Film Appreciation Chapter 8

What is the basic building block of film editing?

The shot

Which is a quality that discontinuity editing seeks to achieve?

Contrast

Montage editing that uses juxtaposition to impart meaning in a way that we usually cannot help but notice is known as

Parallel editing

What is one of the goals of continuity editing?

To keep viewers oriented in space and time

What is a montage sequence?

a string of shots, often with superimpositions and optical effects, which shows a condensed series of events

How does a film editor typically fulfill his or her responsibilities for the spatial relationships between shots?

By placing shots together so that the sense of the overall space suggested on-screen shifts and expands

Which of the following is an element that the film editor does NOT manipulate?

Mise-en-scene

What was the central discovery of Lev Kuleshov?

That two shots need not have any actual relationship to one another to affect the viewer

Which action extravaganza had the astronomical shooting ratio of 240:1 for its 120-minute running time?

Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)

How does a split screen differ from parallel editing?

By telling multiple stories within the same frame

When used in continuity editing, shots in a shot/reverse shot sequence are often framed in what way?

Over the characters' shoulders

How does the 180-degree system influence screen direction?

It ensures consistent screen direction when shots are edited together.

What is screen direction?

Direction of a figure's or object's movement on the screen

The effect of an ellipsis is determined by-

How much story time is implied between shots

Which of the following is an example of a shot/reverse shot editing sequence?

A shot of a character and then a shot of another character who is facing the first

What is parallel editing?

The cutting together of two or more lines of action that occur simultaneously at different locations

How does shot/reverse shot fool viewers in order to achieve continuity?

By linking together shots on-screen that could have been recorded at completely different moments

How does an editor control the rhythm of a film?

By varying the duration of the shots in relation to one another and thus controlling their speed and accents

A video produced by sequencing storyboard images and adding sound to help editors envision how planned shots will work in the edit is known as a-

Animatic

1. What are salient stylistic techniques?

A. Techniques that can be noted and named

B. A confusing choice a filmmaker made

C. The important techniques the film most relies on to create its style

D. Costume choices

A. Techniques that can be noted and named

2. What can limit the stylistic choices of a filmmaker?

A. Fashion trends

B. Viewers' tastes

C. Technology

D. All of the answer choices are correct.

D. All of the answer choices are correct.

3. Our Hospitality creates its gags by

A. isolating each element in a single shot and then linking the two elements by editing.

B. putting two elements in the same shot and letting us observe comic juxtaposition.

C. isolating each element in a single shot and then allowing the progression of shots to create comic structure.

D. following heavily physical actions by the characters with scenes of extreme stillness to create comic juxtaposition of opposite levels of movement.

B. putting two elements in the same shot and letting us observe comic juxtaposition.

4. In Shadow of a Doubt, which of the following is done by the development and stylistic presentation of the story?

A. They make the audience identify with the murderer.

B. They put the audience close to Young Charlie's point of view.

C. They keep the audience confused as to the true motives of Uncle Charlie.

D. They take us chronologically through the defining moments of Young Charlie's adolescent life.

B. They put the audience close to Young Charlie's point of view.

5. In the dinner scene in Shadow of a Doubt in which Uncle Charlie praises small-town living, what purpose does the dialogue serve?

