Film

The Greek word kinetos (moving) gave us the word cinema, certainly the most significant new art form of the 20th
century. Film provided artists with new ways to work with time and motion. As these technologies become increasingly
affordable and available, artists experimented with them more and more, to the point where video became an
important medium for contemporary art.

Film depends on a phenomenon called persistence of vision. The human brain retains a visual image for a fraction of a
second longer than the eye actually records it. If this were not true, your visual perception of the world would be
continually interrupted by blinks of your eyes. Instead, your brain “carries over” the visual image during the split second
while the eyes are closed. Similarly, the brain carries over when still images are flashed before the eyes with only the
briefest space between them. Motion-picture film is not real motion but a series of still images projected at a speed of
twenty-four frames per second, which makes the action seem continuous.

Commercial applications of the motion picture, however, awaited three major developments. In 1888 the American
George Eastman introduced celluloid film, which made it possible to string images together. Another big step was taken
by Thomas Edison, the famous American inventor. It was in Edison’s laboratory, in 1894, that technicians created what
was apparently the first genuine motion picture. Lasting only a few seconds, the film was made on celluloid. Its “star”
was one of Edison’s mechanics, a man who could sneeze amusingly on command. Its title: Fred Ott’s Sneeze.

One major problem remained. There was no satisfactory method for projecting the films to an audience. Here the
challenge was taken up by two Frenchmen, brothers appropriately named Lumière, who in 1895 succeeded in building a
workable film projector. The films shown in that Paris café were made by the brothers Lumière. From that point the
motion-picture industry was off and running.

Making the Movie: Film Production

A movie typically goes through three phases: production, distribution, and exhibition. An individual, group, or company
makes the film. A distribution company rents copies to theater chains, and theaters exhibit the film. Later, DVD and Blu-
ray versions are distributed to chain stores or rental shops; and the movie is then exhibited on TV monitors, computer
screens, or portable displays. For video on demand, streaming, and websites such as YouTube, the Internet serves as
both a distribution and an exhibition medium.

Most films go through four distinct phases of production:

1. Scriptwriting and funding. The idea for the film is developed and a screenplay is written. The filmmakers also acquire
financial support for the project. Two roles are central in this phase: producer and screenwriter. The tasks of the
producer are chiefly financial and organizational. The chief task of the screenwriter is to prepare the screenplay (or
script). Sometimes the writer will compose an original screenplay and send it to an agent, who submits it to a production
company. Or an experienced screenwriter meets with a producer in a “pitch session,” where the writer can propose
ideas for scripts.

2. Preparation for filming. Once a script is more or less complete and at least some funding is assured, the filmmakers
plan the physical production. In commercial filmmaking, this stage of activity is called preproduction. The director, who
may have come on board the project at an earlier point, plays a central role in this and later phases. The director
coordinates the staff to create the film. Although the director’s authority isn’t absolute, he or she is usually considered
the person most responsible for the final look and sound of the film.
3. Shooting. The filmmakers create the film’s images and sounds. Shooting is also known as principal photography.
During shooting, the Director supervises his crew (Assistant Directors, Script Supervisor, etc.) in the making of the film.

The most visible group of workers is the cast, which includes the main actors and supporting players. One of the
director’s major job is to elicit performances from the cast. The assistant director usually works with the extras and takes
charge of arranging crowd scenes.

On some productions, there are more specialized roles, like stunt artists, choreographers, animal wranglers, etc.

4. Assembly. The images and sounds are combined in their final form. This involves cutting picture and sound, executing
special effects, inserting music or extra dialogue, and adding titles. Filmmakers call the assembly phase postproduction.
Yet this phase doesn’t begin after the shooting is finished. Typically, postproduction staff members work behind the
scenes throughout shooting. Since the advent of digital postproduction tools, many filmmakers prefer to start editing,
sound mixing, special effects, and other important tasks immediately after the first footage is shot.

The phases can overlap. Filmmakers may be scrambling for funding while shooting and assembling the film, and some
assembly is usually taking place during filming. In addition, each stage modifies what went before. The idea for the film
may be radically altered when the script is hammered out; the script’s presentation of the action may be drastically
changed in shooting; and the material that is shot takes on new significance in the process of assembly.

