The main differences between art cinema and mainstream cinema in terms of style and plot are the way in which they deal causality, character and space. Whilst mainstream cinema adheres to a Newtonian model of causality and time (cause > effect) art cinema favours a more subjective approach, in which strict causality is a secondary concern and effects often happen without a visible cause. Editing is explicitly used to alter time, to either expand or contract the duration of specific events, resulting in what can often feel like mere meditative ponderousness when contrasted with the conventional style of mainstream cinema. Space is also experimented with, both by the emphasis of off-screen space which is often explored by the the use of sound. Off-screen sound is used to disturb or surprise the viewer by spatially separating cause and effect, thereby going against the audience’s expectations, as well as define a distinct ‘sonic-space’. This scene from Tarkovsky’s The Sacrifice is an excellent example of using off-screen sound to define space.
Plot shapes our perception of a story in three ways:
Quantity of story information to which we have access
Degree of pertinence of information.
Formal correspondences between plot presentation and story data.
A plot with too much information may overwhelm the audience (aptly demonstrated by the somewhat confused public reception of Inception) whilst conversely a plot that provides too little information risks esotericism and may bore the audience. The ideal plot gives the correct amount of information to allow coherent and steady construction of the story. On a similar note, unnecessary information can confuse the audience and so it is necessary to consider the pertinence of information that is presented to the audience.
Formal correspondences between plot and story also colour the audience’s perception; temporary gaps build suspense whilst permanent ones force the audience to engage directly with the film, searching for something they may have missed. The combination of information according to principles of of retardation and redundancy is also crucial in this regard as exposition may be concentrated or distributed, preliminary or delayed, depending upon the director’s intention.
It is also important to consider the particular narration of a film; is thje range of knowledge restricted or omniscient? Is the depth of information subjective objective? Is the narration self-conscious and if so, to what degree does that narration acknowledge that is it presenting a story to the viewer? Is the narration communicative and does it share knowledge with the viewer or does it without hold and suppress information?
The works of Russian filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky are an excellent example of art cinema and the director himself was credited by Ingmar Bergamn with the invention of “a new language which allows him to seize hold of life as appearance, life as a dream”.
Tarkovsky’s work is strikingly formalist and illustrates excessive style composed of a restricted colour pallette, an artifice of cinematography and mise en scene, non-synchronous and subjective sound, discontinous time and space and a self-consciousness of narration (intertextuality, self-referentiality, recitation). In his films, realism is subjective and it is often difficult for the audience to clearly discern between reality, reveries or memories. In terms of narration, Tarkovsky’s plots eschew the question-answer format of classic cinema narration and very often there is no question poised at all, which keeps the audience in the present moment, unable to project forward in time.
Our final assignment was to utilise what we had learned (theoretical and practical) over the course of the module to create a 30 second commercial advertising either a product, service or place, with an emphasis on pre-production and professional execution. I acted as director on this project along side my producer Yousif Mohamed.
Immediately upon reading the creative brief I began to consider a range of different brands and products from Coca Cola to Steam (the digital distribution platform, not water vapour as you may have initially suspected), as well as how I might approach creating a commercial on a technical level. After a series of discussions with my producer in person and online, I opted for Ikea as I believed that it would be possible to create something visually impressive and attractive based upon Ikea’s existing design-oriented brand and minimalist iconography.
A snapshot of Ikea’s target market.
Our next step was to conduct research, both primary and secondary, into Ikea’s ‘brand’ and customer base. For our primary research we visited Ikea’s store in Wembley and took a variety of pictures of the store layout, product range and customers. What we discovered neatly matched my initial assumptions, namely that Ikea’s target base is primarily young to middle aged, on low to middle income with an eye for ‘style’ and predominantly situated in urban/suburban areas.
Uniformity and Style
We also noticed that while Ikea’s product range is extremely wide-ranged and comprehensive, it is also extremely focused around aspects of value, choice, convenience and design. Most products are available in a range of different colours and nearly every item in the store has an easy to spot price tag dangling from it.
Convenience at its finest; ready made rooms.
