bord well narration
TRANSCRIPT
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
1/23
Narration and the Fiction Film
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
2/23
Narration and the Fiction Film Three approaches to the problem of narrative
as representation: considering the storys world or
diegesis; its portrayal of reality or its broadermeanings.
as structure: ways of combining parts to make awhole; segmentation and grammar or languageof film, e.g. the grande syntagmatique.
asprocess: the activity of selecting, arranging,and rendering story material in order to achievespecific time-bound effects on a perceiver (xi). Bordwells preference for a cognitivist and Constructivist
approach to film research.
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
3/23
From formalism to cognitivism
Russian Formalism (1920s) and PragueSchool (Jan Mukorovsky)
Key concepts: syuzhet, fabula,motivation, retardation, parallelism.
Defining the specificity of aestheticfunction while recognizing the importance
of social convention in what a culturedefines as a work of art.
Refusing to put arbitrary boundariesbetween theory, history, and criticism.
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
4/23
From formalism to cognitivism
For a historical poetics of film
poetic concepts relating to the artworks structure
to the perceivers relation to the work
to broader functions of the artwork
historical concepts examining changes in norms and conventions of narration how social context shapes the form and
function of artworks
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
5/23
Narration and the Fiction Film Part One. Critique of mimetic and diegetic theories of
narration.
Part Two: Theoretical Poetics Syuzhetand style
Film viewing as a dynamic perceptual-cognitive process.
How films factors of space and time are organized asnarration.
Part Three: Descriptive poetics Classical narration (Hollywood, 1917-1960)
Art-cinema narration (postwar European)
Historical-materialist narration (Soviet film of the 1920s)
Parametric narration (limited cases of postwar European film)
plus the example of Godard as a hybrid or mixed mode stylist
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
6/23
The process of narrative comprehension
Protocols of story comprehension, orschemata,
through which spectators are cued by the film to
construct a story based on an inferential process. prototype schemata: identifying actants, actions, locales,
etc., according to a posited norm.
template schemata: a master narrative scheme that
embodies expectations concerning how events should be
classified and how parts should be related to the progress of
the whole.
proceduralschemata: dynamic protocols through which
spectators seek to fill in information absent from the
template. A search for appropriate motivations and relations
of causality, time and space.
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
7/23
Fabula, Syuzhet, and Style
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
8/23
Narration is the process whereby the films syuzhet
and style interact in the course of cueing and
channeling the spectators construction of the fabula(53).
The fabula (story) embodies the action as achronological, cause-and-effect chain of eventsoccurring within a given duration and spatial field. A mental construct or pattern that spectators create through
a process of assumption and inference based on prototype,template, and procedural schemata.
The syuzhetor plot is the actual arrangement andpresentation of the fabula by the film.
Style names a films systematic use of cinematicdevices.
Excess or the third meaning: those elements whichmay stand out perceptually because they do not fiteither narrative or stylistic patterns.
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
9/23
Modes and Norms
Intrinsic norms define a pattern of coherence
set by the system of individual films
themselves.
Extrinsic norms referto patterns of coherence
relevant to large groups of films.
Codification of extrinsic norms over time may
lead to the inauguration of a narrational
mode: a historically distinct set of norms of
narrational construction and comprehension.
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
10/23
Historical modes of narration Classical narration (Hollywood cinema, 1916
to present).
Dialectical-materialist narration (post-revolutionary Soviet films of the 1920s).
Parametric narration characteristic of theformal experimentation of filmmakers like
Alain Resnais and Robert Bresson. A single structure determines the compositional
logic from local texture to overall form.
Art cinema (approx. 1957-1969).
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
11/23
Modes of narration
Knowledgeability: the extent to which the narration lays
claim to a range and depth offabula information. Self-consciousness: the degree to which the narration
acknowledges its address to the spectator.
Communicativeness: the extent to which the narration
withholds or communicates fabula information.
ode Knowledge Self-csness Communica-
tiveness
Narrator Author
Classical omniscient moderate high invisible effaced
Art cinema restricted high low foregrounded present
Historical-
materialist
omniscient high very high foregrounded/didactic
present
Parametric omniscient high low foregrounded present
Godard mixed very high mixed overt present
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
12/23
Classical syuzhetpattern Character-centered causality
Reliance upon the canonic story: undisturbed stage-disturbance-conflict-resolution
of conflict
Causality is the prime unifying principle Double causal structure: two plot lines (romance
and action) each with goals, obstacles, and climax
Plot pattern organized by segments
The closure-effect
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
13/23
Classical style
Style is motivated compositionally as a
function of syuzhet patterning: film technique
is a vehicle for the syuzhets transmission offabula information.
