3. Soviet Montage and Formalism
a. What was Pudovkin's concept of constructive editing and how did it manifest itself on film?
According to Pudovkin, shots are meant to express something new to the audience as well as create meaning when shots are put together. Close-ups can unite meaning while long shots are much too realistic. The way montages are put together portray the underlying idea. In Pudovkin’s film called Mother, there is a juxtaposition of images cutting between the mother in a crowd and the son traveling far and wide to reach her. There are cuts between the close-ups of the son’s expressions, the mother’s expressions, and ice being broken up, thus attempting to produce the underlying idea that mother and son must meet obstacles before they can finally be reunited.
b. What was the Kuleshov effect and give me an example of how is it used in today's films?
The Kuleshov Effect cut from shot of a person’s singular expression to something that could explain the expression, then cuts back to the person with the same expression, another object explaining the expression, and then over again. The basic idea is that an actor’s expression juxtaposed with an object of interest creates meaning in that expression and merely changing the object of interest can easily change the entire meaning of the expression. An example would be man, bowl o’ soup, man, coffin, and man, enormous electricity bill. It seems as though the man’s expression changes because of what is in front of him, but really the expression is the same. One film that uses this is Stanley Kubrick’s “The Shining,” Not only does the father maintain a continuously disturbing expression throughout the majority of the film, but the son in the hallway maintains the same expression of fear when the two girls are in the hallway and when they disappeared (were they ever there?).
c. What was Eisensteinian Montage and how does it work in the "Odessa Steps" sequence?
Eisenstein’s Montage was a montage in which its meaning went beyond simply the film. In the “Odessa Steps” sequence, by cutting from wide shots of the fleeing people to close ups and medium shots of specific people, it creates a much more potent effect of fear and sympathy in the audience. This effect would not work if the montage consisted merely of a series of different angles of wide shots in which the emotions of the people were not captured by tighter shots.
4. Andre Bazin and Realism
a. What were Andre Bazin's frustrations with Classical and Formalistic film making?
Bazin as a critic clearly favored film as a representation of real, everyday life. Therefore, such formalist films of filmmakers like Hans Richter, who used abstract cutting. He felt as though filmmakers did not have the right to manipulate reality in such a way because it was distracting and distorted, that they were merely observers. Bazin feels as though less editing and variety allows the audience to pick out what they feel is important and form an opinion about it rather than have it done for them by the filmmaker.
b. What do Realist filmmakers strive for in their work?
Realists strive for as little manipulation as possible to maintain an atmosphere as close to reality as possible. They, along with Bazin, believe the best film lies in what is true, not in what the filmmaker interprets as true. They aim to leave as much up to the audience as possible by allowing every object in the frame to be an object of thought, whereas classicists and formalists take matters into their own hands to reflect their personal views.
c. What techniques to realists use in their filmmaking?
This is achieved through long shots, lengthy takes, deep focus (so one can take in everything the frame has to offer), and tracking, panning, and tilting (to get a well-rounded view). In more early forms of cinema, this would be achieved with a single long and stationary take of some event that is seen through to the end. Later on, there may be shot variety, but it may only be to get a different angle of the same thing so as to get a more well-rounded view of whatever reality the film is attempting to portray.
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