Meanwhile our secondary research revealed that Ikea extends this convenience online with digital catalogues that perfectly resemble their paper counterparts, as well as a simple and easy to navigate online store. We also discovered that Ikea’s advertising largely revolves around the sheer scale of their superstores (as emphasised in their enormously successful ‘cats’ advert) and the scope of their product range (as can be easily surmised by their numerous leaflets, catalogues and brochures.
With our research completed we began to draw up a picture of our target audience and prepare for our tutorial with Eddie to discuss our idea and progress. While Yousif handled the paperwork, I produced a mood board to visually illustrate our target audience and emphasise the key factors that would inform our commercial.
Our tutorial with Eddie came to a rocky start almost immediately. After a series of frustrating attempts to print the mood board and paper work, we finally set off for the tutorial at the very last minute with everything we needed only for the mood board to be blown away the moment we stepped out from the library. Even at the time I couldn’t help but find the situation unintentionally hilarious, much to my producer’s chagrin. Nevertheless we soldiered on, optimistic that we would be able to make our point on the strength of our words alone. Never have two film students been so entirely mistaken. Eddie immediately (and rightly to my mind) took us to task over our late arrival, the state of our paperwork, the absence of our moodboard and the resultant incoherence of our idea. He also asked us to seriously question the viability of Ikea as the basis for an interesting commercial but nevertheless wished us the best of luck. Despite Eddie’s doubts (and the doubts of nearly everyone I talked to) I pushed on.
My initial idea for our commercial revolved around exploiting the vastness of Ikea’s stores as well as tapping into the same saccharine sentimentalism seen in their ‘cats’ advert to create a kind of emotional and stylistic continuity. Put simply my idea was to film a separated couple wandering through the labyrinthine workings of an Ikea store during closed hours (or if this proved impossible, during the least busy hours) and coming together at the end in a perfectly furnished and romantic bedroom with the (admittedly cliché) tagline “Home is where the heart is”. However this seemed overly ambitious and the idea was quickly canned. After talking to my producer and peers, I decided to refocus and think smaller. Yousif suggested the idea of stop motion, which appealed to me as I had yet to try my hand at the technique and felt the challenge would be interesting. Filming in stop motion also freed us from many of the constraints traditionally associated with film, allowing me to focus more on the ‘look’ and tone I wanted to achieve. Further discussion yielded the idea of having an Ikea catalogue tear itself up. I immediately saw potential in this and developed it further, with the notion that the torn pieces might then arrange themselves into room designs. Initially I had decided to set the commercial outside, to create a contrast between the warmth and colour of the catalogue as opposed to the dull grey concrete and overcast gloom of a street in London and wanted the torn pieces of paper to actually crawl across the street in an insect-like manner (I believe at one point I actually suggested we use origami to design the pieces, before quickly realising the insanity of the idea).
An idea comes to life; the initial storyboards.
It took the combined scepticism of both my producer and Eddie in our second tutorial, to make me see the sheer misery I would have trying to film such a commercial outdoors. Eddie did seem intrigued by the idea however and raised the idea of using a green screen, thereby allowing us to film entirely inside. I gave the idea serious consideration before ultimately opting to film indoors, with a few slight adjustments to the storyboard and new, more light-hearted tone in mind for the commercial. I also drastically simplified the main action, reducing it to something we could realistically film given our scant resources and rapidly diminishing time. After scouting several potential locations, we decided to film at Yousif’s flat as not only was it relatively close to the university, but he had exactly the type of floorboards I had been looking for. With this settled, production could begin.
Beginning the production.
Our first shoot took place on the twenty-eight of March. After meeting early in the day, we set-up in Yousif’s flat and began to film. As we were using stop motion for the first time we had anticipated problems and the need to experiment with our shooting, and so most of the day was given over to experimenting with different ideas and movements. Our lighting set-up was relatively simple and based upon what I had learned on the campaign project, by using only two lights on either side of the action to create a smooth, bright and clean image. We shot the rest of the advert two days later using the same set-up, however after reviewing all the footage and doing a rough edit, I was unhappy with the result and so we planned a third shoot to finish the entire commercial within a single day. It was also around this time that I acted as DOP, (or more accurately lighting cameraperson) on Jaspal’s commercial and helped him to develop the ‘look’ he had in mind.