Strives for the utmost denotative clarity.
Highly coded ; i.e.., uses a limited number of
technical devices and these devices operate
according to strict parameters.
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
14/23
The parametric mode
Influence of postwar European avant-garde
music, the nouveau roman, and structuralism.
Values transgression and the need for each artwork toconstruct a unique system.
A single structure determines the compositional logic
from local texture to overall form.
Textual components form an order that coheres
according to intrinsic principles. Textual form treated as a spatial phenomenon.
Phenomenal form of the text tends to be seen as a
permutational distribution of an invisible set.
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
15/23
Parametric style Stylistic system creates patterns distinct from
the demands of the syuzhetsystem.
Representational meaning is subordinated tothe profiling of a sheer perceptual order.
Only a few parameters are highlighted andvaried across the film.
A strong inner unity: a prominent intrinsicnorm with patterned reiterations. The ascetic and sparse options
Tendency to work with additive forms.
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
16/23
Art cinema narration Goal bereft protagonists: characters observe rather
than acting as causal agents.
Elliptical and/or episodic linking of events. Plots based on boundary situations leading to
existential crises and transformations in the maincharacters.
An expressive realism shapes space: dreams,
memories, fantasies motivate ambiguous andsubjective narratives.
Restricted narration.
High degree of stylistic self-consciousness.
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
17/23
Single and multiple protagonistsSingle protagonist
Open endingsStrong sense of closure
Restricted narrationOmniscient narration
Ambiguous or unclear motivationClear and complete motivation
Episodic and ellipticalLinear chain of cause and effect
Boundary situation storiesBuilt on conflict
Goal bereftDriven by desire
Art cinema narrationClassical narration
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
18/23
Expressive verisimilitude in art cinema
A subjective or expressive verisimilitude attuned toexhibiting character. The emphasis on interior or psychological realities.
Plots defined by boundary-situation stories: the causal situation leads up to an episode where the art film
protagonist faces a crisis of existential significance.
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
19/23
Expressive verisimilitude in art cinema
Narrational characteristics of the art film
protagonist.
Lacks clearly defined traits and goals. Causal motivation is withdrawn or unknown, emphasizing
insignificant actions and intervals.
The classical protagonist struggles; the art film
protagonist drifts passively, tracing out an itinerary of
social situations.
Concerned less with action than reaction, art cinema
presents psychological effects in search of their causes.
Characters retard the forward movement of the plot by
recounting stories, fantasies, and dreams. Often leads to
temporal disjunctions, such as flashbacks.
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
20/23
Expressive verisimilitude in art cinema
Narrational characteristics of the art film protagonist,contd. Conventions of expressive realism shape spatial
representation: optical point of view shots, flash frames of a glimpsed or
recalled event, discontinuous editing patterns associated withinterior or psychological time, modulations of light, color, andsound, are motivated by character psychology.
The art film restrains the narrational point-of-view to a single
protagonist or may split it between several protagonists. Enhances expressivity of subjectivity, but also makes narration
unreliable.
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
21/23
Overt narrational commentary Art films tend to highly self-conscious
narration.
The viewer looks for moments in which thenarration may interrupt the progress of theplot and call attention to itself throughstylistic flourishes.
The implied narrator is no longerinvisible but calls attention to itself.
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
22/23
The implied narrator is no longer
invisible but calls attention to itself.
Scenes may end in medias res.
Gaps are created that are not explicable by character psychology.
The plot is retarded through withholding information or providing too
much. Connotative and symbolic associations replace logic of cause and
effect.
Exposition is delayed and widely distributed across the film.
Disjunctions in temporal order such as flashbacks and forwards.
Has the effect of flaunting both the narrations range of knowledge and itsrelative incommunicativeness (telling a little while withholding a lot).
In sum, the construction of the narration becomes the object ofspectator hypotheses: how is the story being told? why tell the storyin this way? (210).
-
7/28/2019 Bord Well Narration
23/23
Overt narrational commentary
Knowledgeability: the extent to which the narration laysclaim to a range and depth offabula information.
Self-consciousness: the degree to which the narrationacknowledges its address to the spectator.
Communicativeness: the extent to which the narrationwithholds or communicates fabula information.
Mode Knowledge Self-csness Communica-tivenes s
Narrator Author
Classica l omniscient moderate high invisible effaced
Art cinema restricted high low foregrounded present