90 to 120 minutes. Some films, however, are much longer. The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2004), in its theatrical release, was 201 minutes long, and the director’s extended version on DVD runs even longer, 251 minutes.

  Story time designates the amount of time covered by the narrative, and this can vary considerably from film to film. In Fred Zinnemann’s Western, High Noon (1952), the story spans 1.5 hours, roughly equivalent to the running time of the film itself. Story time, on the other hand, can span many epochs and centuries, as in Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), which goes from the dawn of the apes well into the age of space travel. Filmmakers also may organize story time through the use of flashbacks so that it becomes fragmented, doubling back on itself, as in Orson Welles’s Citizen Kane (1941), in which the story of Charles Foster Kane is told largely through the recollections of friends and associates who knew him.

  Internal structural time , a third distinct aspect of cinematic time, arises from the structural manipulations of film form or technique. If a filmmaker edits a sequence so that the lengths of shots decrease progressively, or become shorter, the tempo of the sequence will accelerate. A rapid camera movement will accelerate the internal structural time of a shot. Regardless of the shot’s actual duration on screen, it will seem to move faster. (The term shot designates the basic building block of a film. During production, a director creates a film shot by shot. In this context, a shot corresponds to the amount of film footage exposed by the camera from the time it is turned on until it is turned off.

  Films are composed of many shots that are joined together in the process of editing. In a completed film, a shot is the interval on screen between edit points.)

  In Open Range (2003) and Dances with Wolves (1990), the editing imposes a slow pace on the story by letting many shots linger on screen for a long time. Director Kevin Costner felt that a slow pace suited those stately epics about an era when horse and wagon were major modes of transportation. By contrast, contemporary action films like the Mission Impossible series (1996, 2000, 2006) race at breakneck speed, rarely pausing long enough for an audience to catch its breath.

  A film’s internal structural time never unfolds at a constant rate. It is a dynamic property, not a fixed one. Filmmakers modulate internal structural time to maintain viewer interest by changing camera positions, the lengths of shots, color and lighting design, and the volume and density of the soundtrack.

  Viewers experience internal structural time as a series of story events held in dynamic relations of tension and release. Viewers often describe films as being fast or 17

  Film Structure

  FILMMAKER SPOTLIGHT

  Stanley Kubrick

  During his 46-year career, Stanley Kubrick made

  only 12 feature films. Despite the relatively small

  body of work that he left, however, he had an

  extraordinary impact on the medium and is recog-

  nized as one of its major filmmakers. A director of

  legendary stature, he was renowned for spending

  years planning a film and years more shooting it and

  working on postproduction. Famous for doing many

  takes of each shot and for the precision of his visual

  designs, Kubrick honed a style that is unique and

  unmistakable, and his films offer bleak but compel-

  ling visions of human beings trapped and crushed

  by the systems—social, military, technological—they

  have created.

  Kubrick’s reputation was that of an intellectual

  director, keenly interested in a range of subjects and

  whose films explored issues and ideas, yet he never

  finished high school. At age 17 he dropped out and

  began work as a photographer, working at Look

  magazine for several years before completing two

  THE SHINING (WARNER BROS., 1980); A

  documentary shorts for the March of Time newsreel

  CLOCKWORK ORANGE (WARNER BROS.,

  company ( Day of the Fight [1951] and Flying Padre

  1971)

  [1951]). Borrowing money from family and friends,

  Kubrick made some of the most imaginative

  he then completed his first two features as director,

  and precisely designed films in cinema history.

  Fear and Desire (1953) and Killer’s Kiss (1955). In a

  His passion for design led him to shoot 30 and

  move that announced his conviction that cinema

  40 takes of a shot until he had what he wanted.

  was a medium of personal artistry and that he would

  The results were mysterious, haunting, and po-

  control his own work, Kubrick produced, wrote, di-

  etic and included Jack Nicholson’s spectacular

  madness in The Shining and visions of a violent,

  rected, photographed, and edited these films.

  authoritarian future in A Clockwork Orange . Frame

  After another crime film, The Killing (1956),

  enlargements.

  Kubrick made Paths of Glory (1958), a powerful

  drama of World War I and the first of his films to

  all subsequent films. He next went to England to

  pursue what would be his great theme, the domi-

  film Lolita (1962), from the controversial Vladimir

  nation of people by the systems they have created

  Nabokov novel, and he then settled there, using

  (envisioned in this film as the machinery of war and

  English production facilities for most of his ensuing

  the pitiless chain of command). Influenced by the

  films. He was becoming a filmmaker whose work

  moving camera of director Max Ophuls, Kubrick’s

  transcended national boundary.

  sustained tracking shots became a signature ele-

  Dr. Strangelove (1963) is a modern classic, a

  ment of his style.