Task in hand; getting the image right.
Our third shoot went off without a hitch and after several long hours, we finally managed to wrap production, satisfied with what we had shot. My first action was to immediately sort through the images and construct a rough edit purely by lining them up in sequence. I then imported the stills into Sony Vegas and got to work. My reasons for choosing to edit on Vegas were purely pragmatic; I was far more familiar and comfortable with Vegas and my PC than either FCP or the dreaded Macs, meaning that I was able to work far more efficiently and productively.
Crafting the image; Post-production begins!
Though the majority of the editing was a simple matter of adhering to basic continuity, I spent a very long time playing with colour correction and other video FX, to create a smooth, coherent image whilst also subtly altering the image at key points (particularly near the end where the tone becomes much warmer as I felt it made the Ikea logo ‘pop’) and changing the end to feature a reference to their catalogue, as my increased understanding of the target audience led me to believe that this further convenience would appeal to them. In my opinion this new ending also encourages the audience to respond actively to the advert and actually visit the store/online site, rather than simply cutting to a close and allowing the audience to remain passive/uninvolved.
The new ending.
One of the biggest decisions I made in post-production was that of the commercial’s soundtrack. I knew we would need something quirky and light-hearted, though my initial choice was the rather gloomy 32 Ghosts IVfor reasons even I do not entirely understand. I knew what was I looking, even if I couldn’t properly explain it. After scouring the web and listening to countless free tracks (my preference is to also use free music), I finally came across a nice little piece called Amarok on ccMixter that happened, by happy coincidence, to be exactly 30 seconds long. After a few more tweaks and alterations, I had finally finished editing and was ready to present the finished commercial.
Finally finished!
Although there were numerous setbacks along the way I believe that our work shows a thorough understanding of our target audiences, as well as the relationship between the film maker and the viewer that is established through the medium of film. While on this project I found myself drawing upon everything I had learned over the course the last year, from lighting to storyboarding, in order to accomplish my goal. Our biggest weaknesses (and I think my producer would agree) was simply poor organisation, which had the unfortunate knock on effect of straining our efforts to complete the commercial. All in all I am very satisfied with my work on this project.
For this project we were required to make an observational documentary no more than two minutes long. Though I missed this lesson, I had some basic knowledge of the observational mode, it is far from my favourite (I prefer poetic and performative documentaries such as Baraka or Super Size Me) and I seriously doubted my ability to create an interesting documentary based on these guide lines.
For this project I worked once again with Torstein Jacobsen, though we reversed our previously established roles with myself as director. Given that observational documentaries requires unobtrusive camera work that captures the action without interring with the subject, we knew that we would have to be very particular in our choice of subject as well as our approach to shooting. Like many of our colleagues, we played with a number of a different ideas, discussing variously the possibility of shooting on a bus, in a park, in a restaurant or simply setting up in a public space and seeing what we could find.
At long last, fed up with the interminable brainstorming, we simply settled on choosing a convenient location we knew would be at lease moderately populated and see what improvisation might bring. In hindsight I feel that I opted for this as I had little enthusiasm for the project and it was a far easier alternative to planning something more in depth. After helping Jaspal as a runner on his own observational documentary, I went about shooting mine in the Quadrangle at university.
While improvisation can often lead to chance occurrences and unexpected developments, in my particular case it did not. At all. As I had failed to properly consider and define my subject ahead of time, I was left aimlessly shooting anything that caught my interest. This led to difficulty in post-production as Torstein and I attempted to fashion some narrative or continuity out of what had been filmed.
Though I missed the lesson in which the films were screened, I gained a vital insight into where I had gone wrong by watching Jaspal’s observational documentary and recalling the difference between our methods. Whereas he had clearly developed at least some type of plan and had an idea of the story he wanted to tell that involved a kind of positive forward momentum, I had completely failed to consider my film theoretically. All in all, though I believe I met the brief I am largely unsatisfied with the finished piece but I have gained an importance lesson in the relationship between theory and practice.