Bringing the Film to the Audience: Distribution and Exhibition

Distribution: The Center of Power

Distribution companies form the core of economic power in the commercial film industry. Filmmakers need distributors
to circulate their work; exhibitors need them to supply their screens. The major distributors have won such power
because large companies can best endure the risks of theatrical moviemaking.

Distributors arrange release dates, make prints, and launch advertising campaigns. For big companies, distribution can
be efficient because the costs can be spread out over many units. One poster design can be used in several markets, and
a distributor who orders a thousand prints from a laboratory will pay less per print than the filmmaker who orders one.
Large companies are also in the best position to cope with the rise of distribution costs.

Exhibition: Theatrical and Nontheatrical

We’re most familiar with the exhibition phase of the business, the moment when we pay for a movie ticket or play a DVD
or stream a movie. Theatrical exhibition involves screening to a public that pays admission, as in commercial movie
houses. Other theatrical sites are city art centers, museums, film festivals, and cinema clubs. Nontheatrical exhibition
includes all other presentations, such as home video, cable transmissions, Internet downloads, and screenings in schools
and colleges.

Ancillary Markets: Taking Movies beyond the Theater

When a film leaves theatrical distribution, it lives on. Home video creates a vast array of ancillary markets “downstream,”
and taken together these return more money than the theatrical release windows and the Web.

Distributors carefully plan the timing of their video releases according to windows of scheduling. Typically the video
version appears first on hotel pay-television systems, then on pay-per-view cable, then on DVD release, then on pay
cable outlets like HBO, and eventually on network broadcast and basic cable. Thanks to greater Internet bandwidth,
video on demand (VOD) has become an important window. Sometimes VOD becomes available after a film’s theatrical
release, sometimes during it, and sometimes even before it.

Narrative Form

We can consider a narrative to be a chain of events linked by cause and effect and occurring in time and space. A
narrative is what we usually mean by the term “story,” although we’ll be using that term in a slightly different way later.
Typically, a narrative begins with one situation; a series of changes occurs according to a pattern of cause and effect;
finally, a new situation arises that brings about the end of the narrative. Our engagement with the story depends on our
understanding of the pattern of change and stability, cause and effect, time and space.

Plot and Story

The story is the chain of events in chronological order. That story may be presented in various ways. If we use flashbacks
instead of linear time, or if we decide to organize events around one character rather than another, or if we make other
choices about presentation, we will be creating a different plot. A story can be presented in different ways—rendered as
different plots—and each variant is likely to have different effects on the audience.

As viewers, we have direct access only to the plot that the filmmakers finally decided on. Yet eventually we arrive at an
understanding of the underlying story. The filmmakers have built the plot from the story, but viewers build the story
from the plot. How do viewers do that? By making assumptions and inferences about what’s presented. We’re probably
not aware of making these inferences, but insofar as we understand what we see and hear, we are making them. The
filmmaker has steered us to make them.

From the viewer’s perspective, the plot consists of the action visibly and audibly present in the film before us. The plot
includes, most centrally, all the story events that are directly depicted. Note, though, that the filmmaker may include
material that lies outside the story world.

From the standpoint of the filmmaker, the story is the sum total of all the events in the narrative. As the storyteller, you
could present some of these events directly (that is, display or mention them in the plot), hint at events that are not
presented, and simply ignore other events.

The spectator’s task is quite different. All we have before us is the plot—the arrangement of material in the film as it
stands. We create the story in our minds, thanks to cues in the plot. And in telling someone about the movie we’ve just
seen, we can summarize it in two ways: We can recap the story, or recap the plot.

Mise-en-Scene

Of all film techniques, mise-en-scene is the one that viewers notice most. After seeing a film, we may not recall the
cutting or the camera movements, the dissolves or the offscreen sound. But we do remember the costumes and lighting.
We retain vivid impressions of the setting. We recall the performances of the actors. Many of our most vivid memories
of movies stem from mise-en-scene.