A. Informational, mostly to orient the audience as to the current events in the town to which Young Charlie has moved

B. To strengthen the audience's and Young Charlie's suspicions that the uncle is a murderer

C. To strengthen the audience's suspicions that the uncle is a murderer while keeping Young Charlie in the dark

D. To confuse the audience as to the true motives of the principal characters, especially Young Charlie

B. To strengthen the audience's and Young Charlie's suspicions that the uncle is a murderer

6. The nature of the lighting, setting, and music give the opening scene of Citizen Kane a feel most associated with

A. documentary films.

B. thrillers.

C. romance films.

D. mystery movies.

D. mystery movies.

7. The ending of Citizen Kane

A. does not reference the beginning of the film, which is a move away from traditional organizational form.

B. provides firm resolution to the mystery of Kane's character.

C. echoes the beginning of the film explicitly.

D. provides no real insights into Kane's character.

C. echoes the beginning of the film explicitly.

8. A salient characteristic of Citizen Kane's style is the use of

A. crosscutting.

B. nondiegetic inserts.

C. nonactors.

D. dolly and crane shots.

D. dolly and crane shots.

9. In 1941 the most startling transitional device used in films was

A. the shock cut.

B. the swish pan.

C. the sound bridge.

D. superimposition.

A. the shock cut.

10. Which of the following does NOT belong to this list of films and their salient techniques?

A. Grand Illusion: the long take

B. Citizen Kane: shooting in depth

C. October: mobile camera

D. Mon Oncle: comic sound manipulations

C. October: mobile camera

11. In Citizen Kane, Welles makes the narrator, Thompson, almost unidentifiable through the use of low-key lighting and staging choices.

true

12. Parallelism, an important feature in many great films, is surprisingly absent from Citizen Kane.

false

13. Welles makes the important newsreel sequence distinctive by using a number of techniques that do not appear anywhere else in Citizen Kane.

true

14. If a character speaks, the viewer expects to hear diegetic sound that is faithful to the source.

true

15. The 180-degree editing of The Maltese Falcon is typical of traditional form and of no interest, and thus would not be considered a salient technique used by the filmmaker.

false

16. A filmmaker's creative choices can be constrained by technology, stylistic norms, or taste.

true

17. Welles uses the shock cut to convey the passage of time during the "breakfast table" sequence between Kane and his first wife.

false

18. Tati's stylistic choices in Mon Oncle produce a thematic and narrative contrast of charming neighbors to modern homes that runs throughout the film.

true

19. If a character begins to leave the frame in a scene, the viewer expects the camera to remain stationary.

false

20. Independent films have less opportunity to make extreme stylistic choices.

false

21. In Citizen Kane, each narrator's version is presented as objective and omniscient narration.

false

Editing

The process by which the editor combines and coordinates individual shots into a cinematic whole; the basic creative force of cinema.

Cutting

In the process of pre-digital editing, the use of scissors to cut shots out of a roll of film before splicing them together with glue to form a continuous whole.

Splicing

In pre-digital editing, the act of gluing or taping together shots together to form a continuous whole.

Flashback

A device for presenting or reawakening the memory of the camera, a character, the audience—or all three—in which the action cuts from the narrative present to a past event, which may or may not have already appeared in the movie either directly or through inference.

Flash Forward

A device for presenting the anticipation of the camera, a character, the audience—or all three—in which the action cuts from the narrative present to a future time, one in which, for example, the omniscient camera reveals directly or a character imagines, from his or her point of view, what is going to happen.

Ellipsis

In filmmaking, generally an omission of time—the time that separates one shot from another—to create dramatic or comedic impact.

Montage

1. In France, the word for editing, from the verb monter," to assemble or put together." 2. In the former Soviet Union in the 1920s, the various forms of editing that expressed ideas developed by theorists and filmmakers such as Sergei Eisenstein. 3. In Hollywood, beginning in the 1930s, a sequence of shots, often with superimpositions and optical effects, showing a condensed series of events.

Duration

A quantity of time. In any movie, we can identify three specific kinds of this: story duration (the time that the entire narrative arc—whether explicitly presented on-screen or not—is implied to have taken), plot duration (the time that the events explicitly shown on-screen are implied to have taken), and screen duration (the actual time that has elapsed to present the movie's plot, i.e., the movie's running time).

Content curve

In terms of cinematic duration, the point at which we have absorbed all we need to know in a particular shot and are ready for seeing the next shot.

Continuity editing

A style of editing (now dominant throughout the world) that seeks to achieve logic, smoothness, sequential flow, and the temporal and spatial orientation of viewers to what they see on the screen. This ensures the flow from shot to shot; creates a rhythm based on the relationship between cinematic space and cinematic time; creates filmic unity (beginning, middle, and end); and establishes and resolves a problem. In short, continuity editing tells a story as clearly and coherently as possible.

