Introduction to film studies

1
Introduction to film studies

• Media education
• Formalist film analysis

2
Media education should train in

• recognizing propositions concerning reality
• analyzing the background assumptions and values
  those propositions are based on
• measuring those assumptions and values against
  ones own views and experiences
• relating what media offer to ones own reality
  and experiences

3
Cinematic competence includes

• Ability to understand motivations of fictional
  characters and how those generate action
• Ability to detect themes
• Ability to assess ideological issues
• Ability to relate an individual film to frames
  such as art in general, film history, genres,
  other modes of representation
• Ability to assess and appreciate the individual
  qualities of a film

4
Reading strategies (Stuart Hall)

• Differences in decoding
• Dominant-hegemonic position the message is
  decoded entirely as it was intended
• Negotiating position at least some components
  are adapted or reinterpreted according in local
  terms
• Oppositional position the message is read in
  terms of an alternative framework resulting in a
  reading which may carry far away from the
  intended meanings

5
Scale of competence

• Basic competence the spectator recognizes the
  diegetic and explicit meanings
• A fully competent spectator either
• - recognizes the implicit meanings and accepts
  their
• ideological connotations (hegemonic rstr)
• - recognizes and accepts basic assumptions but
  not
• all their implications (negotiating rstr)
• - finds her own implicit meanings on the basis
  of her
• own ideological position (oppositional rstr)
• A critical spectator analyzes also symptomatic
  meanings, i.e. ideological implications and
  psychological symptoms

6
Why analyze a film?

• When the film piques our interest, we analyze it
  in order to explain, in formal and historical
  terms, what is going on in the work that would
  cue such a response ultimately we write and
  read criticism as much for issues raised as for
  the explication of a single film. Theory and
  criticism thus become two different aspects of
  the same give-and-take process. (Kristin
  Thompson Breaking the Glass Armour p. 5)

7
Background assumptions of Formalism

• Narration as a process of selecting, arranging,
  and rendering story material in order to achieve
  specific time-bound effects on a perceiver (NF)
• The work itself defines which aspects of reality
  are relevant for comprehension
• Meanings are not messages conveyed by he film but
  parts of the films structure
• Viktor Shklovski It is true that in a work of
  literature we also have the expression of ideas,
  but it is not a question of ideas clothed in
  artistic form, but rather artistic form created
  from ideas as its material.
• Not everything is narrational and/or thematic.
  The filmic qualities can be an autonomous
  dimension of the film - excess

8
Formalist analysis in practice

• How can the film be understood in terms of
  motivations?
• How does the film guide the spectator in forming
  hypothesis and how does it either confirm them or
  deny them?
• Does the film confirm to certain norms or does it
  challenge them?
• How do all the different elements function
  narratively, thematically or expressively?
• How does the film build up into a whole?

9
Background constructions (Thompson)

• enable the assessing of realistic motivation
• define which aspects of reality are relevant in
  the film
• define to which aesthetic norms the film adheres
  to
• form a horizon in the spectators mind which make
  the film comprehensible

10
Tasks of film criticism

• To analyze and expand the range of perception and
  understanding in respect of a challenging work or
  art
• Prevent the formation of a gap between the artist
  and the audience by demonstrating how the work of
  art functions
• Bring a challenging work within the range of the
  audience not by simplifying it but by developing
  useful concepts and approaches
• Show a conventional work in a new light e.g.
  bringing out neglected background constructions

11
Semantic fields

• Conceptual structures that organize potential
  meanings in respect of one another
• Precede analysis but may be revised as the
  analysis proceeds
• Are selected according to what is though to be
  relevant in a given community
• Are supposed to be able to pick up all the
  relevant features of the object of study
• Have traditionally derived from the humanities
  what does the work tell us about the human
  condition, love, anxiety, alienation,
  difficulties in communication, relativity of
  values etc.

12
How is interpretation worked out? (DB)

• The most pertinent meanings are assumed to be
  either implicit, symptomatic or both
• One or more semantic field is highlighted
• Different levels of the film are mapped out in
  terms of semantic fields by correlating textual
  and semantic features with one another
• Presenting an argumentation which displays the
  novelty and value of the interpretation

13
Four tasks of an interpreter (DB)

• Demonstrate why the film chosen is a relevant
  object of analysis
• Demonstrate how the critical concepts applied
  suit the specific features of the film under
  study
• Make the interpretation novel by
• - presenting a new theory or method
• - revising an existing theory or method
• - applying an established theory to a new area
• - drawing attention to features previously
  neglected
• Present the interpretation in a convincing way

14
Stylistic feature of mainstream films

• Centrality of the individual
• Psychological motivation
• Transparency of narration
• Continuity
• Stylistic unity
• Emotional appeal
• Realism plausibility of plot and characters
• Compositional motivation creates a sense of
  unity, realistic motivation supports it

15
Main features of art cinema narration

• Relatively self-conscious narration
• stylistic features relatively foregrounded
• Realistic motivation dominates, although often in
  a problematic way
• Subjectivity, deep focalization
• The crises the characters go through often have
  an existential dimension. The value of life
  itself might appear to be in jeopardy
• Unreliable narration
• Exposition often less concentrated than in
  mainstream films
• Elliptic and non-linear narration
• Intertextuality
• Imbedded stories - memories, anecdotes, fantasies
  - may disrupt, sidetrack or form parallels or
  contrasts with the main story
• End often narratively and/or thematically open .