ENG 110: Intro to Film and Media Instructor: Diana Martinez CRITICAL FILM TERMINOLOGY The shot

• The shot is the building block of all filmmaking. • It is a single, uninterrupted piece of film; the image that is seen on screen until it is replaced by another image through some type of editing technique. Scene vs. Shot

Shot: Scene: what is recorded by a section of film of single, uninterrupted continuous action operation of the taking place in camera continuous time and space when a camera starts to where it stops usually contains multiple shots 4 Components of Film

• Mise-en-scene • Cinematography • Editing • Sound 4 Components of Film

• Mise-en-scene • Cinematography • Editing • Sound Mise-en-scene (meez-ahn-sen)

from French mettre – “to place, put”

• refers to the visual arrangement of items on screen

BUT, mise-en-scene also takes into account how those items affect the atmosphere of the shot Verisimilitude

Mise-en-Scene is the element of stylistic form that seeks to create verisimilitude, or the appearance or semblance of reality, plausibility, or believability. Elements of Mise-en-Scene

1. Setting & Perspective 2. Props, Costumes, Makeup 3. Light, Shadow, & Color 4. Actors and Performance Setting

• Landscape/ Environment • Spectacle • Minute detail/ Directed attention Sets determine the audience’s expectation for the action Landscape/Environment Amelie (dir. Jean-Pierre Jeunet, 2001) Rushmore (dir. Wes Anderson, 1998) Rosemary’s Baby (dir. Roman Polanski, 1968) Spectacle Minute Detail/Directed Attention Elements of Mise-en-Scene

1. Setting 2. Props, Costumes, Makeup 3. Light, Shadow, & Color 4. Actors and Performance Prop

• Abbreviation for Property • Part of the setting that plays active role in action. • May reoccur as a motif. Props-objects that the actors use a part of a set or scene

Costumes and Makeup

• Like Setting, Function in Story • Realistic, Unobtrusive or Stylized

22 Costumes or the clothes the actors wear, are quick signals for the audience to learn about the character Nicholson in Batman (1989)

• Highly Stylized, Exaggerated Costume/ Makeup • Characterize Joker as theatrical, aberrant. Ledger in The Dark Knight (2008) Elements of Mise-en-Scene

1. Setting & Perspective 2. Props, Costumes, Makeup 3. Light, Shadow, & Color 4. Actors and Performance Lighting

• Allows us to see action • Directs our attention • Impacts how characters appear

27 Lighting

• High light/Low light • Source of the light • High or low contrast lighting

The use of light can affect your perception of the objects on screen. High Key

• Low Contrast • Soft • Detail • Clarity • Hollywood Optimism

29 High Key Lighting is characterized by brightness and light.

Low Key

• Contrast • Hard • Shadow

31 Lighting with lots of shadowing and dark angles is called: Low-key lighting.

Low-key lighting Color

• Note the dominant color and any use of contrasting or symbolic colors

Color • Descriptive – it looks like what it is • Emotional – creates a feeling • Symbolic – represents an idea Descriptive Color Emotional Color

Symbolic Color Elements of Mise-en-Scene

1. Setting & Perspective 2. Props, Costumes, Makeup 3. Light, Shadow, & Color 4. Performance Acting

• Two aspects of an actor’s performance: – Visual elements (body, gesture) – Auditory elements (voice) • Film acting vs. stage acting – largely a question of scale and spontaneity • Acting Styles: – Realistic (aims for verisimilitude) – Stylized (stagey, fantastical) Acting Choice is the performance of the actors Character Placement

• The arrangement of characters on the screen (position, size, etc.) Staging Position

• The characters’ reactions to the camera

Is the character looking at the viewer? Looking away? How intimate is the viewer able to get with the character? 4 Components of Film

• Mise-en-scene • Cinematography • Editing • Sound The Establishing Shot

The Illusionist 2006 It lets the audience have a look at the subject in relation to its surroundings. It usually appears at the beginning of a film or scene to establish the setting or to introduce a film.

When you look at a frame, one of the first things to consider is distance.

How much do you see of the character(s)?

• Is it a close up? • Is it a full or long shot? • Is it a medium shot?

Can you see the whole body or a part of the body? A Place in the Sun 1951-close up

! ! ! Close Ups In general the closer the camera gets to the characters, the closer the viewer feels towards the characters.

This is when close ups are often used:

§ romantic scenes

§ scenes where the character is suffering or fearful

§ any other scene where the viewer is supposed to understand what the character is feeling.