The aim of this project was to produce a campaign film based upon an issue or an existing campaign with a specific aim such as creating awareness or motivating people to act.
During our first production meeting we decided upon our initial idea and roles, with myself as producer and Claire opting for director. We chose to base our campaign around politeness on public transport, particularly in light of the fast-approaching Olympics and the various government campaigns/varieties to improve London Transport. After this Claire began to flesh out a number of concepts for our film whilst I performed some basic research.
Our second production meeting saw our final idea solidify as we decided upon a single idea and began storyboarding. We also selected a number of locations we could use, though were frustrated to discover that many of them would be off-limits to us, either due to time constraints (such as requiring a permit to film in certain areas) or simple impracticality. Though we had growing doubts about the feasibility of our campaign concept at this point, we pushed ahead on the basis that any insurmountable problems that we had failed to take into account would be highlighted during our tutorial with Eddie.
We turned up to the tutorial woefully unprepared, though the blame for this lies largely with me. However I believe many of my mistakes were the result of simple inexperience on my part as this was my first time as producer. During the tutorial Eddie deconstructed our idea and explained the underlying weakness of “politeness on public transport” as a campaign and cast severe doubt over our ability to produce an effective film without access to the necessary locations.
In the wake of the tutorial, Claire and I immediately decided to drop the idea in favour of one of our initial ideas; medical marijuana. Our aim was to advocate the legalisation and use of medical marijuana. However now we had to produce an entirely new concept from scratch. We began extensive research and began to broadly define our target audience as essentially conservative leaning and middle-aged upwards. Based upon this and the results of our research we decided that simple facts alone would not engage our audience’s sympathy. We would need some kind of emotional core to appeal directly to the audience and allow our message to properly take root. By chance, both Claire and I had come across the same story during our research concerning a young boy suffering from cancer whose life was saved through the use of medical marijuana. This story became the basis for our campaign film.
Crafting a campaign; Production in progress
Claire suggested that we speed-draw our narrative on a white board in order to create an eye-catching aesthetic over we which we could have total control. We agreed upon a meeting time and decided to film in the atrium as the camera would be focused exclusively on the whiteboard meaning that aside from the necessity of electricity for the lighting kit, we were free to film where we pleased.
Shooting the film was relatively straight forward; the only real problem during the shoot was positioning the lights in such as way as to eliminate glare on the white board and create a smooth image. After some experimentation, we managed to get the look we were aiming for. We then shot some test footage as we tried to find a position in which Claire could comfortably draw without intruding too far into the frame. At long last we shot the film in one run through and packed up for the day.
Finishing the shoot; moving into post production
Unlike production, post-production was to prove a difficult process from the off. For some reason I have still as yet to ascertain I was unable to play the footage on either my home pc or laptop (I had initially hoped to edit using Sony Vegas). However we were eventually able to play the footage in FCP, though the program still seemed to have some issue with the file leading in inexplicable playback & editing problems. At the same time I wrote the script for our voice over narration and managed to hunt down a track (http://ccmixter.org/files/AlexBeroza/35784) licensed under Creative Commons we could use that seemed appropriate given the subject matter of the film, as well as the overall tone we were aiming for. With the deadline bearing down on us we managed to at last edit the film, though time constraints meant I had to record the narration using equipment that might be charitably referred to as subpar, resulting in a less than perfect sound quality. Nevertheless we managed to edit the film in time to present it in class.
Despite my fears the film was well-received, though it was roundly agreed that the sound quality of the narration was noticeably poor.
All in all I was satisfied that the finished piece had met the brief though I believe we could have done far better. Our greatest weakness was simply a lack of organisation and as producer I claim full responsibility for this. However in hindsight I feel that this project was an excellent practical lesson for me and has broadened my knowledge of (and respect for) producing on a practical, hands-on level.