  shrewd and superb satire of the Cold War and the

  Kubrick’s next film, Spartacus (1960), was a

  policy of nuclear deterrence aptly named MAD

  production on which he, uncharacteristically, did

  (Mutual Assured Destruction). Kubrick’s startling

  not have complete authority (the picture belonged

  marriage of baroque imagery and popular music

  to its star–producer Kirk Douglas), and as a result,

  (detonating atom bombs accompanied by the sen-

  Kubrick was careful to work as his own producer on

  timental ballad “We’ll Meet Again”) became one

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  Film Structure

  of his trademarks, used famously in 2001: A Space

  the mind in The Shining (1980), which depicts the

  Odyssey (spaceships pirouette to the Blue Danube

  hotel’s sinister influence on a mentally unstable care-

  waltz) and A Clockwork Orange (lurid violence set to

  taker and his family and ends with one of the direc-

  Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy”).

  tor’s bleakest images of futility and alienation.

  With Strangelove , these two films solidified

  Kubrick extended his pessimistic visions of hu-

  Kubrick’s reputation as a social and cinematic

  man failure to eighteenth-century Ireland in Barry

  visionary. 2001 (1968) is a visual feast whose

  Lyndon (1975) and the battlefields of Vietnam in

  startling effects are married to a mystical and

  Full Metal Jacket (1985). H
is untimely death fol-

  mind-bending narrative that takes humankind on

  lowed completion of Eyes Wide Shut (1999), a

  a cosmic journey from the dawn of the apes to the

  haunting and mysterious evocation of erotic fan-

  era of space travel. Controversial for its violence, A

  tasy and its emotional consequences.

  Clockwork Orange (1971) depicted a brutal vision of

  Kubrick never made the same kind of film twice.

  future society where the state learns to control the

  Each picture is uniquely different and uniquely reso-

  violent impulses of its citizens. Kubrick said, “The

  nant and must be seen more than once before it

  central idea of the film has to do with the ques-

  begins to yield up its treasures. Kubrick dedicated

  tion of free will. Do we lose our humanity if we are

  his life to making films, and he believed that cin-

  deprived of the choice between good and evil?”

  ema was an art. Few filmmakers gain the authority

  By making the main character a thug and a men-

  to pursue this conviction without compromise.

  ace to society, Kubrick aimed to give the question

  Kubrick’s achievements in this regard place him in

  resonance.

  very select cinematic company. By showing film-

  With dazzling Steadicam shots of a labyrinthine

  makers what the medium can achieve, Kubrick’s

  hotel, Kubrick explored the effects of space on

  work remains a continuing inspiration. ■

  slow moving, but in fact, the pacing of any given film typically varies as filmmakers use structure to create narrative rhythms that alternately accelerate and decelerate.

  While internal structural time results from a filmmaker’s manipulations of cinema structure, viewers experience this type of time subjectively, and their responses often vary greatly. One viewer may love the dramatic intensity and emotional lyricism of The Bridges of Madison County (1995) or Monster’s Ball (2001), whereas another may find the overall pacing of these films to be too slow.

  Cinema is an art of time and space. The spatial properties of cinema have several components. One involves the arrangement of objects within the frame (the dimensions of the projected area on screen; the term also refers to the individual still image on a strip of film). This is the art of framing, or composition because it is a part of the cinematographer’s job.

  The spatial properties of the cinema, though, go beyond the art of framing.

  Cinema simulates an illusion of three-dimensional space on a flat screen. To do so, it corresponds in key ways with the viewer’s experience of physical space in daily life, and filmmakers create these correspondences in the design of their films.

  Cinematographers control the distribution of light on the set to accentuate the shape, texture, and positioning of objects and people. Film editors join shots to establish spatial constancies on screen that hold regardless of changes in the camera’s position and angle of view. Sound designers use the audio track to convey information about physical space. The spatial properties of cinema are multi-dimensional and can be expressed through many elements of structure. This chapter explains these spatial properties and how filmmakers manipulate them.

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  Film Structure

  OPEN RANGE (TOUCHSTONE, 2003) AND MISSION:

  IMPOSSIBLE 2 (PARAMOUNT, 2000)

  This Western, directed by Kevin Costner, has a slow pace because he wants to concentrate on the characters and their situation rather than rushing over these for action or special effects. Costner also believes that a slow pace works well in Westerns where characters travel by horse or wagon. Snappy editing and a fast pace would be as ill-suited to this material as a leisurely pace would be for contemporary action films, such as the Mission: Impossible series. Frame enlargements.

  STRUCTURE AND THE CAMERA

  Let us begin our understanding of film structure by discussing the fundamentals of camera usage. The basic issues of camera position and lenses as discussed in this chapter are actually part of cinematography. But it will be helpful to cover them here separately as an introduction to the camera. These must be grasped before more complex issues of cinematography can be examined. The camera’s position, angle, lens, and the camera’s movement have a major impact on the visual structure of every film. The reader seeking to understand cinema should begin with a clear sense of the relationship among these characteristics and the differences between them.

