Eisenstein

I found the comparison of cinema and pieces of cinema to Japanese characters to be extremely fascinating, and made everything easier to understand. Cinema is really just putting pieces together to make something make sense, much like how pieces of characters are put together to make new words. It also solidifies the idea that in order to understand the whole, we must be able to put together its parts. I find this to be especially relevant to our film journals and dissection of film—each part contributes to a greater whole that allows us to make sense of everything. I will say I was a little confused about the greater idea of montage and how it fits into everything that Eisenstein is saying. From what I can surmise, it relates to the ability to weave things together and make pieces flow into each other. Dialectic, however, was much harder for me to understand. I think this also involves pieces being woven together, but I found this section much less intuitive and harder to understand for me.

Eisenstein- The Cinematographic Principle and the Ideogram

One of the first thoughts that I had while reading this writing was that I have found myself confused by the meaning on montage. I feel that there are so many different definitions floating around that I have mixed them up so I will definitely be looking for clarity in this dilemma. I found this reading to be a little hard to really get a grasp of but thought that some of the examples that were used made it a little easier to understand. An interesting point that I got from this reading was the relationship between shot and montage. As I mentioned I have been having difficulty really understanding what the meaning of montage is when it is used in many different ways. I believe that montage is used in this reading as a compilation of shots that come together to form a series that is meaningful to spectators. I thought that it was interesting that Eisenstein wrote shot as a cell of montage. Shots then collide together to create the montage. I thought that these two terms were particularly important to pick out of this reading because Eisenstein even states that shot and montage are the basic elements of cinema. I thought that the way that this concept was linked to hieroglyphs to be interesting and actually helped clarify some of the reading for me. Much like a shot, the hieroglyphs are objects that are depictive that then form intellectual series, or in the world of cinema a montage.

The Obvious & The Code

Last year I took a Communications class that specifically focused on film noir. Throughout the duration of the course, we examined the ways in which the Production Code forced directors to imply certain notions as obviously as they could, without explicitly showing the action. However, my association with the production code and its defining affect on classical Hollywood cinema is what confused me when trying to understand Bellour’s reference to the code. I think that Bellour was focusing on the code as a way of using shot symmetry and dissymmetry to create meaning through segment. He elaborates on this idea by referencing to the conversation between Marlowe and Vivian in the car. He points out that each time Marlowe speaks, there is a shot of Vivian, and each time Vivian speaks, there is a shot of Marlowe. However, by using a shot of both of them together in moments of silence, the audience is able to understand “narrative elements ebbing and flowing throughout the segment” (74). It was interesting to see how Bellour used this minute scene in the film to demonstrate his point, because I think it is often an exchange that goes unnoticed (at least I never thought anything of it). That being said, I can’t really place a finger on what statement Bellour is trying to make, besides the fact that the visual composition of the shots make obvious what the dialogue does not.

The Cinematographic Principle and The Ideogram

Japanese cinema is unaware of montage but montage is a basic element of the culture (the hieroglyph). This is montage because it is combining shots that are depictive, single in meaning, neutral in content- into intellectual context and series. I found this article interesting in the way that Eisenstein used hieroglyphics and elements of Japanese culture to show how they represent montage because Japanese cinema itself is absent of montage and cinematography.

Eisenstein explains hieroglyphics here: “The picture for water and the picture of an eye signifies ‘to weep’ the picture of an ear nearing the drawing of a dog= ‘to listen’ (128).” He calls this montage because it mimics what is done in the cinema- combining of shots that are depictive into intellectual contexts and series.

Like we learned in class, there are different definitions for montage and different ways at looking at the term as it relates to cinema. In this article, we see montage as an idea that arises from the collision of independent shots- shots even opposite to one another. I really like the idea he had of saying montage is an “unrolling of an idea with a series of single shots.” This gives the multiple points of view and shots a purpose to keep a steady tempo while getting the point and meaning across to the spectator. It also creates drama.

The Obvious and the Code

Bellour's piece, in all its complexity and seemingly needless theoretical jargon, really solidified for me a concept that pulls together my study of film thus far. His invocation of semiotics to talk about film as a language, consisting of signified and signifier like any other, really helped me as an English person to draw the analogy between literature and film, just like the Russian Formalists once did. The close textual analysis of a scene is just like the close textual analysis of a dense passage of prose, in revealing meanings represented subtly through artistic choices. As for Bellour's piece itself, well, it's an example of just how deep and precise one can take said analysis. Everything in film, like everything in art, is a choice, and choices are made for a reason. Meaning can't get lost in simplicity, in obviousness, if that itself is meaningful and significant.