Modernism is an artistic movement that cut across all mediums (though it arguably began with painting) and represented a rejection of realism. Closely linked to the spread and development of secularism in the late 19th century. Modernism aimed to create new grand narratives to replace God and religion.
Les Demoiselles d’Avignon (1907) by Pablo Picasso
Features of Modernism
Modernism takes contemporary life as a theme; subject matter and themes such as the advance of technology, city life and personality identity. Godard’s À bout de souffle is an excellent example of this.
Challenges traditional ‘realistic’ art – which is not really ‘real’.
Often critical of popular mainstream entertain.
As a response to realism, modernism was concerned with representation and experimented with the relations between the signifier (words, verbal and written) the signified (what the signified actually is) and the sign (some symbol, index or icon – pictorial representations ).
Intertextiality – modernism works often borrowed from previous works to form part of a great artistic ‘conversation’ in which codes, conventions and representations are repeatedly de-constructed and analysed. An example of this would be John Steinbeck’s East of Eden, which retells the biblical story of adam and eve in early twentieth century America in rural California. An example of this in film would be Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill, which heavily references Asian cinema, explotation films, comic books and his own previous films.
Kill Bill (2003/2004) – Directed by Quentin Tarantino
Examples of modernism are;
Cubism was an early example of a radical strain of modernism that used abstraction to analyse representation and meaning. Geogres Braques and Pablo Picasso were key figures in the movement.
Photography, a key medium in the creation and spread of modernism, triggered a crisis in painting with its realist visual representation that was at once a ‘mechanical art’ whilst able to capture a moment perfectly in time and truly record the chance moment in way that painting could not.
Modernist cinema has found it’s most noticeably expression in experimental cinema and avant garde film, which feature a uniquely stylised aestheticism and often social or political themes. Excellent examples of avant garde/art films are Godard’s A bout de souffle and Welle’s The Trial.
As far as introductions go, this one proved to be far more intriguing than I had expected. The majority of the lesson was spent examining our preconceptions of “film” and looking at alternatives to “Hollywood” filmmaking such as corporate, experimental and campaign films. During the workshop our first new project was outlined and explained.
The main thrust of this particular brief was to experiment with different film-making methods, with an emphasis on post-production, that demanded an imaginative approach. After briefly reviewing our options with my partner and director, Torstein Jacobsen, we planned to tackle the idea entirely through post-production using aftereffects. However after conducting some research for our idea (an exploration of atomic space) and experimenting in aftereffects, we decided the idea had become too big a thing to be completed in the short time we had left. We then had an impromptu production meeting and fleshed out a new idea that would play with the idea of linguistic/conceptual space by stressing the importance of language and the spoken work through its absence whilst also using ‘space’ as a clue in the game of charades, a reference to physical space realised entirely through physical gestures. We then obtained a suitable location, shot and then edited. As I had initially expected, the biggest problem in this assignment (for me personally at least) was actually trying to come up with a meaningful way to express ‘space’ as a subject. Overall though, I am pleased with what we have accomplished.
For this assessment we were required to write a three minute silent script based on previous story and narrative strategies we had previously studied. My main inspiration for this story, as may be obvious, was the biblical tale of Cain and Abel . However I also applied what I had learned about modernism and postmodernism (in both MDA1800 and MDA1700) to create the ending accentuates the dark comedy of the piece I was aiming for, as well as I had learned early on in MDA1700 about how cinema mirrors the movements of the mind. When we had studied Hitchcock’s Strangers on a train, I noticed how by cutting together the two characters as they converge on the same point, the audience is able to understand at once that these characters will be connected in the story and anticipate their imminent meeting. The introduction to my characters was an homage to this, attempting to replicate the same effect of building anticipation whilst also defining my characters through careful juxtaposition.
