1.6 Lesson Film

1.6 Lesson: Film

If you want a happy ending, that depends on where you stop the story.

~ Orson Welles

The basic element of music is the note; the basic element of language is the word; the basic element of films is the frame or the border around the picture.

Just as authors of literature choose certain words to suggest specific meaning, film-makers compose a shot to evoke an emotion. The objects or actions included in the picture tell the story.

Similar skills used to analyze literature are employed when analyzing film. Analyzing a film can enrich the entire viewing experience.  

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However, note the information one can analyze from a picture is limited.  Images can evoke a mood or tell a story, but they cannot present an argument. For example, how would you film these sentences without words:

• The cat is on the mat.  (How do you convey the verb is or state of being visually? Even if the cat was sitting on a mat, the viewer might observe only the colour of the cat, or the bowl of milk beside the cat but not the mat.)
  
• The cat was on the mat.  (If the cat moved in the next frame, you might think the film maker communicated, "A cat next to the mat" or "the cat moved off the mat." Film has difficulty conveying the past tense.)
  
• The cat likes to be on the mat.  (Is the cat purring? The cat's thoughts are difficult to communicate without words.)
  
• The cat should not be on the mat.  (Images cannot express what should or should not be.  A no cell-phone sign relies on the reader recognizing the circle with a red line through a phone means "no".)
• If the cat, does not get off the mat, I shall take it off the mat."  (An image cannot predict the future, what will or will not happen. The viewer cannot predict motivations from an image alone.)

A moving picture is new, immediate or quick, appeals to the senses, is emotional, is accessible to everyone, focuses on consuming, is ambiguous, is an escape from reality, and leaves the viewer attached to the present.  

View  "The Elements of Film Junior/Senior High ADLC Tutorial."   Click here to access.

For a glossary of thirty-five Grade 8 film terms, click here.  The ADLC film tutorial covers more elements than these terms.

1. consider film-making techniques
   

1. think critically about what you see in film
   

1. create a storyboard or film