Narrative law of montage

What is a "montage"? Montage means "editing" in French, but it has developed into a theory of lens combination in movies in Russia. Montage is basically a theory developed by Russian directors, which was extended by pudovkin according to the editing technique of Griffith, the father of American movies, and then Eisenstein also put forward related views. Platts thinks that the juxtaposition of two shots is more meaningful than the juxtaposition of a single shot, and even thinks that movies are the art of juxtaposition between shots. At least with a long-term vision and a lot of close contact, psychological, emotional and abstract ideas are the result. Influenced by Russian dialectical philosophy, Eisenstein believes that the juxtaposition and even fierce conflict between shots will produce a third new meaning. When describing a theme, we can put a series of related or unrelated shots together to produce a metaphorical effect, which is montage. For example, when we are cooking, washing clothes, taking care of the children, or even when our father reads the newspaper, we will feel that our mother is "busy" by putting her in the mirror.

& ltP> montage in a broad sense refers to editing. In the previous movies, one reel was unedited, and it took more than ten minutes to shoot before changing to another reel. The first use of editing in the film is Battleship potemkin, in which the stroller falls down the stairs, people are shooting around, and the mother is very nervous. These pictures are alternately edited < BR> It has the effect of tension, compactness and metaphor, and has become an unprecedented classic in the history of film. If you don't know much about it, you can refer to pudovkin's Mother or Eisenstein's Battleship of potemkin's Footsteps of Odyssey, but basically montage is a way for the director to manipulate the camera, that is, to control the absolute intellectual thinking and express the meaning, and the audience just waits to be instilled, which is completely different from the fuzziness and openness presented by the poetically expressed films such as Tarkovsky, Wenders and Ferini. & ltBR & gt should not be just called editing, because there are other forms that can create a montage effect. In short, it is the word "knowledge" in China's Chinese characters. People from different places can be sorted by editing to make you think they are related. For example, it is a person who knocks at the door first, and then people come into the house, and the place where they may take things when they enter or go out is different. & lt/P & gt；

& ltP> What is a "montage" paragraph? For example, there is a scene where two people face each other, followed by a close-up of one person's expression. The audience can know another person's actions through this person's expression, although that person does not appear in the picture. Montage (clip) is a jump of time and space, and time is a connection of points. Unlike the movement of a line from A to B, the time of montage presentation is a point strictly selected by the director. In addition, montage emphasizes the result of one thing, just like a woman arguing in the lounge, followed by the scene of her death in the bedroom. The scene emphasizes the ending after the quarrel, and the consideration of the ending exceeds the process of her killing. Montage highlights the shock caused by the result of the event, first let the audience know the ending of death instantly, then let the audience see the messy scene in the living room, and trace the cause and scene from the knowledge. & lt/P & gt； & ltBR & gt

& ltP> montage has two functions: narrative and ideographic. Accordingly, we can divide montage into three basic types: narrative montage, expressive montage and intellectual montage. The former is a narrative means, while the latter two are mainly used to express ideas. On this basis, it can also be divided into two levels, as follows:

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& ltP> narrative montage is the most commonly used narrative method in film and television, which was initiated by movie master Griffith and others in the United States. It is characterized by the description of the plot and the presentation of events. According to the time flow and causal relationship of the plot development, the shots, scenes and paragraphs are cut and combined to guide the audience to understand the plot. This montage is clearly connected, logically coherent and easy to understand. Narrative montage also includes the following specific skills:

& ltP> 1. Parallel montage This kind of montage is often a parallel representation of two or more plot lines that occur in different time and space (or in different places at the same time), which are described separately and unified in a complete structure. Griffith and Hitchcock are masters who are very good at using this montage technique. Parallel montage is widely used. First of all, because it is used to deal with the plot, it can abridge the process, save space, expand the information content of the film and strengthen the sense of rhythm of the film. Secondly, because this technique is a parallel expression of several clues, it is easy to produce a strong artistic infection effect by comparing with each other. For example, in the movie "Fighting against the North", the director used parallel montage to show the scene that I captured the Motianling with the enemy, which caused a tense rhythm. & lt/P & gt；