Craig Rose Up
We see Alan, a tall, fashionably dressed young man strolling casually down a sparsely populated high street, a backpack slung casually over one shoulder and his sneakers only loosely tied. At the same time Craig, a similarly aged man in a business suit, marches down the street from the opposite direction, briefcase held stiffly at his side. Alan saunters towards a large office block and disappears inside. The business man follows in straight after. Alan turns right into a corridor lined by glass panels and lit by sterile electric lights. Craig begins climbing a flight of stairs. Alan walks through an inexplicably vast reception bustling with people. Craig checks his watch as he steps into an elevator heading down. Alan then turns left into a dimly lit, wood-panelled corridor that scarcely seems to be part of the same building. At long last, Craig emerges at one end of a long corridor. Alan appears at the opposite end. Both men stop outside a door marked “Producer” and each of them sit down in chairs on either side of the door.
Alan opens his backpack and pulls out what appears to be a somewhat crumpled script whilst at the very same time Craig opens his briefcase and removes a neat block of paper. He glances over at Alan, who nods in reply and smiles. He holds up his script and we can see the title pages which reads ‘Shadow of a Clue by Alan Jones’. Craig nods appreciatively. Alan suddenly appears wearing a fedora, his face half-obscured by shadow as everything turns black and white. He mimes shooting with his hand, then freezes as if shot and slumps over melodramatically, before looking up expectantly. Craig applauds. Alan , once again in colour, mock bows and gestures towards Craig’s script. Craig shifts awkwardly and shrugs. Alan nods understandingly. The door opens and Alan is quickly ushered inside by a secretary. Obviously apprehensive, Craig begins fidgeting but quickly regains his composure as the door re-opens. Alan emerges grinning ear to ear and gives Craig a thumbs up then sets off back down the corridor. Craig gets up to enter the office but the secretary raises her palm to indicate he is no longer required. The door slams firmly shut in his face. His hand tightens around the briefcase as he watches Alan growing smaller in the distance.
Alan appears at the top of a long staircase. Just as is taking his first step, an indistinct figure appears in the background. He seems to abruptly lose his balance, his hand slips free of the handrail. He crashes head first to the ground and remains still, his eyes staring lifelessly into the distance. Craig stares down upon corpse from the top of the stairs, visibly heaving with effort. He stiffens as if alerted, then slowly looks around towards the camera, which zooms in to capture an expression of guilt and shock. A man stood behind the camera and tripod looks back at Craig with the same surprised expression. For a moment, neither man moves, each waiting for the other to break. Craig raises his brief case into the air and charges for the camera man, who quickly flees along with the camera.
Our final project for MDA1300 tied together all that we had learnt in our previous workshop. For this project we were required to form groups of four and shoot a short film based upon one of our previous scenarios for MDA1800. In order to successfully complete the project we would have to demonstrate an understanding of mise en scene, continuity style, the three act structure and diegetic sound, all while presenting a story that featured “distinct characters” who undergo change. My group for this project consisted of:
Producer/Editor – Eduard Stîngă-Ţîrlea
Director – Arielle Alvarez
Camera Operator – Karl Cross
Sound Operator – Matt Emons
Our first big problem with this project was that none of us had an appropriate screen scenario, having misunderstood description for the initial assessment to mean simply “filmable” rather than “filmable by university students with little to no budget”. Nevertheless after some discussion with our course tutors, our producer was given the go ahead to create a new scenario. Eduard then explained a outlined a relatively simple but effective scenario we could use. After some minor brainstorming, the story took full form and our director was assigned the task of translating it into a screenplay. The script underwent numerous revisions before we were ready, largely due to a group session with David in which he offered several pieces of advice that came to have a bearing on the ultimate shape the script would take.
With the script nearing completion, it became time to consider the more physical, practical elements of our film, namely location and actors. Our producer felt it would be best to draw our actors from our class on the basis that it would therefore be easier to coordinate and organise, as well as saving us from the potential embarrassment of making mistakes in front of professional actors. With regards to location, Eduard managed to find some excellent locations all within reasonable distance of each other and our temporary base, which allowed for a degree of flexibility while we were shooting. Based on our script and photos of the various locations, Arielle began drawing up storyboards over the holiday and updating us over Facebook.
The first page of our revised script; ready for production.
