James Monaco, in his book How To Read A Film, connects the development of film to the science of brain function. On a technical level, to tell a story on film requires understanding how it is that we process images, and the art of film, of creating on-screen storytelling methods which imitate movement in time and space, utilizes technological tools to help shape this as a coherent experience. Much in the same way that our brains process information and formulate memory.
Consider how filmmakers decipher the relationship between scenes (continuous) and sequences (a broken up series of scenes). It is the relationship between these two essential components of narrative form that allows a film to make sense of otherwise disparate moments, activities, ideas, encounters, ect.. This is in fact how we navigate each and every day of our lives. Our brains need to take the scenes that frame our experiences in time and space and arrange them together to formulate a coherent point of view or experience. Without this we could not function
Sequences themsleves, broken down into two categories, episodic and ordinary, also allow us to distinguish between function and interpretation. When a sequential narrative is formed and coherent, it frees us, again in the same way as processing memory, to distinguish between the scenes, and to narrow in on the specifics of each scene. Without that broad, narrative view as an interpretive lens the scenes would cease to be coherent.
Even the way film is designed, establishing the necessary frames per second to accord with how long an image stays in our memory, is working in tandem with the science of brain function. This is how and why a strip of film or the movement of digital images creates the illusion of seeing an unbroken image that contains movement in space and time.
Or consider the way film takes the rules of prose, dictated by punctuation, and plays that into a visual language. We may not always realize it, but our brains are constantly moving between flashback and the processing of fresh images. In a sense this is what film language would describe as the momtage- the act of mixing images and conjoining them at the same time. All of which requires an active use of punctuation in our day to day processing. Our brains break things down, compartmentalize, and form a narrative based on the metaphorical sentences that our experiences represent.
I also found this to be a really interesting insight to go along with that. Monaco notes that while it may seem counterintuitive, something like the hard cut (shifting from one image to another) correlates more with the way our brains actually function than the panning shot. The pan, in which the camera moves from one thing to another, is effectively dictating the narrative the Director wants to tell. It is guiding us to details we would normally just pass over in day to day function. We experience the hard cut, not the pan. This is equally true with things like the jump cut, where time has the appearance of being condensed by jumping us from one moment to another, eliminating the process of getting from point a to point b. This is an obvious editing tool designed to hold our attention and engage effective storytelling, but it’s the art of manipulating actual brain function that allows it to work.
Here’s another interesting point. Monaco notes a difference in langauge between America and Europe. In Europe montage, a key element of narrative filmmaking, means editing. In America editing is its own term. What’s the significance? Editing denotes the idea of cutting down, while montages “build up from the raw materials.” If the montage creates continuity by blending unrelated things into a shared narrative, building up then is the act of forming a narrative out of the foundation that is already there, a way of seeking to understand this foundation as the natural and necessary framework for the narrative itself. On the other hand, cutting down is the act of fitting reality into an external set of rules and perceptions that we coerce and manage and formulate apart from that foundation. It’s worth stating the model the montage is following is built on the more integrated understanding of the European approach. In terms of brain function, it is a ground up approach.
On codes- this is shared langauge that filmmakers can evoke, utilize, and manipulate. These codes apply to the rules of filmmaking, defining the technical asoects of visual storytelling in film. They also apply to what these aspects are utilizing in terms of that preexisting foundation. Syntagmas (narrative elements, chronological or not), are evoking images that have a shared language. Filmmakers understand that when viewers see a particular image they are also seeing particular ideas, sharing necessary reactions, making automatic connections. Because these codes don’t need to be established or explained, they can be manipulated in service of the narrative a filmmaker wants to establish and explore. These are the natural associations that form from our shared cultural context, which is also how our brains form our sense of identity and character.
Of course there is a relationship between the art on screen and the camera movement/placement a filmmaker is employing. It’s here where the complexities of our own pov and the artists pov come into relationship with the perspective of the camera. Much in the same way, we build relationships between our selves and the world around us, only here the camera becomes that additional element which can enable us to interpret reality through the art of imitation. This is what allows film to both direct our focus and exist in relationship to it, ultimately with an awareness of how the brain sees and interprets the world around us. It can follow (stay focused on a moving subject) or utilize Rack focus (shift our focus). It can match cut (link two disparate scenes by the repetition of an action or a form), it can edit (joining two shots and determining the length of each), it can engage deep focus or narrow focus, it can jump or pan. What is perhaps most powerful about this art form though is that it informs how we see and understand the world while simultaneously enabling us to see and understand the world
Some final thoughts on why I’ve been thinking about all of this over the past week:
- Over the years I have become more and more indebted to narrative philosophy/theology (see Walter Fisher’s book Human Communication As Narration: Toward a Philosophy of Reason, Value and Action). Narrative philosophy is defined as “a theory that suggests that human beings are natural storytellers and that a good story is more convincing than a good argument.” (Wikipedia) Another definition states it as “a theory that suggests that human beings are natural storytellers and that a good story is more convincing than a good argument.” Narrative Theology is built on the same notion, using narrative approaches to bridge ancient and modern contexts by way of scripture and Tradition as story rather than doctrine. I have found this study of film as an artform to align with this philosophical approach to understanding reality, especially where it connects to how we know and how we experience it. Story is not only integral to how we interpret this reality, it’s integral to the way our brains process reality as narrative.
- Reality is more than what we observe and experience on a functional level. It has a foundation and an ontological shape, it requires the art of interpretation. It needs language. It’s experienced through the construction of codes. All of this invites another central conviction of mine: participationist philosophy/ theology, defined as a theory of knowledge that holds that meaning is enacted through the participation of the human mind with the world. All things known in and through relationship. The art of film is expressly about the different components functioning in relationship. These different components are active. They participate in the establishing of the narrative, and through this the narrative can become known. Similarly we participate as viewers, engaging in the reading of a film so as to be informed and transformed by it. Taken together with narrative philosophy, these two things have a lot to say about what it means to be human.
The Stories of my Life 