& ltP>2. Cross montage, also known as alternating montage, quickly and frequently clips together two or more plot lines that occur simultaneously in different regions. The development of one clue often affects other clues, and each clue is interdependent and eventually blends together. This editing technique can easily arouse suspense, create a tense and intense atmosphere, and strengthen the sharpness of contradictions and conflicts, which is a powerful means to grasp the audience's emotions. Thrillers, horror films and war films often use this method to create chase and thrilling scenes. For example, in the Battle of Speeding South and Speeding North, the third line of our army and the enemy marching into Dasha River and the third line of guerrilla dam bombing are alternately spliced together, showing that thrilling battle. & lt/P & gt；

& ltP>3. Repetitive montage is equivalent to the way of narration or repetition in literature. In this montage structure, meaningful shots appear repeatedly at critical moments to achieve the purpose of depicting characters and deepening the theme. For example, the pince-nez and the red flag symbolizing revolution in Battleship potemkin are repeated in the film, which makes the structure of the film more complete. & lt/P & gt；

& ltP>4. Continuous montage This montage does not develop so many clues as parallel montage or cross montage, but follows the logical order of events in a rhythmic and continuous narrative way along a single plot clue. This narrative is natural and smooth, simple and smooth, but due to the lack of time-space and scene transformation, it is impossible to directly express the simultaneous plots, it is difficult to highlight the antagonistic relationship between plot lines, it is not conducive to generalization, and it is easy to feel procrastinating and straightforward. Therefore, it is rarely used alone in a film, but mixed with parallel and cross montage techniques to complement each other. & lt/P & gt；

& ltP> Performance Montage Performance Montage is based on the juxtaposition of shots, through which the connected shots contrast and collide with each other in form or content, thus producing rich meanings that a single shot itself does not have, so as to express certain emotions or thoughts. Its purpose is to stimulate the association of the public and inspire the thinking of the audience. & lt/P & gt；

& ltP> 1. Lyric montage is an idea and emotion that transcends the plot while ensuring the coherence of narrative and description. Jean mitry pointed out that its original intention is not only a narrative story, but also a vivid rendering, and it pays more attention to the latter. Major events are decomposed into a series of close-ups or close-ups, which capture the essential meaning of things from different sides and angles and render the characteristics of things. The most common and easily felt lyric montage often cuts into the empty lens symbolizing emotion after a narrative scene. For example, in the Soviet film "The Rural Female Teacher", varvara and Martinoff fell in love, and Martinoff tentatively asked her if she would wait for him forever. She replied affectionately, "forever!" Then cut to the scene where two flowers bloom. It is not directly related to the plot, but it properly expresses the feelings of the author and the characters. & lt/P & gt；

& ltP>2. Psychological montage is an important means of psychological description of characters. It vividly expresses the inner world of characters through the combination of pictures and cameras or the organic combination of sound and painting, and is often used to express the psychological activities of characters such as dreams, memories, flashes, hallucinations, reverie and thinking. This montage is often used in stitching techniques, such as crossing. It is characterized by the fragmentation of pictures and sound images, the discontinuity of narration and the jumping of rhythm, and the sound and picture images have strong dramatist subjectivity. & lt/P & gt；

& ltP>3. Metaphorical montage implicitly and vividly expresses the creator's implication through the analogy of shots or scene sequences. This technique often highlights some similar characteristics between different things, so as to arouse the audience's association, understand the director's meaning and appreciate the emotional color of the event. For example, in "Mother", pudovkin associated the scene of workers' demonstrations with the lens group of thawing glacier water in spring to describe the overwhelming revolutionary movement. Metaphor montage combines great generalization with extremely concise expression, which often has strong emotional appeal. However, we should be cautious in using this timidity, and we should combine metaphor and narration organically to avoid being stiff and far-fetched. & lt/P & gt；

& ltP>4. The contrast montage is similar to the contrast description in literature, that is, the strong contrast in content through the lens or scene (such as poor and rich, bitter and happy, life and death, noble and humble, victory and failure, etc.). ) or form (such as the size of the scene, the warmth and coldness of the color, the intensity of the sound, the movement, etc.), which produces a conflicting effect to express the creator's certain meaning or strengthen the expressed content and ideas. & lt/P & gt；

& ltP> Intellectual Montage and jean mitry define intellectual montage as: it expresses its meaning through the relationship between pictures, not through simple and coherent narrative one after another. The difference between intellectual montage and coherent narration is that even though the picture belongs to the facts that have actually been experienced, the facts combined according to this montage are always subjective. This kind of Monbenchi was founded by Eisenstein, the main representative of the Soviet school, and mainly includes:

