Questions for Review
- How and why do we differentiate between
form and content in a movie, and why are they
relevant to one another? - What expectations of film form can filmmakers
exploit to shape an audience’s experience? - What is parallel editing, and how does it
utilize pattern? - In what other ways do movies use patterns to
convey meaning? How do they create meaning
by breaking an established pattern? - How do the movies create an illusion of
movement? - How does a movie manipulate space?
- How do movies manipulate time?
- What is the difference between realism and
antirealism in a movie, and why is verisimili-
tude important to them both? - What is meant by cinematic language? Why
is it important to the ways that movies
communicate with viewers? - Why do we identify with the camera lens?
62 CHAPTER 2PRINCIPLES OF FILM FORM
Analyzing Principles of Film Form
At this early stage in your pursuit of actively
looking at movies, you may still be wondering just
what exactly you are supposed to be looking for.
For starters, you now recognize that filmmakers
deliberately manipulate your experience and under-
standing of a movie’s content with a constant
barrage of techniques and systems known as film
form and that this form is organized into an inte-
grated cinematic language. Simply acknowledging
the difference between form and content, and
knowing that there is a deliberate system at work,is the first step toward identifying and interpreting
how movies communicate with viewers. The general
principles of film form discussed in this chapter
can now provide a framework to help you focus
your gaze and develop deeper analytical skills.
The checklist below will give you some specific
elements and applications of form to watch out for
the next time you see a film. Using this and subse-
quent screening checklists, you can turn every
movie you watch into an exercise in observation
and analysis.these patterns? Do they help you determine the
meaning of the film?
✔Do you notice anything particular about the
movie’s presentation of cinematic space—what
you see on the screen? Lots of landscapes or
close-ups? Moving or static camera?
✔Does the director manipulate our experience of
time? Is this condensing, slowing, speeding,
repeating, or reordering of time simply practical
(as in removing insignificant events), or is it
expressive? If it is expressive, just what does it
express?
✔Does the director’s use of lighting help to create
meaning? If so, how?
✔Do you identify with the camera lens? What does
the director compel you to see? What is left to
your imagination? What does the director leave
out altogether? In the end, besides showing you
the action, how does the director’s use of the
camera help to create the movie’s meaning?✔A useful initial step in analyzing any movie is
to distinguish an individual scene’s content from
its form. Try to first identify a scene’s subject
matter: What is this scene about? What
happens? Once you have established that
content, you should consider how that content
was expressed. What was the mood of the
scene? What do you understand about each
character’s state of mind? How did you perceive
and interpret each moment? Did that
understanding shift at any point? Once you
know what happened and how you felt about it,
search the scene for those formal elements that
influenced your interpretation and experience.
The combination and interplay of multiple formal
elements that you seek is the cinematic
language that movies employ to communicate
with the viewer.
✔Do any narrative or visual patterns recur a
sufficient number of times to suggest a
structural element in themselves? If so, what are