"The Obvious and the Code"

Raymond Bellour, in his article “The Obvious and the Code,” examines the workings of a simple piece from The Big Sleep and concludes that working behind the simplicity of the classical Hollywood style is a highly structured and very measured representation. This schematic, he claims, is concentrated on repetition, but a repetition, which seeks to subvert itself with subtle differences in the use of cinematic codes. Furthermore, this repetition works to create a symmetrical structure, which is the very key to narrative. Through a difficult dissection of twelve shots, Bellour demonstrates how through non-obvious codes the film creates meaning. Bellour describes how twelve shots where there is relative inaction set between two extremely active scenes tell us more about the film, characters, and the film's meaning than the seemingly major scenes. Bellour talks about the relative "poverty" of this segment; he explains how to the average viewer it would seem nothing but a long take, or maybe at most two or three shots, but in actuality the segment is twelve extremely important shots. Overall, Bellour expresses how all of the shots, ordered and edited the way they are, contribute to the development of the movie's narrative and meaning.

The Obvious and the Code

Bellour begins by highlighting the distinction between a scene and a segment. To illustrate an important segment, he examines the 12 shots in between two scenes in The Big Sleep. A segment, as the author describes is “a moment in the filmic chain that is deliminated both by an elusive but powerful sense of dramatic or fictional unity and by the more rigorous notion of identity of setting and characters of the narrative." This scene is difficult to read upon first viewing because in this segment the audience is only left with a sense of vague unity. We make sense of the scene through picking up on certain codes. The author emphasizes thinking of scenes as containing multiple codes, giving the audience something to grasp onto. I found it very interesting how the author broke down exactly the means through which the director ensures continuity. He emphasizes the importance of using the same camera angle, maintaining the same duration for each shot, and using shots that contain each character. When watching this segment at home, I failed to notice the importance of the use of silence. The juxtaposition of speaking in shots 8 and 9 against the silence in shots 11 and 12 is a unique narrational technique that is very powerful. Overall, I thought this was a great reading. It got me thinking more closely about the techniques used to create certain effects, continuity, or stand-out segments like the one analyzed in the essay.

The (Not So) Obvious Code

       After viewing The Big Sleep and analyzing "The Obvious Code," the frame designing used in each shot added a new dimension to my understanding of film language. In another class I am taking, we just learned about storyboarding, the act of sketching each scene before it is filmed. The act of doing this stylizes a film. It also directs our attention to specific aspects on the screen to guide the plot/storyline. For example, when Bellour unpacks the Vivian and Marlowe scene into twelve shots he showed how the narrative unfolds in terms of framing, camera angle, speech, repetition, and balance. Essentially, he is explaining how film techniques contribute to our understanding, like storyboarding in reverse. Then he breaks down his shot further into six codes depending on their film technique. However, the article takes an interesting turn when he discuss how the average moviegoer would not appreciate these details. Bellour calls this "poverty."  One of Bellour's overall thesis is that audiences need to recognize and analyze these film details to understanding the meaning behind a film, but there is a major disconnect between what directors include and what people can actually understand. We must ask ourselves how many people are watching incredible films but taking away a completely different meaning. But can any meaning be wrong?

"The Obvious and the Code"

“The Obvious and the Code” breaks down Howard Hawk’s The Big Sleep (1946) both physically as well as contextually by scene. Bellour offers readers a better understanding of the film by the way that editing techniques are set up for the film’s audiences. While watching The Big Sleep, many of these techniques stood out to me as a viewer. However, after reading Bellour’s analysis of the film, there appears to be significantly more analysis of both the cinematography and the context that I missed upon my first viewing of The Big Sleep. In fact, “the work of the codes” is barely something that I knew existed prior to this reading. Hawk is able to expand on codes and establish connections mainly by associating various scenes’ codes as well as their narrative evolutions. His elaborations on transitions between different shots allows for a further understand on what it was that Howard Hawk exactly intended for his film. It is likely that if I had read “The Obvious and the Code” prior to screening The Big Sleep, there would be many more elements integrated into the film that I would have picked up on. If I was to watch the film once more, it would definitely be a different experience. 

The Obvious and the Code

Throughout this reading I learned the importance of camera movement. I feel as though when watching a film I usually am initially attracted to/first notice the Mise-en-scene. The things that initially stand out in a film are the costumes, settings, characters/portrayals, and other elements that give a sense of the who, what, where, and when of a film. However, this reading made it apparent that there is a strong importance of camera movement, angles, and shot techniques. In many ways, these elements of how the film is shot in terms of camera movement techniques, etc. can be attributed to making the ideas and message of the film become clear and in existence in the first place. Ultimately, the reading showed me that camera angles, movement, shot, etc. have a very important role in creating the film and effect on the overall message and idea conveyed in the film.