How to read a film Card
Content
How to Read a Film Sequence in Handy-Dandy Chart Form Narrative Staging Cinematography Function w/in larger Setting: on loc/studio; Film Stock: type, narr? Realistic/stylized; grainy, contrasty, What happens? historical/contemp tinted? Over/ under Character arcs? exposed? B/w Expos, Trans, Climax, (ortho or pan 4shadow, modal chromatic?) or change (dream, color? hallucination) Telling vs. Tale? Space: cluttered/empty; Speed: “normal,” Overt or latent state of mind? slomo, fast, stop narration? Staging space vs. action, time-lapse, How do we know camera space freeze frame what we don’t see? Linear or flash- back, forward, episodic? Divisible? Markers? Frame: Open (docu) or Lens: Wide-angle Segments, intertitles, closed (composed) (fishy, ! depth), how many stories? Frame vs. narrative telephoto ( " depth), zoom, anamorphic
Editing Transition techniques: dissolve, fade, cut, wipes; opening and closing of segment vs. internals?
(Connor, 2004, via Kaes & Rentschler, Chion) Sound Audience Voice: timbre, loc Position: (front or back voice); voyeuristic? Voice-over? Addressed? Neutral absorbed display?
Writing Intertitles; stylized in silent? Used in sound? Why? Location tags?
Purpose: continuity, montage (thematic, dialectical), cutting on motion, “invisible” cutting, shock cutting, cross cutting
Dialogue/Silence: stilted/naturalist? Do different characters use different types of language? Slang, dial, profanity? Allusion/quotation? Noise: sound fx, natural (ambient), represented or rendered enviro?; material sound indices? Music: diegetic or non; diegetic on or off screen What kind? Typical of period? Sig of piece? Comment on action? Irritate? Direct attention? (an)empathetic? Sourced or unscourced (acousmatic); unsourced being (acousmetre); viz. Camera: how susceptible are volume and timbre to camera mvt (big mvt=>small change?) Synch points? Sound bridges? Amount of reverb?
Aligned with chars (knowledge, presence, other codes)
Subtitles: when not? Parodic?
Rhythm and pacing: jerky, disjointed, smooth (pans); shot durations
Appeal to genre expectations? Subverted or supplemented?
Literary quotations: poems, epigraphs, headings Letters, email, Monitor shots, Typewriters, Business forms
Interplay/Dominance of channels (image, speech, sound, music, writing)
Lighting: what lit/not? Quality (hard/soft)? FX?, natural/studio (key, fill, back), expressive?
Focus: depth of field, shallow, deep? Rack (refocusing)? Soft?
Source for narration?: V.O.? Perspective?
Spectator acknowledged? Self-conscious/ reflexive?
Political views: current? Conform to/ question/affirm dominant ideol? Subvert, oppose?
Acting & Choreog: non/method/Old Vic/hieratic/delsart Appearance, gesture, facial exp., voice W/I frame: movement/ gaze/hearing/grouping How dir attention/ manipulate symp? Suspense, ambig, certainty? Costume & Makeup: Realistic/Stylized? What style? Social and cultural coding (status, wealth, attitude, foreignness) Symbolic props? Mirrors? See social and cultural coding above
FX: Glass/matte shot? Superimposition? Projection process (rear, green screen)? Optical or digital? Mocap? How function w/in overall content?
Cinematography Cont.: Camera Movement: Pan (horiz), Tilt (up/down), Tracking (or dolly) shot; directions? Crane? Aerial? How function: info about space? Follow action? New perspectives? Subjective camera? Viz on/off screen space?
Contemporary social issues? Controversial? Didactic? Sympathetic? Hard to watch?
Visible narrator or audible speaker? How do we relate to these authoritative presences? Their views vs presentations?
Credits: separate sequence? Over action? Synch of credit and action? Withheld to end?
