Movies and Meaning- Pearson New International Edition
Page 10
Godard films the sequence in a single, unbroken tracking shot that lasts over 7
minutes. The camera tracks along the road and the line of stalled vehicles, keeping 43
Film Structure
ATONEMENT
(UNIVERSAL, 2007)
Camera movement can
work to reveal details
and vistas by enlarging
perspective. Trying to
rejoin British forces at
Dunkirk in World War II,
Robbie Turner (James
McAvoy) finds a group
of schoolgirls who have
been killed by German
soldiers. The camera
move reveals the hor-
ror gradually. At first,
Robbie is framed alone
(a). Then the camera
pulls away a short dis-
tance to reveal a few
bodies (b), and then it
continues moving to
reveal the full scale of
the outrage (c). Frame
enlargements.
44
Film Structure
THE SEARCHERS (WARNER BROS.,
1956)
Camera movement can work to con-
centrate the viewer’s attention on dra-
matically important objects or details.
John Wayne’s character in this John
Ford Western has an intense racial ha-
tred for the Commanche, and Ford uses
a dolly shot to emphasize the depth of
this animosity. Pictured here are the be-
ginning and ending frames of the shot.
Notice how the dolly brings Wayne’s
face forward, emphasizing his extraordi-
nary expression. Frame enlargements.
pace with Roland as he inches his way forward. The camera frames the scene slightly to the rear, preventing viewers from seeing what lies ahead. The effect of this madden-ing and funny sequence depends on the length of the shot—lasting an extremely long time—as well as on the slow, methodical progress of the camera along what seems an endless line of stalled vehicles. The tracking shot becomes a metaphor for the experience of being stalled in traffic and enables the filmmakers to subject the audience to that oppressive experience.
These examples of camera movement point toward an important conclusion.
Whether a filmmaker uses it to reveal detail, to convey the sensory experience of motion, or to symbolically express thematic and narrative ideas, camera movement provides filmmakers with an essential means of shaping and organizing the visual space of a scene. Camera movement gives structure and meaning to the composition of a shot.
TECHNOLOGICAL COMPONENTS OF FILM ART Technological developments in recent years have made camera movement especially easy to achieve. The elaborate camera moves in Snake Eyes and Goodfellas were achieved with the Steadicam, as were the sweeping camera moves during the climactic battle in Terrence Malick’s The Thin Red Line (1998).
Malick’s film also benefited from the use of an Akela crane for scenes showing U.S. soldiers hunting their Japanese foes through waist-high grass. These grassy 45
Film Structure
THE DARK KNIGHT (WARNER
BROS., 2008)
Rapid movement by objects or
by the camera produces mo-
tion blur. Even digital effects
sequences simulate motion blur
because it is so characteristic
of the camera’s way of seeing.
The Joker (Heath Ledger) takes
a maniacal ride through Gotham
City, and the fast- moving
camera makes the background
appeared blurred. Frame
enlargement.
WEEKEND (NEW YORKER FILMS, 1967)
Godard’s tracking camera slowly travels the length of a line of stalled cars. The framing prevents a view of what lies ahead, deliberately frustrating the viewer. Finally, after several minutes, the camera reveals the cause of the accident. Frame enlargements.
fields on the Australian location (subbing for Guadalcanal in the Solomon Islands, where the story was set) were dense, with rocks and holes underneath, an impossible terrain for a camera operator to move about. But the Akela could be positioned securely on solid ground and the camera extended on its 72-foot arm into the grassy areas that were vital to the story. On the crane, the camera could execute sweeping moves through the fields. In Ali , a film biography of boxer Muhammad Ali, Michael Mann used a “lipstick” camera—as tiny as its name implies—that he could hold in his hand as he moved between the boxers in order to film the fight scenes from unconventional angles.
Camera moves also can be simulated digitally today. Computer-effects shots in Panic Room (2002) create effortless camera moves through floors in a house, through air vents, and other impossible objects. This is animated footage that imitates the appearance of a camera move. And filming digitally enables a filmmaker to create an endless camera move, or at least one that doesn’t, of necessity, end when the camera 46
Film Structure
runs out of film. Shot on digital video, Russian Ark (2002) is composed of a single moving-camera shot that runs the entire length of the film’s 96 minutes.
Obviously, filmmakers in earlier decades did not have the luxury of such devices.
When viewing older films, therefore, one must be aware of the physical resources available in earlier periods. Sometimes filmmakers had to struggle with clumsy or cumbersome equipment, and it is often their ingenuity at devising solutions to these technical problems that is a mark of their talent.