& ltP> 1. Acrobatic Montage Eisenstein defines acrobatic montage as a special moment, in which all elements are aimed at instilling the idea that the director intends to convey to the audience into their consciousness, making the audience enter the mental state or psychological state that causes this idea, thus causing emotional impact. This kind of hand banyan can be chosen at will in content, and is not bound by the original plot, which promotes the final effect of explaining the theme. Compared with performance montage, this is a more rational and abstract form of montage. In order to express some abstract rational ideas, some scenes completely unrelated to the plot are often forcibly inserted. For example, in the film "October", when the representative of Menshevik spoke with ulterior motives, he inserted the lens of playing the harp in hand to show that "the old tune is repeated and confusing." For Eisenstein, the re-enactment of montage is not limited to the special way of creating artistic effects, but the style of expressing intention and the way of conveying ideas: an idea is established through the collision of two shots, and a series of ideas create an emotional state, and then with this excited mood, the audience will be excited about the idea that the director intends to convey to them. In this way, the audience will involuntarily participate in this process and willingly agree with the general trend and great significance of this process. This is the principle of this great director. After 1928, Eisenstein further promoted the vaudeville montage to a "film dialectical form", which was based on the symbolism of visual image and the logic of internal meaning, ignored the expressed content, even fell into the maze of pure theory, and brought creative mistakes. Later generations have learned his lesson, and the use of juggling montage in modern movies is more cautious. & lt/P & gt；

& ltP>2. Reflective montage is not like juggling montage, where symbolic pictures irrelevant to the plot content are inserted stiffly at will. Instead, the things described and the things used for metaphor are in the same space, and they are interdependent: either contrast with the events, or determine the reaction between the connected things, or reveal similar events contained in the plot through reflective association, thus affecting the audience's palace view and consciousness. For example, in October, kerensky went to the Winter Palace surrounded by ministers, and a backward shot showed a painting column above his head. There is a sculpture on the stigma, as if a bad lamp had covered kerensky's head, which made the dictator look very noble. The reason why this shot is not blunt is because Eisenstein used a sculpture in the real set and a real object in the real drama space. He processed it, but he didn't attract people with objects unrelated to the plot. & lt/P & gt；

& ltP>3. This was created by Wiltoff. The method is to rearrange and express an idea by using literature in newsreels. This montage form is an abstract form, because it only shows a series of thoughts and emotions inspired by reason. The audience looked on coldly, which caused a certain "alienation effect" between the screen and them, and their participation was completely rational. Ordinary Fascism directed by Rome is a typical work. & ltBR & gt See Montage for the first time

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As the existence of skills and thinking,<P> montage has a deep-rooted foundation in human psychology. The visual psychology of & ltBR & gt montage is based on the fact that human beings live in a moving world. Objects pass through our field of vision, leaving a series of images on the retina, which requires changes in the field of vision to move normally. When a person's eyes are fixed on a fixed object (such as a point on the wall) for about five minutes, the image will become blurred. Look at something else, return to the original image, and it will be clear again. This experiment shows that the human eye has the physiological instinct of constantly pursuing new images. & ltBR & gt Bruiser pointed out that people have this instinct in infancy, for example, babies have been chasing moving objects with their eyes before they can gather their eyes. The latest research by American psychologist Hope and Swiss scientist wiesel (who won the Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology for 198 1) shows that human brain and eyes have special cells to detect image motion. These cells make people have a physiological need when observing external things: they don't stay in one place all the time, but constantly shift their eyes and observe the world from different angles. Film and television use sound and pictures to record images, reproduce actions, and the use of montage correctly reproduces the way we constantly pursue new goals when watching things, and reproduces the inner process of contacting videos in turn with the shift of attention in the real environment. & ltBR & gt This psychological process exists not only in film and television art, but also in other art fields. When you read a novel, your eyes always move from word to word and from line to line. With the advancement of the novel plot and the excitement of readers' emotions, the speed of eye movement is also accelerating. When the novel is in a gentle lyric paragraph, the reader's mood appears calm and peaceful, and the movement speed will be slow and leisurely. This is consistent with people approaching an event. When a person is observing or experiencing a very exciting and rapidly changing activity, his reaction rhythm will be greatly accelerated, and the direction of sight will be quickly changed. On the contrary, he will be very calm, indifferent to an ordinary thing, and his observation of objects will become dull. This physiological phenomenon produces the rhythm requirement of montage. & ltBR & gt To sum up, the impression gained by a quiet observer can be reproduced by a so-called "slow-cut" film technology, that is, each shot stays on the screen for a long time before being replaced. The impression gained by an extremely excited observer can be reproduced by "quick cut", that is, a series of interconnected short shots. It is through montage that film and television artists realize this psychological process of human beings. & ltBR & gt Therefore, in a sense, the talent of film and television artists lies in the use of montage, so that the visual psychological rhythm of human beings can be properly reproduced in the film. In a quiet and peaceful scene, using fast cutting will cause jumping and abrupt effects, which will make the audience uncomfortable. On the other hand, if the content of the scene is wonderful, the audience will instinctively ask for quick editing, and if the editing is slow, it will destroy the wonderful content of the film. So, how is the "speed" of screen switching appropriate? It is appropriate to decide by the emotional content of the scene, but the emotional content of the scene is included in the script. Therefore, the mosaic patterns appearing in the final movie are the same as those clearly defined in the script. This pattern in the script is gradually formed during the playwright's writing process. Even before he started, in the process of collecting materials, he had picked up the materials with montage eyes and decomposed and combined time and space. It is in this sense that montage is a unique way of artistic thinking, which runs through the whole process of film and television creation and is the foundation of film and television art. /P & gt；