Angle/Level: high angle, low angle, straight-on; eyelevel; oblique, canted (Dutch) angled frame Distance: Extreme long, LS, MS, 2shot, CU, ECU?
A particular audience assumed? Inside jokes? Presuppose specialized info?
Written signs in frame: ads, shopwindows, logos, displays
Color: hue, saturation, value? symbolic? Expressive? Monochromatic? Palate choices? vs lighting?
Multichannel: 2 or more? in-the-wings? 5.1 groundswells?
Items with the status of “writing”: dots, splotches, screens as screen
Editing Transition techniques: dissolve, fade, cut, wipes; opening and closing of segment vs. internals?
(Connor, 2004, via Kaes & Rentschler, Chion) Sound Audience Voice: timbre, loc Position: (front or back voice); voyeuristic? Voice-over? Addressed? Neutral absorbed display?
Writing Intertitles; stylized in silent? Used in sound? Why? Location tags?
Purpose: continuity, montage (thematic, dialectical), cutting on motion, “invisible” cutting, shock cutting, cross cutting
Dialogue/Silence: stilted/naturalist? Do different characters use different types of language? Slang, dial, profanity? Allusion/quotation? Noise: sound fx, natural (ambient), represented or rendered enviro?; material sound indices? Music: diegetic or non; diegetic on or off screen What kind? Typical of period? Sig of piece? Comment on action? Irritate? Direct attention? (an)empathetic? Sourced or unscourced (acousmatic); unsourced being (acousmetre); viz. Camera: how susceptible are volume and timbre to camera mvt (big mvt=>small change?) Synch points? Sound bridges? Amount of reverb?
Aligned with chars (knowledge, presence, other codes)
Subtitles: when not? Parodic?
Rhythm and pacing: jerky, disjointed, smooth (pans); shot durations
Appeal to genre expectations? Subverted or supplemented?
Literary quotations: poems, epigraphs, headings Letters, email, Monitor shots, Typewriters, Business forms
Interplay/Dominance of channels (image, speech, sound, music, writing)
Lighting: what lit/not? Quality (hard/soft)? FX?, natural/studio (key, fill, back), expressive?
Focus: depth of field, shallow, deep? Rack (refocusing)? Soft?
Source for narration?: V.O.? Perspective?
Spectator acknowledged? Self-conscious/ reflexive?
Political views: current? Conform to/ question/affirm dominant ideol? Subvert, oppose?
Acting & Choreog: non/method/Old Vic/hieratic/delsart Appearance, gesture, facial exp., voice W/I frame: movement/ gaze/hearing/grouping How dir attention/ manipulate symp? Suspense, ambig, certainty? Costume & Makeup: Realistic/Stylized? What style? Social and cultural coding (status, wealth, attitude, foreignness) Symbolic props? Mirrors? See social and cultural coding above
FX: Glass/matte shot? Superimposition? Projection process (rear, green screen)? Optical or digital? Mocap? How function w/in overall content?
Cinematography Cont.: Camera Movement: Pan (horiz), Tilt (up/down), Tracking (or dolly) shot; directions? Crane? Aerial? How function: info about space? Follow action? New perspectives? Subjective camera? Viz on/off screen space?
Contemporary social issues? Controversial? Didactic? Sympathetic? Hard to watch?
Visible narrator or audible speaker? How do we relate to these authoritative presences? Their views vs presentations?
Credits: separate sequence? Over action? Synch of credit and action? Withheld to end?
Angle/Level: high angle, low angle, straight-on; eyelevel; oblique, canted (Dutch) angled frame Distance: Extreme long, LS, MS, 2shot, CU, ECU?
A particular audience assumed? Inside jokes? Presuppose specialized info?
Written signs in frame: ads, shopwindows, logos, displays
Color: hue, saturation, value? symbolic? Expressive? Monochromatic? Palate choices? vs lighting?
Multichannel: 2 or more? in-the-wings? 5.1 groundswells?
Items with the status of “writing”: dots, splotches, screens as screen