In the original French, mise en scène means “putting into the scene,” and it was first applied to the practice of directing
plays. Film scholars, extending the term to film direction, use the term to signify the director’s control over what appears
in the film frame. As you would expect, mise-en-scene includes those aspects of film that overlap with the art of the
theater: setting, lighting, costume and makeup, and staging and performance.
The Power of Mise-en-Scene

Filmmakers can use mise-en-scene to achieve realism, giving settings an authentic look or letting actors perform as
naturally as possible. Throughout film history, however, audiences have also been attracted to fantasy, and mise-en-
scene has often been used for this purpose.

Components of Mise-en-Scene

Setting

Since the earliest days of cinema, critics and audiences have understood that setting plays a more active role in cinema
than it usually does in the theater. In a film, the setting can come to the forefront; it need not be only a container for
human events but can dynamically enter the narrative action.

A full-size setting need not always be built. Through much of the history of the cinema, filmmakers have used miniature
buildings to create fantasy scenes or simply to economize. Parts of settings could also be rendered as paintings and
combined photographically with full-sized sections of the space. Now, digital special effects can conjure up settings in
comparable ways.

In manipulating a shot’s setting, the filmmaker may use a prop, short for property. This is another term borrowed from
theatrical mise-en-scene. When an object in the setting has a function within the ongoing action, we can call it a prop.

Costume and Makeup

Like setting, costume can have a great variety of specific functions in the film’s overall form. Costumes can play causal
roles in film plots. Less obviously, costumes can become motifs, enhancing characterization and tracing changes in
attitude. In other films, costumes can be used for their purely graphic qualities.

By combining with setting, costumes may reinforce narrative and thematic patterns. Computer technology can graft
virtual costumes onto fully computer- generated characters. Entirely digital costumes for human actors are less common,
but fantasy and science fiction films use them.

Many of these points about costume apply equally to a closely related area of mise-en-scene, the actors’ makeup. In the
early days of cinema, makeup was necessary because actors’ faces would not register well on film stocks. Over the
course of film history, a wide range of possibilities emerged.

Changing actors to look like historical personages has been one common function of makeup. Makeup is most noticeable
in horror and science fiction films, and the popularity of those genres contributed new technology to the craft. Rubber
and plasticine compounds can create bumps, bulges, extra organs, and layers of artificial skin. Now other genres are
utilizing those resources.

Today the hope is for makeup generally to pass unnoticed, and quietly accentuate expressive qualities of the actor’s face.
Because the camera may record cruel details that we wouldn’t notice in ordinary life, unsuitable blemishes, wrinkles,
and sagging skin will have to be hidden. The makeup artist can sculpt the face, making it seem narrower or broader by
applying blush and shadow. Viewers expect that female performers will wear lipstick and other cosmetics, but the male
actors are usually wearing makeup as well.

Although most makeup continues to be physically applied to actors’ faces, digital technology can be used as well. Minor
cleanups remove flaws or shadows from faces.
Lighting

In artistic filmmaking, lighting is more than just illumination that permits us to see the action. Lighter and darker areas
within the frame help create the overall composition of each shot and guide our attention to certain objects and actions.
A brightly illuminated patch may draw our eye to a key gesture, while a shadow may conceal a detail or build up
suspense about what may be present. Lighting can also articulate textures: the curve of a face, the grain of a piece of
wood, the tracery of a spider’s web, the sparkle of a gem.

Staging: Movement and Performance

When we think of a film director, we usually think of someone directing performers. The director is the person who says,
“Stand over there,” “Walk toward the camera,” or “Show that you’re holding back tears.” In such ways, the director
controls a major component of mise-en-scene: the figures we see onscreen. Typically the figure is a person, but it could
be an animal, a robot, an object, or even a pure shape. Mise-en-scene allows all these entities to express feelings and
thoughts; it can also dynamize them to create kinetic patterns.

Cinema gains great freedom from the fact that here expression and movement aren’t restricted to human figures. The
filmmaker can breathe life into two-dimensional characters, such as Shrek or Daffy Duck. Puppets may be manipulated
frame by frame through the technique of stop-action or stopmotion. In science fiction and fantasy movies, robots and
fabulous monsters created as models can be scanned and movement added via computer manipulation. Even if the
figures are fantastical, however, the filmmaker is obliged to stage their actions and construct their performances.