& ltP> has experienced a historical process from combination skills to montage of thinking modes, from occurrence to development to maturity. & ltBR & gt Strictly speaking, there was no montage editing in early movies, and there was no decomposition and reorganization of time and space. & ltBR & gt Lumiere's movies are actually just a demonstration of new technology and a simple game. It uses a very simple method to shoot a movie, that is, aim the camera at a scene until it is finished. This is a naturalistic record lacking montage conception. & ltBR & gt Mei began to connect the shots taken in different scenes to tell stories, which made the film have the characteristics of "decomposition and combination". Obviously, he is one step ahead of Lumiere. But the whole scene was shot from a camera, and the lens connection is also the simplest connection. He doesn't understand the significance of this connection combination. & ltBR & gt At the same time, American directors Burt and Griffith are also looking for a unique way to build this film. In 1902, Porter uses some movie materials reflecting the life of firefighters in the old movie library to make up the picture of saving the mother and the child in the studio by the way of actor's acting, and then splicing the material film and the supplementary film appropriately to form the life of an American firefighter. Porter's attempt is a big step forward than that of Mei, exploring the possibility of freedom of time and space for the film. & ltBR & gt On the basis of Porter, Griffith became the first person to consciously use "montage" in film history. In The Adventures of Dawley (1908), Griffith created the technique of "flashback"; In the bleak villa (1909), he applied parallel montage for the first time and created the famous "last-minute rescue" technique. In Ramona (19 10), he created a great vision; In Pastor Longerda (19 1 1), he used very close shots and developed the skill of alternately cutting people. In the Holocaust (19 12), he first used mobile phone photography. & ltBR & gt Although Griffith has created the above series and skillfully used his new techniques in the two representative works, The Birth of a Country (19 15) and Conflicts with Different Groups (19 16), he never used his montage method. It seems that he works mainly by intuition and an inexpressible love for film means, and he never shows that he is aware of these principles. He believes that montage is only the most powerful assistant to vividly express drama stories, and using montage is only a technical means. In essence, he has not understood the basic nature of montage and its full potential. & ltBR & gt After the First World War, Soviet filmmakers developed montage into a complete film theory system on the basis of analyzing the creative experience of Griffith and others, according to the requirements of the new Soviet regime for film art, and on the basis of a series of experiments, thus forming the Soviet montage school represented by Kuleshov, pudovkin and Eisenstein. Griffith mainly focuses on how to deal with the relationship between two drama scenes, while Soviet directors pay more attention to the relationship between single shot and fragment, and the meaning and implication expressed by this relationship. & ltBR & gt Kuleshov and pudovkin believe that the essence of the film lies in the composition of the film, and in the interrelation between the shot clips to organize a series of impressions-how to change from one shot to another, and how they are formed in chronological order. They are convinced that montage editing can create extraordinary effects and realize the narrative and ideographic nature of the film. To this end, they have done a lot of experiments to practice their theory. According to pudovkin's records, in 1920, Kuleshov connected the following scenes: < BR>( 1) A young man came from left to right. & ltBR & gt(2) A young woman is coming from right to left. & ltBR & gt They met and shook hands. The young man lit it with his finger. & ltBR & gt(4) Large white building with wide steps. & ltBR & gt(5) Two people walk up the steps. & ltBR & gt From the audience's point of view, this connected segment becomes an uninterrupted action: two young people meet on the road, and the man invites the woman to a nearby house. In fact, each clip was shot in a different place. The scene showing the young man was shot near the state-run department store, the scene of the woman was shot near the Nikolai Gogol Monument, and the scene of shaking hands was shot near the Grand Theatre. The white building was cut from an American movie (the White House), and the scene of walking up the steps was taken in the Church of the Savior. As a result, although these clips were shot in different places, they were regarded as a whole by the audience, thus creating what Kuleshov called "creative geography" on the screen. Here, people's illusion is used to combine