Medium Shots As the camera moves further away from the character(s), the viewer is provided more information about them or about their situation. The shot on the right is a medium shot, but the one on the left is a close up.

From Rosemary’s Baby 1968 From Babel 2006 Long Shots The further the camera is from the subject, the more distant you will feel from what is happening in the scene or to the character(s) this lets the audience have a look at the subject in relation to its surrounding. (A Long Shot shown here)

Another thing you should consider when observing A frame is the angle or camera position.

§ Was the frame shot from high above looking down? (a high angle shot)

§ Was it shot at eye level (straight on)?

§ Was it shot from a low angle (the camera is below its subject)? A frame shot from a high angle is often referred to as God’s eye view because it suggests that‘someone’ is observing the characters. It can suggest danger and helplessness. These are high angle shots.

300 2006 Apocalypto 2007-High Angel Shot

High Angle Shots

The Fountain 2007 High Angle Shot A frame shot from a low angle makes the subject seem larger. These are low angle shots being that the camera is below the subject.

Citizen Kane 1941

The Postman Always Rings Twice 1946 The Dark Knight 2008-Low Angle Shot Inglorious Basterds 2009- Low Angle Shot The Departed 2006-Eye Level Shot Eye-level Shots How many people are in the shot? • . . . a one-shot reveals one character

• . . . a two-shot reveals two characters (Frida) Camera Movement

Pan: camera placed on a stationary base and pivots horizontally. Tilt: when a camera moves vertically up and down

Tracking Shot: a camera mounted often on a track or on a vehicle; the camera moves with the action.

Zoom: zoom in means to get closer, and zoom out means to get farther away from the subject 4 Components of Film

• Mise-en-scene • Cinematography • Editing • Sound What is editing?

To EDIT is to select, arrange, add, and delete things. THE SHOT VS. THE CUT

• The basic building block of film editing is the shot and its most fundamental tool is the cut. • Each shot has two values: 1. What is within the shot. 2. How the shot relates to other shots. Editing from scene to scene

• A scene consists of one or more shots that can be described in terms of a continuous space, time and action • A sequence consists of any number of shots that are unified as a coherent action, such as a walk to school, or as an identifiable motif, such as the expression of anger, regardless of changes of space and time An editor’s arrangement of a series of shots can create or disrupt continuity Continuity in editing makes the shot appear naturalistic, its elements connected (continuous), the graphic, spatial, and temporal relationships maintained from shot to shot. It IS verisimilar.

Discontinuity in editing, in contrast, seems jumpy and disconnected (discontinuity, which calls attention to itself). It is NOT verisimilar. Five Conventions of Classical Hollywood- Style Continuity Editing

1. Do not call attention to the editing- make it invisible. The visual transitions and manipulations of audio is hidden from our perception. Screen direction is consistent from shot to shot. 2. Edits are there to move the story forward. 3. Cuts are psychologically motivated from the audience’s point of view. 4. Editing gives the illusion of continuous space and time. 5. What happens on the screen makes as much narrative sense as possible. Relations in Editing

There are five areas of choice and control in editing, based on five types of relationships between shots:

Graphic Relations Rhythmic Relations Temporal Relations Spatial Relations Thematic Relations Graphic Relations

Although the primary focus of the film editor is to ensure continuity of the narrative, film editors remain acutely aware that film is a visual art. Therefore, they work to achieve visual interest by creating transitions between shots that are graphically similar and graphically dissimilar, depending on the desired effect.

Rhythmic Relations

Film is not only a visual art, but also an auditory and even tactile art. Therefore, editors also remain aware of the effects achieved by manipulating the rhythms experienced by perceivers through thoughtful juxtapositions of longer and shorter shots as well as through transitional devices that affect the perceiver’s sense of beat or tempo. Temporal Relations

Editing is the process by which the difference between temporal duration and screen duration is reconciled. It sounds simple, but consider this: most feature films present in roughly two hours sufficient intersection of story and plot to provide perceivers with everything they need in order to understand days, weeks, months or even years in characters’ lives. Temporal Relations: Chronology

• Most narrative films are presented in roughly chronological order, with notable exceptions (Memento, anyone?) • The two most common disruptions to chronological order are flashbacks (a leap to an earlier moment) and flashforwards (a leap into the future) - the former is much more typical than the latter). Temporal Relations: The Passage of Time • To speed up time, editors make use of elliptical editing techniques such as

Ø Transitional devices Ø Empty frames - figure walks out of the frame in Shot A and then into the frame in Shot B Ø Cutaway shots – cut from a scene to another scene that takes less time, and then back

• To slow down time, editors make use of expansion editing techniques such as

Ø Overlapping – end of Shot A is identical to beginning of Shot B Ø Repetition – multiple views of a single shot Long takes- generally feel as if they unfold in real time, allowing the director to set up the scene realistically. A long take would be longer than 5-8 seconds.