During production of The Last Laugh (1924), for example, F. W. Murnau experimented with many different ways of producing camera movement. The
camera was attached to a ladder, to scaffolding, to a rubber-wheeled trolley, and to the stomach of cameraman Carl Freund while he rode a bicycle. So impressed was Hollywood with the work of Murnau and Freund in The Last Laugh that it sent a telegram to Ufa, the German studio that produced the film, inquiring about the special camera that had been used to take the shots, adding that in the United States there was apparently no such device. Robert Herlth, the set designer for The Last Laugh and several other Murnau films, remarked that what the Americans didn’t know was that Murnau and the crew had not used sophisticated equipment but only the most primitive and basic methods to achieve outstanding results.
Technical sophistication, by itself, provides a misleading yardstick for measuring the quality of films. Film equipment is so advanced today that filmmakers of only moderate talent (a category that does not include Malick, Mann, Scorsese, or De Palma) can produce images with a sophistication that the early masters—Renoir, Murnau, D. W.
Griffith—could only dream of. Technology without intelligence, however, is just mechanics. It must be balanced by artistic vision and ingenuity.
STRUCTURAL DESIGN AND CREATIVE CHOICE
A film’s structural design results from the creative choices made by filmmakers, who confront a range of options as a project moves into production. There is no single, right way to film a scene. Where to position the camera, from what angle, which lens to use, whether to employ camera movement, how to light the set, how to choreograph the actors on screen, how to record the sound and balance dialogue, music, and sound effects, a filmmaker wrestles with all these decisions. How they are resolved defines the style or structure of a given film.
Case Study SAVING PRIVATE RYAN AND FLAGS OF OUR FATHERS
Two prominent World War II films—Steven Spielberg’s
Saving Private Ryan (1998) begins with a star-
Saving Private Ryan (1998) and Clint Eastwood’s Flags of
tlingly graphic depiction of the D-Day invasion of
Our Fathers (2006)—include vivid scenes of combat that
the Normandy beaches, a battle that helped turn
are accentuated by an intentionally harsh visual design
.
the tide of World War II in June 1944. In a harrowing
But the filmmakers on each production used different
25-minute sequence, Spielberg and cinematographer
tools and took different creative approaches in achiev-
Janusz Kaminski depict the carnage on Omaha beach,
ing their designs.
where the Allied forces suffered their greatest casualties
( continued)
47
Film Structure
under withering fire from German troops barricaded on
water, heightening the physical effect Spielberg was
high ground overlooking the beach.
after. To darken the blood so it would stand out amid
Spielberg wanted the violence in Saving Private Ryan
the de-saturated colors, the effects crew added dyes to
to have a chaotic quality that would correspond to the
make it more blue.
subjective experience of the men on the beach, know-
Because the lenses used by combat cameramen
ing that death could come at any time, regardless of
were inferior to what a modern filmmaker would use,
how one tried to avoid it.
Kaminski and Spielberg ordered that the protective
He and Kaminski used the documentary footage
coating be stripped from some of their lenses. This
shot by combat cameramen on the Normandy beaches
gave the photographed images a sharp but cloudy
as a model. They aimed to emulate the striking features
appearance, with reduced contrast. To heighten
of this footage, much of which was shot in color and
the sense of chaos, they shot scenes with cameras
had a flat look, with reduced contrast. Accordingly,
using mismatched lenses, with and without the
they decided to film in color, in contrast to their previ-
coating, to give the resulting footage a disjointed and
ous World War II collaboration, Schindler’s List (1993),
disconnected feel.
shot in black-and-white in order to correspond with
To accentuate this off-kilter feeling, they manipulated
much of the historical footage of Nazi atrocities.
the camera’s shutter (a device that regulates how light
They used two photochemical (non-digital) tech-
reaches the unexposed film) to create strange, memo-
niques—flashing and ENR—to render the colors more
rable effects in some shots. They threw the shutter out
monochromatic and to reduce contrast. When film
of synch to create a streaking, teary effect from top to
is flashed, the negative is exposed to a small amount
bottom of the image and set the shutter at unusual
of light prior to filming. This has the effect of de-
angles to give the action a stroboscopic appearance.
saturating color and reducing the density of shadows,
( Pearl Harbor (2001) copied this effect.) To create a dis-
allowing more detail to come through in shadow areas.
turbed, visually unsettled perspective, they used hand-
ENR (named after the technician, Ernesto N. Rico, who
held cameras and employed a Clairmont Camera Image
helped develop the process) is a somewhat comple-
Shaker to vibrate camera perspective both horizontally
mentary process and has been used widely in recent
and vertically.
films ( Evita , 1996; Amistad , 1998; Bulworth , 1998). ENR
Through all these choices about technique,
retains a portion of the silver in film emulsion, which
Spielberg and Kaminski aimed to capture the jarring
is normally removed during developing. This has the
experience of being inside combat. As Spielberg said,
effect of making shadows blacker, de-saturating color,
the film’s style is hard and rough. He stated that he
and highlighting the texture and edges of surfaces.
and his crew were trying to capture fear and chaos.
