Film as Art 2 CTVU 101 Film Form

Film Form : 

Foundational Ideas in Cinema and Television Aesthetics Introduction to the Aesthetics of Film & Television Dr. Mark Keuthan Regent University School of Communication and the Arts Film Form

Film Form: Form as a system : 

Artworks involve us by engaging our senses, feelings, and mind in a process The artist involves us in a process by creating a pattern Artworks arouse and gratify our human craving for form Artists design their works (give them form) so that we can have a structured experience. Therefore, form is of central importance to any artwork. Film Form: Form as a system

Film Form: Form as a system : 

How do we see form as a system? First, understand the perception in all phases of life is an activity Your mind is never at rest. It is constantly attempting to create order and significance of everything you see, looking for patterns and breaks in the patterns. Second, understand that artwork cues us to perform a specific activity. Like any other piece of artwork, a film employs cues in order to involve us. Cues are never random; they are organized into systems. In the systems a group of elements affects one another in order to involve the viewer and create the piece of art. Film Form: Form as a system

Film Form: Form as a system : 

So what is Film Form? A film is not just a random collection of elements Like all art works, film has been refined into a particular form in the last hundred years So, Film Form is the overall system of relations that we can perceive among the elements in the whole film. Film Form: Form as a system

Film Form: Form as a system : 

What are “elements”? Film elements can be grouped into two categories: Narrative elements: these constitute the film’s story Stylistic elements: these are the technical and artistic choices made by the filmmakers in order to create the actual film and portray the narrative Stylistic elements usually include: Mise en scène Cinematography Editing Sound Film Form: Form as a system

Film Form: Form as a system : 

Formal expectations You as a viewer don’t simply let a film parade past you. Instead, you engage into an active participation with the film, and your mind creates and readjusts your expectations as you see the pattern of the film develop. Therefore, our involvement with a work of art depends largely on our expectations. Film Form: Form as a system

Film Form: Form as a system : 

Formal expectations Expectation as to the pattern of the film provides the filmmaker with several tools to use to get you involved: Suspense– involves a delay in fulfilling unestablished expectation Surprise– the result of an expectation that is revealed to be incorrect Curiosity– the ability of the viewer to wonder about prior events as they project forward to expectations. Film Form: Form as a system

Film Form: Form as a system : 

Conventions and Experience You the viewer form your expectations based on prior life experience A filmmaker cannot avoid relating his film in some way to other works of art and to aspects of the world in which we live A tradition, a dominant style, and/or a popular form all create elements which will be common to several different kinds of artworks These common traits are called conventions Film Form: Form as a system

Film Form: Form as a system : 

Conventions and Experience The role of the film critic, being familiar with Film Form, must understand the formal cues of the film through knowledge of life and familiarity with other artworks All performance art depends on the viewer’s willingness to suspend the laws of ordinary experience and to accept particular conventions. In other words, we watch a film, constantly applying our life experience to understanding it and identifying its form. Additionally, we approach a film with the understanding that it is art, and therefore, constructed in a way apart from reality. Film Form: Form as a system

Film Form: Form as a system : 

Form and Feeling Emotion plays a huge role in our experience and appreciation of Form The film critic must make a distinction between… Emotions represented in the film And an emotional response to the film All emotions present in the film have been carefully cued and systematically related to one another through the form of the film. In short, the viewer is being manipulated emotionally Film Form: Form as a system

Film Form: Form as a system : 

Form and Meaning Bordwell suggests that there are four types of meaning in film: 1. Referential meaning – refers to things or places already invested with significance 2. Explicit meaning – openly asserted or obvious meaning. Explicit meanings in the film arise from the whole film and are set in dynamic formal relationship to one another Film Form: Form as a system

Film Form: Form as a system : 

Form and meaning Bordwell suggests that there are four types of meaning in film: 3. Implicit meaning – goes beyond what is explicitly stated in the film, not stated directly When viewers find implicit meaning in the film they are usually said to be interpreting the film One of the great appeals of film is that this art form invites us to interpret it, often in several ways at once The abstract quality of implicit meanings can lead the viewer to discover themes in a film In film, both explicit and implicit meanings depend closely on the relationship between narrative elements and stylistic elements Interpretation can be seen as one kind of formal analysis, one that intends to review a film’s implicit meanings Film Form: Form as a system