fragments of different time and space into a whole, and montague's function of decomposition and combination is fully reflected. The Soviet school not only stayed in the narrative aspect of montage, but also further studied its ideographic function. & ltBR & gt pudovkin believes that every object photographed from a certain shooting point and then displayed to the audience on the screen is still a "dead" object, even if it was moving in front of the camera. Only when this object is put together with other objects, and only when it is displayed as a part of various visual image combinations, this object is given life. Eisenstein highly summarized this ideographic function of montage. He said: the juxtaposition of two shots is not a simple one plus one, but a new creation. In his view, the unedited footage taken by the camera is meaningless and has no aesthetic value. Only by combining them according to the montage principle can we convey the visual image with social significance and artistic value to the audience. & ltBR & gt's famous "Curry Schouw Effect" is a strong evidence of Eisenstein's montage theory. Pudovkin once described this experiment as follows: "We selected several special shots of the famous Soviet actor Mo Youxin from a certain film, all of which were close-ups, and we were not lazy at all. We associate these same close-ups with small clips of other movies in three combinations. In the first combination, Moyuxin's close-up is followed by a dish of soup on the table, which clearly shows that Moyuxin is looking at the dish of soup. The second combination is to closely connect the lens of Mo Youxin with the lens of the female corpse lying in the coffin. The third combination is this close-up, followed by a little girl playing with an interesting teddy bear. When we show these three different combinations to some audience who don't know the secret, the effect is amazing. The audience enjoyed the artist's performance very much. They pointed out that when he looked at the soup he left on the table, he showed a thoughtful mood; They were very excited because he looked at the heavy and sad face of the female corpse; They also appreciate his relaxed and happy smile when watching girls play ball. But we know that in all three combinations, the faces in the close-ups are exactly the same. " & ltBR & gt Eisenstein once emphasized that no matter which two shots are matched together, new appearances, new concepts and new images will inevitably emerge. Through the conflict of lens alignment, it produces new meanings and guides the audience's rational thinking. This is the essence of Eisenstein's "juggling montage" and "intellectual montage". Montage appeals to both narrative emotion and appeal to reason. Therefore, in Battleship potemkin, Eisenstein cut into three scenes of "the lion swoops down, looks up and leaps up" which have nothing to do with the plot, thus showing the people's awakening and resistance. In October, this tendency to express abstract ideas became more obvious. The collapse of the iron statue of the tsar symbolizes the collapse of the tsar's regime, and inserting the statue of Napoleon is a metaphor for kerensky's dictatorship. & ltBR & gt Eisenstein tried to communicate image thinking and logical thinking through montage, and to combine science and art, trying to embody people's rational activities and strengthen the philosophical tendency of movies. This book is very valuable. However, Eisenstein overemphasized the role of montage, thinking that movies should use montage to explain reality, avoid characterization, express ideas directly, and even intentionally put Das Kapital on the screen. As a result, some of his films are fragmented and obscure. Nevertheless, Eisenstein and other representatives of the Soviet school made indelible contributions to the film montage theory. In 1950s and 1960s, long shots were widely used, especially TV reporting technology, which contributed to this trend. The depth arrangement of complex scenes in feature films is developing day by day. This kind of scene scheduling does not need to change the action location, which changes the nature of traditional montage. Film theorists believe that the evolution of this montage marks a new era in film history. Although in the 1950s and 1960s, some western film newspapers and periodicals sometimes predicted "the demise of montage" and "the end of montage", practice has proved that there is no film without montage, and even in a long shot, there is a montage (scene scheduling) inside the shot. Montage also exists in TV, even if it is a live event for TV viewers, such as ship launching, sports competition or delegation arrival. , must be edited on the spot. This kind of live editing requires TV photographers and directors to have special qualities, be able to immediately discover and accurately express the essence of events, and have more keen montage thinking and montage vision.