As a result of ENR, the patterns on the uniforms in
Technical imperfections actually worked to achieve
Saving Private Ryan grew more vivid, as did the edges
this end. If blood or sand hit the lens, no attempt was
of helmets and guns and the reflective surface of the
made to clean it off. Spielberg wanted the footage
SAVING PRIVATE RYAN
(DREAMWORKS, 1998)
The ferocious intensity of this film’s bat-
tlefield sequences resulted from highly
stylized manipulations of cinema tech-
nique. In cinema, there is no one “right”
way to shoot a scene. Structural design
results from the creative choices made by
filmmakers. Frame enlargement.
48
Film Structure
to look as if it had been filmed by a combat camera-
digital video for color correction is known as the digital
man. The film’s design has its visual point of origin in
intermediate (DI) .)
combat photography, even though many of the tech-
Eastwood likes rich, deep blacks (shadows and dark
niques they used had no basis in such photography.
areas in the image), and digital color correction enabled
Their design choices—rendering a monochromatic
him to “crush” the blacks—making them so dark that
look, emulating the visual qualities of the documen-
little or no detail is visible—to a degree that went be-
tary footage of the invasion, creating a subjective view
yond what he had achieved using photochemical means
of the battle—led them to elaborate technological
on films such as Million Dollar Baby .
manipulations to achieve these ends.
The film has a severely monochromatic look that
Flags of Our Fathers depicts the brutal fighting on
verges on black-and-white, but individual colors were
the Pacific island of Iwo Jima between American troops
intensified in portions of the image—blood erupting
and Japanese soldiers who were determined to hold the
from soldiers hit by gunfire, the reds on the American
island. Eastwood wanted the battle scenes to have a
flag raised on Mt. Suribachi, skintones on faces and
monochromatic look, but, unlike Spielberg, he achieved
hands. The film was shot in Iceland, and the sandy
this look using digital methods.
beaches were digitally darkened to depict the volcanic
Cinematographer Tom Stern and Eastwood had
soil of Iwo Jima.
planned to use ENR in order to de-saturate the color,
The de-saturated design of the battle scenes contrasts
but they ran tests comparing ENR with comparable
with other sequences in the film that take place in the
results that could be achieved digitally. They decided
United States and that have more vivid colors. The de-
to use digital methods because these allowed results
saturation was meant to evoke the hellish and brutal con-
that could not be achieved through traditional pho-
ditions faced by the soldiers doing battle on the island.
tochemical means. Because ENR is applied during the
Flags of Our Fathers marked the first time that
creation of a positive release print, the smallest incre-
Eastwood had used digital methods of color correction,
ment in which it can be used is one lab reel (about 10
and he continued to do so on each of his subsequent
minutes of film), and it cannot be varied within that
films.
unit. By contrast, working digitally Stern could not only
Structural design results from a filmmaker’s inevi-
replicate the de-saturated ENR look but he could vary
table need to choose one or more sets of techniques
it dynamically within a shot, adjusting individual colors
and tools, based on an organizing design concept. On
and areas of the frame. Accordingly, the film foot-
Saving Private Ryan, Spielberg emphasized traditional
age was scanned to digital video where the extensive
photochemical methods of achieving his goals, while
color manipulations could be carried out. Once these
Eastwood on Flags of Our Fathers used a digital ap-
were finished, the results were scanned back to film for
proach to achieve his goals. While the imagery of both
distribution to theatres. (This process of scanning to
films is severe looking, de-saturated in color, and heavy
in contrast, Spielberg and Eastwood took different
FLAGS OF OUR FATHERS
(PARAMOUNT PICTURES, 2006)
Clint Eastwood used digital
methods of color correction
for the first time on this pro-
duction. The film’s severely
monochromatic design verges
on black-and-white. The film
footage was shot and processed
normally but then was converted
to digital video for manipula-
tion to achieve the extremely
de-saturated look that Eastwood
wanted. Frame enlargement.
( continued)
49
Film Structure
routes to achieve these goals. The many potential ways
must be integrated with other decisions about lights,