Film Form: Form as a system : 

Form and Meaning Bordwell suggests that there are four types of meaning in film: 4. Symptomatic meeting – to understand a film’s explicit or implicit meanings as bearing traces of a particular set of social values. The set of values that get revealed are called social ideology A film enacts and/or displays ideological meanings to its particular and unique formal system. Film Form: Form as a system

Film Form: Form as a system : 

Form – summary Films have meaning because we attribute meanings to them. Meaning, therefore, is not simple content to be extracted from the film. Sometimes filmmakers intentionally guide the viewer towards certain meanings Sometimes the viewer finds meanings the filmmaker did not intend A viewer cannot help but probe an artwork for significance and meaning at several levels: Referential meaning Explicit meaning Implicit meaning Symptomatic meaning Film Form: Form as a system

Film Form: Form as a system : 

Film Evaluation To evaluate is to form an opinion about the artwork’s goodness or badness The critic should strive for an objective evaluation, using specific criteria – a standard that can be applied in the judgment of art Film Form: Form as a system

Film Form: Form as a system : 

Film Evaluation Several criteria are available for the evaluation of film as an art form: Realistic criteria – an evaluation based on how closely the film approximates “real life” Moral criteria – an evaluation based on the film’s representation of a value system in comparison with the value system of culture and society Coherence – often referred to as the unity. Does the film hold together as a homogenous whole, rather than scattered and unconnected bits? Intensity of effect – is the film vivid, striking, and emotionally engaging? Complexity – creates a multiplicity of relations among many separate formal elements and tends to create intriguing patterns of feelings and meanings Originality-- Is the film a fresh experience, a new take on ordinary themes or ideas? Film Form: Form as a system

Film Form: Principles of Film Form : 

Film Form is a system – a unified set of related, interdependent elements Therefore, certain principles must exist which help create the relationships among the parts. In the arts, no absolute rules or principles of form exist to which all artists must adhere. Art is a product of culture. Therefore, principles of artistic form are the result of convention An artist follows (or disobeys) norms or conventions, not laws Film Form: Principles of Film Form

Film Form: Principles of Film Form : 

Function If Form in cinema is the over-all interrelations among various systems of elements, then we can assume that every element has one or more functions. Every element will need to fulfill its role(s) within the whole system Functions are almost always multiple Both narrative and stylistic elements have functions Film Form: Principles of Film Form

Film Form: Principles of Film Form : 

Function One way to notice the functions of an element is to consider the element’s motivation. Films are human creations; therefore, we should expect that any element in a film will have some justification for its existence This justification is the motivation for that element Film Form: Principles of Film Form

Film Form: Principles of Film Form : 

Similarity and Repetition Formal repetitions in film are commonly called a motif Any significant repeated element in a film is a motif Another form of repetition utilizing similarity is called parallelism The process whereby the film cues the spectator to compare two or more distinct elements by highlighting some similarity Films form patterns recognizable by viewers by a skillful utilization of similarities as well as exact duplication Film Form: Principles of Film Form

Film Form: Principles of Film Form : 

Difference and Variation A skillfully constructed film could not rely only on repetition and similarity – that would be boring To balance the pattern of the film, filmmakers utilize changes and/or variations Also, differences must be infused in several elements to expertly construct a film Characters must be differentiated, environments delineated, and different times or activities established Even within the frame, the filmmaker must distinguish differences in tonality, texture, direction and speed of movement Film Form: Principles of Film Form

Film Form: Principles of Film Form : 

Development All skilled movie viewers are keenly aware of how similarity and difference operate in film, to look for principles of development as the film progresses – this is called the Principle of Progression Progression means development – a movement from beginning through the middle to the end of the story To analyze the film’s pattern of development, the critic constructs a segmentation A segmentation is a written outline of the film that breaks it into its major and minor parts Film Form: Principles of Film Form

Film Form: Principles of Film Form : 

Development Film Form engages our emotions and expectations in a dynamic way The constant interplay between similarity and difference, repetition and variation, leads the viewer to an active engagement with the films developing system – its Form. Film Form: Principles of Film Form