Narrative Structure (DAPS 6 and 7)
- 1. Narrative Structure • In most films, a narrative is present… • Series of events in ways that imply connections between one event and the next. • Cause and effect relationship: one event causes the next event. • Narratives require ‘narration’. • Think of some ways in which films narrate.
- 2. Text Character dialogue Angles Move- ment Dialogue Camera Voice shots over Narrative Conventi- ons Visual Narrative Codes Connotati -ons
- 3. Narrative Structure • Film are organised according to a set of rules or conventions. • They are understood by filmmakers, and recognised by film viewers. • Responses to film are based on our real life experiences and, previous experiences of films. • Story: What happens in a narrative. • Plot: How things happen in a narrative. • Example: In Terminator II, a crazy machine tries to kill John Connor (story) over the space of a couple of weeks. This happens by us first seeing John and Arnie hook up, then John, Arnie and Sarah hooking up to kill the T1000.
- 4. Narrative Structure • Focalisation: Is when the viewer adopts the point of view of a specific character. • This helps us understand the plot more as we empathise with there character and understand why they do certain things. • It can also help us understand the story better and we might get a couple of focalisations and thus know a number of different stories and more than any individual character. • Dictated by the need to arouse and sustain our interest. • Character-based : stress on active characters, whose exploits reveal motives we can readily appreciate.
- 5. Hollywood Benevolence and Transparency • Hollywood narratives are dictated by a desire to make the story readily comprehensible to the audience. • Benevolence: A set of conventions, sometimes sophisticated, which aims to guide viewers through the story. • Transparent: The techniques are ‘transparent’ because they seek to keep viewers focused on the story. • They are therefore unobtrusive, so that audiences remain absorbed in what is happening, rather than become distracted by how the story is told.
- 6. Hollywood Cause and Effect • Hollywood narratives use cause and effect most rigidly, as it produces story clarity. • Characters provides the causal elements, driving the story forward, and providing connections between the elements which the plot places side by side. • Hollywood films therefore, have heroes who have definite goals. • The central character desires something, seeks to achieve something, and the story consists of the actions the character undertakes to fulfill such aims.
- 7. Hollywood Cause and Effect • Most Hollywood films are closed, meaning the ending offers a complete conclusion to the character’s goal. • The narrative will end with the character’s goal having been met, or the attempt having failed – the later is unlikely however, as Hollywood revolves around audience pleasure. • Worth noting, that most narrative are driven by male characters. • Can you think of any films that are driven by female characters…
- 8. Hollywood Invisible Story Telling • The main purpose of a mainstream Hollywood film is to tell us a story. • All mainstream films are based around a plot or narrative idea and contain various scenes and sequences all of which contribute to the overall story. • On a more fundamental level all films can be boiled down to just two core building blocks: the shot and the cut. • As such, the use of camera and editing are crucial elements of moving image language.
- 9. Hollywood Continuity Style • Continuity Style: a particular style of shooting and editing, emerging in the 20th century, geared towards making film narratives easier to understand. • Continuity style, encourages you the viewer to become enthralled and captivated by a story but actively discourages you from consciously noticing the editing and camera techniques that are being used to tell it. • The continuity style deliberately sets out to make the camera, camerawork and editing invisible or, at the very least, unobtrusive.
- 10. Hollywood The Three-Act Structure Act I • The film is set up; main characters introduced, their goals and the obstacles they are likely to encounter. Act II •The plot thickens; action is increased, sense or urgency, often a false conclusion to the obstacles outlined in Act I Act III •The resolution; the story concludes, almost always with a happy ending.
- 11. Hollywood The Dramatic Arc