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  Film Structure

  Camera Position

  The most basic way of classifying camera usage is in terms of camera position . This refers to the distance between the camera and the subject it is photographing. Obviously, the camera-to-subject distance is a continuum with an infinite series of points from very close to very far. In practice, however, the basic positions usually are classified as variations of three essential camera setups: the long shot , the medium shot , and the close-up .

  Each of these positions has its own distinct expressive functions in the cinema.

  Filmmakers typically use the long shot to stress environment or setting and

  to show a character’s position in relationship to a given environment. In Titanic (1997), the majesty of the ship’s enormous size is conveyed with a series of long shots that contrast the huge ship with the tiny passengers that crowd its decks.

  When they are used to open a film or begin a scene, long shots may be referred to as establishing shots . Many detective films, for example, begin with a long shot of the urban environment, often taken from a helicopter.

  In contrast to the long shot, the medium shot brings viewers closer to the characters while still showing some of their environment. In The Phantom of the Opera (2004), a medium-shot framing shows the Phantom (Gerard Butler) embracing

  Christine (Emmy Rossum) while revealing details of the Phantom’s candlelit lair underneath the opera house. Sometimes medium shots are labeled according to the number of characters who are present within the frame. Accordingly, this shot from The Phantom of the Opera would be termed a two-shot . A three-shot and a four-shot would designate medium shots with larger numbers of people.

  By contrast with long and medium shots, the close-up stresses characters or objects over the surrounding environment, usually for expressive or dramatic purposes, and it can be an extremely powerful means for guiding and directing a viewer’s attention to important features of a scene’s action or meaning.

  Once the filmmaker chooses a camera position, the camera is typically locked down on a tripod or other type of platform in order to produce a steady image without jitter. Alternatively, rather than locking the camera down, the filmmaker AN AMERICAN IN PARIS

  (MGM, 1951)

  Longer, full-figure framings in

  the dance sequences of classic

  Hollywood musicals showcase the

  beauty of the dance. The longer

  framing allows the viewer to see

  the performer’s entire body in mo-

  tion. By contrast, contemporary

  filmmakers “cheat” when they

  film dance, using fast editing and

  close-ups to create the impression

  of a dance performance without

  showing the real thing. Here, Gene

  Kelly dances in an elaborate pro-

  duction number designed around

  the styles of Impressionist painting.

  Frame enlargement.

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  Film Structure

  THERE WILL BE BLOOD (PARAMOUNT, 2007)

  Medium-shot compositions can stress the relationship among characters while integrating them into their environment. This medium shot, in widescreen, preserves the intimacy of this moment between Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day-Lewis) and an orphaned child that he h
as adopted. The widescreen frame enables the viewer to see a great deal of the train compartment in which they are riding. Frame enlargement.

  might work with a hand-held camera . In this case, the camera operator physically holds the camera, either on his or her shoulder or on a harness strapped to his or her body. Long shots, medium shots, and close-ups can be filmed in this fashion. Going hand-held enables a filmmaker to cover the action of a scene in a more flexible and spontaneous way, but the challenge is to produce a smooth and steady image. (The Steadicam can help to achieve this—it is discussed in the section on camera movement.) All the shots in Jaws (1975), when the characters are at sea, are done with a THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING (NEW LINE, 2001)

  Galadriel (Cate Blanchett) is a strong, spiritual presence as ruler of the domain of Lothlorien, where the film’s heroes journey seeking refuge. Note how the close-up framing concentrates attention on her face. The framing is tight, and the focal plane of the shot does not extend beyond her face. This gives the close-up additional punch.

  The halo of light and Galadriel’s glowing, luminescent appearance were created digitally in post-production. Frame enlargement.

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  Film Structure

  JAWS (UNIVERSAL, 1975)

  All the shots in the second half of Jaws , once the characters are at sea, are done with a hand-held camera. They look remarkably steady, however, because the camera operator used his body to absorb the rocking of the boat. The camera had to be hand-held because locking it to a tripod or other fixed platform would have induced seasickness in the viewer. The camera operator was Michael Chapman, who went on to become cinematographer of Raging Bull and Taxi Driver . Frame enlargement.

  hand-held camera. It was impossible to do otherwise—locking the camera down on a rocking boat would have made the film’s viewers seasick!

  The fact that filmmakers can choose among different camera positions illus-

  trates a basic difference between cinema and theater. In theater, the spectator views a play from a single fixed vantage point, a position in the auditorium, usually from a distance. By contrast, in film, viewers watch a shifting series of perspectives on the action, and their ability to understand the story requires synthesizing the shifting points of view as the filmmaker moves from one camera position to another, from shot to shot. How viewers make sense of changing views of a scene supplied by different camera positions is a major issue to be examined while editing.