Discontinuity editing

A style of editing—less widely used than the other one, often but not exclusively in experimental films—that joins shots A and B in ways that upset the viewer's expectations and cause momentary disorientation or confusion. The juxtaposition of shots in films edited for this can often seem abrupt and unmotivated, but the meanings that arise from such discordant editing often transcend the meanings of the individual shots that have been joined together.

Coverage

The use of a variety of shots of a scene—taken from multiple angles, distances, and perspectives—to provide the director and editor a greater choice of editing options during postproduction.

Master shot

Also known as a cover shot. A shot that covers the action of a scene in one continuous take. They are usually composed as long shots so that all of the characters in the scene are on-screen during the action of the scene.

Screen direction

The direction of a figure's or object's movement on the screen.

180 degree system

The fundamental means by which filmmakers maintain consistent screen direction, orienting the viewer and ensuring a sense of the cinematic space in which the action occurs. The system depends on three factors working together in any scene: (1) the action in a scene must move along a hypothetical line that keeps the action on a single side of the camera; (2) the camera must shoot consistently on one side of that line; and (3) everyone on the production set—particularly the director, cinematographer, editor, and actors—must understand and adhere to this system.

Axis of action

An imaginary line connecting two figures in a scene that defines the 180-degree space within which the camera can record shots of those figures.

Reverse angle shot

A shot in which the angle of shooting is opposite to that of the preceding shot.

Match cut

A cut that preserves continuity between two shots. Several kinds of these exist, including the eye-line match cut, the graphic match cut, and the match-on-action cut.

Match on action cut

Also called cutting on action. A match cut that shows us the continuation of a character's or object's motion through space without actually showing us the entire action. This is a fairly routine editorial technique for economizing a movie's presentation of movement.

Graphic match cut

A match cut in which the similarity between shots A and B is in the shape and form of the figures pictured in each shot. The shape, color, or texture of the two figures matches across the edit, providing continuity.

Eye line match cut

An editing transition that shows us what a particular character is looking at. The cut joins two shots: [1], the character's face, with his/her eyes clearly visible, then [2], whatever the character was looking at. When the second shot is of another character looking back at the character in the first shot, the resulting reciprocal of this, and the cuts that follow, establish the two characters' proximity and interaction, even if only one character is visible on-screen at any one time.

Parallel editing

The intercutting of two or more lines of action that occur simultaneously, a very familiar convention in chase or rescue sequences. Also called crosscutting and intercutting, although the three terms have slightly different meanings.

Point of view editing

The process of editing different shots together in such a way that the resulting sequence makes us aware of the perspective or POV of a particular character or group of characters. Most frequently, it starts with an objective shot of a character looking toward something outside of the frame and then cuts to a shot of the object, person, or action that the character is supposed to be looking at.

Jump cut

The removal of a portion of a film, resulting in an instantaneous advance in the action—a sudden, perhaps illogical, often disorienting ellipsis between two shots.

Fade in/out

Transitional devices in which a shot fades in from a black field on black-and-white film or from a color field on color film, or fades out to a black field (or a color field). Compare dissolve.

Dissolve

Also known as lap dissolve. A transitional device in which shot B, superimposed, gradually appears over shot A and begins to replace it at midpoint in the transition. These usually indicate the passing of time.

Wipe

A transitional device between shots in which shot B wipes across shot A, either vertically or horizontally, to replace it. Although (or because) the device reminds us of early eras in filmmaking, directors continue to use it.

Iris shot

Optical wipe effect in which the wipe line is a circle; named after the iris of a camera. The" "-in begins with a small circle, which expands to a partial or full image; the " "-out begins with a large circle, which contracts to a smaller circle or total blackness.

Freeze frame

Also known as stop-frame or hold-frame. A still image within a movie, created by repetitive printing in the laboratory of the same frame so that it can be seen without movement for whatever length of time the filmmaker desires.

Split screen

A method, created either in the camera or during the editing process, of telling two stories at the same time by dividing the screen into different parts. This can tell multiple stories within the same frame.