Short takes- are typical in quick-cutting music videos in which a single shot can be less than 1 second. Action films will also use a lot of short takes to create suspense and drama in a fight sequence or car chases. Spatial Relations

Perhaps the most important, as well as the most overlooked, principle of editing is its function in providing perceivers a reliable sense of the physical space that constitutes the world of the film. Editors are responsible (with assistance from cinematographers) for relating points in space in order to achieve narrative continuity. Thematic Relations Editors have at their disposal two very powerful techniques for manipulating the perceiver’s place in the hierarchy of knowledge, and therefore affecting our thematic understanding of the film: • Montage sequences – visual motifs, communicate passage of time • Crosscut editing – cutting back and forth between two lines of action happening simultaneously; greatly heightens perceiver’s position in the hierarchy of knowledge 4 Components of Film

• Mise-en-scene • Cinematography • Editing • Sound Diegetic Sound vs. Non-Diegetic Sound • Diegetic Sound is sound that has a source within the story world of the film. – Dialogue, Sounds made by objects seen in the story world, and music created by instruments within the story world. • Non-Diegetic sound is represented as coming from outside of the story world. – Omniscient Narrator or Music added to heighten the emotional impact of the story, Layered Sound

• Contemporary Films today use layered sound to achieve a realistic depth in the sound environment. • Sound can actively shape how we perceive and interpret the image. Its ability to connect emotionally is often very powerful – Film sound can direct our attention to a specific event. • A creaking floor or the slow, squeaky turn of a door knob. – Sound can cue us to form expectations. • A siren approaching, Footsteps on a path – Sound can give new value to silence. • Clarice in the Darkness being stalked by Hannibal Lecter The Four Dimensions of Film Sound

• Rhythm • Fidelity • Space • Time Rhythm in Film Sound

• Because sound occupies a duration, it has a Rhythm. • Rhythm involves, minimally: 1. A beat, or pulse; 2. A tempo, or pace; 3. A pattern of accents, or stronger and weaker beats. Fidelity

• Fidelity refers to the extent to which the sound is faithful to the source as we conceive it. • Fidelity has nothing to do with what originally made the sound in production. • Fidelity is purely a matter of expectation. • Fidelity can be applied to all three types of sound (Speech, Music, and Sound Fx) Sound Space

• Sound has a spatial dimension because it comes from a source. • Sound creates the sense of space or a three-dimensional environment through the use of Diegetic and Nondiegetic sound. Sound & Time

• Sound takes place in time and can be used to manipulate time or represent time in a variety of ways. – Simultaneous sound is sound that takes place at the same time as the image in terms of story events (most sounds fall into this category) – Non-simultaneous sound describes sound that we hear at the same time as the present image, but that represents a moment from the past or from the future. Special Effects in Sound

• Using sound to tell the inner story – To reinforce the emotional struggle of the character • Pile Driver and mechanical waterfront sounds to support the inner struggle that Terry Malloy faces in confession of a murder. • Distortion of Sound – Subjective POV – Sound reflect the inner psychosis of a character. • Slow-Motion Sound – The power of a single punch in Raging Bull. Foley

• Sound Effects developed by human activity within the film frame. – Created by a Foley Artist – Comes from the first Foley Artist: Jack Foley The Horror Film

RINGU (DIR. HIDEO NAKATA, 1998)

Psycho (dir. Alfred Hitchcock, 1960)

ACTING AND ACCENT Dracula (dir. Tom Browning, 1931) True Blood (HBO, 2008-2014) The Silence of the Lambs (dir. Jonathan Demme, 1991) The Exorcist (dir. William Friedkin, 1973) SOUNDTRACK Jaws (1975) Composer: John Williams Suspiria (1977) Composer: Goblin Halloween (1978) composer: John Carpenter House (1977) Composer: Mickie Yoshino and Asei Kobayashi 2 Types of Soundscapes

• Narraonal- walks us through the story of a scene/sequence • Atmospheric- creates mood but does not contain narraonal cues Friday the 13th: Part 2 (dir. Steven Miner, 1981) Tuck Me In (dir. Ignacio F. Rodo, 2013) The Horror Movie Trailer Summary of film

• We need to be aware of these techniques, and ask ourselves: What is the EFFECT?

• How do the techniques help us decode the film and its meaning?