When the holidays came to an end and with the crew all back together, Eduard devised a schedule that could work around the limits of the crew, our actors and the camera, a Canon 60D, which he had borrowed from another student specifically for our production. This meant that we would have to complete the majority of our film in a single day and although I initially had reservations regarding the feasibility of the schedule (after all a single unexpected problem could throw the schedule off completely) I was impressed by the ambition of the schedule and eager to see if we could meet it.
We met up relatively early in the morning to take out our equipment and hopefully pick up a couple of SD cards (my own card had broken some weeks previously), unfortunately we met our first setback almost immediately as the equipment store had run out of SD cards, necessitating that Matt and I head down to Brent Cross, while Arielle and Eduard printed out the scripts and our fake envelope of cash. We managed to all meet up on the bus later on route to our base for the day, however this unfortunate incident had set us back by almost two hours. With a certain grim determination, we nevertheless pushed on and briefly discussed moving a couple of small scenes to another day so that we could at least complete the more complicated scenes.
Discussing the film and checking sound.
As we began shooting it became apparent that we would have to deviate somewhat from our storyboards, partly due to time constraints, but also due to our choice of camera. Given several of our scenes were set within relatively restrictive interiors it was impossible to complete many of the shots with the dslr camera we had opted for as we had no wide lenses and little to no familiarity with the camera. For my part, this was my first time properly using this specific camera (and my first time properly using a dslr, come to that) meaning that I spent a large part of the shoot in sheer bewilderment as I attempted to get to grips with the camera. Another problem we had with the camera was battery power; as we had no spare battery and no way to charge the camera during the day of our shoot, we had to carefully conserve power lest the schedule become completely ruined. The only other real problems we encountered were to do with the use of exterior locations (people walking into shot, background noise, weather, etc) but these are to be expected. After a long day of shooting we packed up having completed the majority of our shots.
Filming in the subway; The Deal is struck.
Post-production was handled by Eduard, who updated us via Facebook as he went about editing the film and tracking down appropriate music. After a few cuts the film began to take shape and despite my initial misgivings I was quite pleased with the final piece, though I feel we could have accomplished more with more planning and perhaps a practise shoot, for both the actors (to give them time to familiarise themselves with the script and get a feel for the scenes before filming) and the crew (so that could properly get to grips with the equipment).
‘Realism’ is a word with many differing connotations and throughout the history of cinema there can be found various movements that shared and adhered to a specific notion of cinematic realism. These movements are classic realism (20’s to 60’s), socialist realism (late 20’s to 30’s), French poetic realism (30’s to 40’s), Italian neorealism (40’s to early 50’s) and social realism (50’s – 60’s).
Classic realism: Classic realism was solidified and codified in Hollywood during the twenties, built around the principles on continuity editing and primarily concerned with maintaining the illusion of the fourth wall. Example: Casablanca, The Adventures of Robin Hood, North by Northwest.
North by Northwest (1959) – Directed by Alfred Hitchcock
Socialist Realism: Characterised by an adherence to soviet montage theory and positive depictions of the working class and a thoroughly socialist ideology. Examples: The Youth of Maxim, The Battle of Stalingrad, Alexander Nevsky.
Alexander Nevsky (1918) Directed by Sergei Eisenstein and Dmitri Vasilyev.
French poetic realism: As the name implies, poetic realism was situated entirely in France. A lyrical, stylized realism that purposefully draws attention to the stylistic aspects of films. Examples: La Grande Illusion, Le Jour se leve.
La Grande Illusion (1937) – Directed by Jean Renoir
Italian neorealism: A reaction to fascism and the difficult economic conditions of post war Italy. Typically involves depictions of the everyday struggles of ordinary working class characters and a detached, documentary style. Examples: Open City, Bicycle Thieves, Umberto D.
Bicycle Thieves (1948) – Directed by Vittorio De Sica
Social Realism: Rooted in Italian neorealism and commonly associated with British filmmaking, social realism explored the social lives of working class characters and the state of society as a whole as seen from their perspective. Examples: Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, A Kind of Loving, Room at the Top.
Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (1958) – Directed by Karel Reisz
Italian neorealism was broadly inspired by poetic realism and socialist realism, but differs from the two in it’s stylistic techniques and shares some similarities with classic realism, insofar as both use an ‘invisible’ style. Natural lighting, handheld camera work, extraneous sound are use to create a documentary sensibility, with the aim of replicating reality as faithfully as possible. Some Ideas on Cinema, written by screenwriter and theorist Cesare Zavattini, is a neorealist manifesto that explicitly lays out the movements goals and intentions. Zavattini wrote of a possibly ‘ intensity of human vision’ that could make the mundane spectacular through the mere emphasis of its normal qualities. He posits the simple of conceit of a woman going to buy a pair of shoes and then states that ‘upon this elementary situation is it possible to build a film’.
In this essay I shall analyse the film Citizen Kane in order to determine whether it is a comedy and or a tragedy.
According to Aristotle’s Poetics, the authoritative text on classic tragedy, the protagonist of a tragedy must be neither good nor evil who exists “between these two extremes” and whose undeserved downfall occurs due to an “error or frailty”. The protagonist must also be noble or otherwise above the common man, thereby emphasising the tragedy of his downfall. Judging from these criteria it may be safely said that Charles Foster Kane, a fabulously wealthy newspaper tycoon who begins an idealistic crusade to help the “hard-working people” yet is eventually corrupted by his own encroaching megalomania, at least partially fits the mould of the classic tragic hero. However Kane differs from Aristotelian tragic protagonists in terms of his hamartia or “tragic error”, in that his downfall is less attributable to a single specific error than a specific flaw in his character (1).
In his book, Anatomy of Criticism, Northrop Frye draws a sharp distinction between comedy and tragedy. Whilst comedies are concerned with the integration of society, tragedies are concerned with the separation of the hero from society. In Frye’s own words “the center of tragedy is in the hero’s isolation”. This creeping isolation can be seen in Citizen Kane in visual as well as narrative terms.
Through the film’s fractured narrative, which shows Kane initially surrounded by friends and employees, to the later years of his life as he lives a miserable life alone in his mansion save for his bitter and resentful wife, the audience is shown how Kane becomes the alienated and enigmatic figure presented in the opening newsreel, having almost entirely separated himself from society.
In terms of the wider narrative and structure, Citizen Kane eschews traditional narrative structure and follows instead a more circular, non-linear structure that is at odds with Aristotle’s view that a tragedy should “have for its subject a single action, whole and complete, with a beginning, a middle, and an end.” Aristotle also believed that action and plot were of paramount importance and that characters should be “as subsidiary to the actions.” however Citizen Kane is principally character-driven rather than plot/action-driven, concerned as it is with the exploration of a single individual.
The film’s narrative also only loosely adheres to the basic structure of Aristotle’s model of tragedy. For instance, while Kane does experience peripeteia, it is less a single action than a protracted string of events that continue throughout the film from the ruination of his political ambitions at the hands of a political boss through bankruptcy during the great depression to the departure of his second wife, Susan. Aristotle’s concept of anagnorisis is also used in Citizen Kane and is demonstrated in a scene that takes place towards the end of the film (and towards the end of Kane’s life as well) in which Kane halts his destructive tantrum to contemplate a snow globe that contains a log cabin that closely resembles his childhood home. Though it is communicated visually, the audience realises that Kane has gained some greater insight into the tragedy of his life and the reason for his seemingly self-engineered downfall. It is by this sudden insight that the mystery of Rosebud is almost entirely explained as a symbol for Kane’s lost innocence and childhood. With regards to catharsis, Citizen Kane catches the interest of the audience by positing the overall mystery of rosebud, before delving into the film’s true mystery which is Kane himself. It is by carefully engaging the audience in this way that the film is able to leap between events to create a sympathetic character who can nevertheless be seen as deeply flawed, which therefore renders his death and in particular, the burning of his sled, as cathartic for the audience.
In conclusion, it would seem that while Citizen Kane only loosely adheres to Aristotle’s traditional principles of tragedy, it nevertheless meets most of the necessary criteria and fits the broader definition of tragedy.
karlcross 