Since the creation of digitally generated characters, actors have had to learn new skills. Performers in special suits
covered with dots were filmed digitally to form the basis for characters’ movements. Soon CGI (computer- generated
imagery) programs allowed more dense arrays of dots to capture smaller details of facial movement. The addition of tiny
cameras attached to the actors’ heads permitted even subtler capture of expressions.

Now a distinction is made between motion capture, where the whole body is filmed, and performance capture, which
concentrates on the face. Motion capture can also be used on animals. Thanks to capture dots, ordinary horses can be
transformed into fantastical creatures. Animated films use performance capture for their human characters. In predigital
days, actors would play fantasy characters with heavy prosthetics and ample makeup. Motion capture and performance
capture make it easier for the actor to concentrate on the performance.

The Shot: Cinematography

In controlling mise-en-scene, the filmmaker stages an event to be filmed. But what happens in front of the camera isn’t
the whole story. That event has to be captured, on a strip of film or in a digital format. The recording process opens up a
new area of choice and control: cinematography.

Cinematography (literally, “writing in movement”) depends to a large extent on photography (“writing in light”). It is a
general term for all the manipulations of the film strip by the camera in the shooting phase and by the laboratory in the
developing phase.

Contrast refers to the comparative difference between the darkest and lightest areas of the frame. Contrasts in the
image help filmmakers to guide the viewer’s eye to important parts of the frame and to give the shot an emotionally
expressive quality—somber, cheerful, or whatever.
Exposure is the adjustment of the camera mechanism in order to control how much light strikes each frame of film
passing through the aperture. Exposure regulates how much light passes through the camera lens. Often we notice
exposure only when an image seems too dark (underexposed) or too bright (overexposed).

The speed of the motion presented onscreen depends on two factors: the rate at which the film was shot and the rate of
projection. Both rates are calculated in frames per second. The standard rate for film-based shooting, established when
synchronized-sound movies came in at the end of the 1920s, was 24 frames per second (fps). Today’s 35mm cameras
commonly offer the filmmaker a choice of anything between 8 and 64 fps, with specialized cameras offering a wider
range of choice.

The Lens: (Focal Length) Filmmakers think carefully about the perspective of an image. The main area of choice involves
the focal length of the lens. In technical terms, the focal length is the distance from the center of the lens to the point
where light rays converge to a point of focus on the film. The focal length alters the size and proportions of the things we
see, as well as how much depth we perceive in the image. Lens length can distinctly affect the spectator’s experience.
For example, expressive qualities can be suggested by lenses that distort objects or characters. A decision about lens
length can make a character or object blend into the setting or stand out in sharp relief.

The Lens: (Depth of Field and Focus) Every lens has a specific depth of field: a range of distances within which objects
can be photographed in sharp focus, given a certain exposure setting. For example, suppose you are shooting with a
50mm lens and your subject is 10 feet away. At one common exposure level, focusing the lens at 10 feet will render
everything between 8½ and 12 feet away in acceptable focus. Outside that zone, either closer to the lens or farther way,
objects will blur.

Framing is defined as the use of the edges of the film frame to select and to compose what will be visible onscreen.
You’re very aware of framing when you take a photo or shoot a video. You don’t usually want to cut off people’s heads.

Aspect ratio is the “shape” of the frame — how wide and how tall it is as a ratio. For example, an image that is twice as
wide as it is high is said to be in a 2:1 ratio. Thomas Edison, Lumière, and other early film inventors set the proportions at
approximately four by three.

Camera Position: Angle, Level, Height, and Distance of Framing

Angle: The frame positions us at some angle on the subject. The filmmaker faces a huge number of choices here, but we
can say roughly that the framing can present a straight-on angle, a high angle, or the low angle.

Level: The frame can be more or less level—that is, parallel to the horizon. If the framing is tipped to one side or the
other, it’s said to be canted. Canted framing (also called a “Dutch angle”) is relatively rare, although a few films make
heavy use of it, which can create rather disruptive effects.

Height: We may not think as much about camera height as we do angle and horizontal balance, but it’s another area of
choice for the filmmaker. Height is related to camera angle, since some angles demand that you position the camera
higher or lower than the subject.

Distance: The framing of the image stations us relatively close to the subject or farther away. This aspect of framing is
usually called camera distance. The terms for camera distance are approximate, and they’re usually derived from the
scale of human bodies in the shot.