Classification of montage

Montage is the general name of film composition forms and methods.

Montage-a transliteration of French montage, originally a term in French architecture, meaning combination and assembly. Later, it was borrowed and extended to be used in movies, which means editing combination, indicating the combination of shots.

Simply put, montage is to make a film into many shots according to the content of the film and the psychological order of the audience, and then connect them according to the original idea. Bottom line: Montage is a means to connect the cut lens groups.

Therefore, montage is a means to connect the shots taken by the camera according to the logic of life, the order of reasoning, the author's viewpoint tendency and its aesthetic principles. First, use the camera, and then use the scissors.

Of course. The montage of movies is mainly realized through the re-creation of directors, photographers and editors. The screenwriter of the film designs a blueprint for the future film, the director of the film recreates it with montage on the basis of this blueprint, and finally the photographer reflects it with the expressive force of the film.

In film production, the director makes many shots according to the theme of the script or film, and then organizes and clips these different shots organically and artistically according to the original creative idea, so as to make them coherent, contrasting, associative, suspenseful and connected with different rhythms, thus selectively forming a film that reflects certain social life and thoughts and feelings and is understood and loved by the broad audience. These forms and means are as follows.

To sum up, it can be seen that the basic element of the film is the lens, and the main way and means to connect the lens is montage. It can be said that montage is a unique expression means of film art.

Since the smallest unit of the film is the lens, what is the basic element of the film-the lens? What does it have to do with montage? As we know, the lens is a piece of film shot from different angles, different focal lengths and different times, and has undergone different processing. In fact, montage has been used since the camera shooting.

As far as the lens is concerned, shooting from different angles naturally has different artistic effects. Such as frontal shooting, cypress leaning, upward shooting, side shooting, backlight, filtering, etc. The effect is obviously different. As far as the lens with the same focal length is concerned, the effect is different. For example, distant view, panoramic view, middle view, close view, close-up and large close-up have different effects. Furthermore, different processed lenses will also produce different artistic effects. In addition, due to the use of spaces, abbreviations, upgrades and other techniques, it has also brought a variety of specific artistic effects. In addition, because of the different shooting time, there are long shots and short shots, and the length of the shots will have different effects.

At the same time, when connecting lens scenes and paragraphs, we can choose to use different connection methods according to different changes, different rhythms and different emotional needs, such as speaking, changing, scratching, cutting, winding, pinching, pushing and pulling. In short, what kind of shots to take and what kind of shots to arrange together. In what way to connect the arranged shots, the way and means for filmmakers to solve this series of problems is Meng Daqi. If picture and acoustics are the "vocabulary" for the film director to communicate with the audience, then the montage means of using picture and acoustics to form shots and combining shots to form film rules is the director's "grammar".

For a film director, mastering these basic principles does not mean mastering "grammar". Montage often presents a variety of faces in the specific content and aesthetic pursuit of each film.

Montage is from point to surface for the audience. For the director, montage is first divided into parts, then edited, and then divided into parts, that is, combination. The smallest unit of cutting is the lens, so the director has to write a storyboard. As an audience, how should we appreciate the director's art from the perspective of montage? After all, montage is a way for directors to tell stories; The audience always wants the story to be smooth, vivid and infectious, which can arouse the association and interest of the audience. These requirements fully apply to montage. The audience is not only satisfied with understanding the plot. Or roughly understand the idea of the film, but it requires clear and smooth perception of every link and detail of the film narrative process. The montage of the film must first be understood by the audience.

Nowadays, a contemporary feature film usually consists of about 500 to 1000 shots. The scene, angle, length, action form and the combination of picture and sound of each shot all contain montage factors. It can be said that montage has existed since the beginning of the lens. At the same time, the treatment of lens angle, focal length and length has included the photographer's will, emotion, praise and criticism and ingenuity.

In the arrangement, combination and connection between shots, the photographer's subjective intention is more clearly reflected. Because each lens part does not exist in isolation, it is bound to have a relationship with the upper and lower lenses connected with it. Different relationships will produce different artistic effects such as coherence, jumping, strengthening, weakening, parallelism and contrast. On the other hand, the combination of shots not only plays a role in vividly describing the contents of shots, but also produces new meanings that each isolated shot itself may not express. Griffith tried to use montage for the first time in film history, which was to combine the lens of a man on a desert island with the close-up of a wife waiting at home. After such a combination, the audience feels "waiting" and "leaving sorrow" and produces a new and special imagination. O Plus, the artistic effect of arranging a group of short shots together and connecting them by quick cutting is very different from that of arranging the same group of shots together and connecting them by "light" or "chemistry".

For another example, if the following three shots A, B and C are connected in different order, different contents and meanings will appear.

A, a person is laughing; B, pistol pointing; C, the same person's face showed surprise.

What impression did these three close-ups give the audience?

If connected in the order of A-B-C, the audience will feel that this person is a coward and a coward. Now, the shots remain the same. If we just change the order of the shots above, we will come to the opposite conclusion.

C, a person's face shows the appearance of the courtyard, b, the pistol is pointed; A, the same person is laughing.

If you connect in the order of C-B-A in this way, this person's face will look frightened because there is a gun pointed at him. However, he thought about it and thought it was nothing, so he smiled-in the face of death. Therefore, he gave the audience the impression that he was a brave man.

In this way, changing the shot order of a scene without changing each shot itself completely changes the meaning of a scene, draws the opposite conclusion and receives completely different effects.

This coherent organizational arrangement is to use the unique montage means of film art, which is also what we call the structural problem of film. From the above examples, we can see the importance of this arrangement and combination structure, which is an important means to organize the materials together to express the film ideas. Meanwhile. Due to the different arrangement and combination, different artistic effects such as positive, negative, deep, rich, strong and weak have been produced.

Eisenstein, a Soviet movie master, thinks that shot A plus shot B is not a simple synthesis of shot A and shot B, but will become a brand-new content and concept of shot C. He clearly points out: "The juxtaposition of two montage shots is not the addition of two numbers, but more like the product of two numbers-this fact was correct before, and it still seems correct today. The reason why it is more like the product of two numbers than the sum of two numbers is that the result of the arrangement is qualitatively (or "dimensionally" if you want to use mathematical terms) very different from each individual component. Let's go back to the above example. Woman-this is a painting, a woman's mourning-this is also a painting; These two pictures can be expressed in kind. The' widow' produced by the juxtaposition of these two pictures is no longer something that can be expressed in kind, but a new representation, a new concept and a new image. "

It can be seen that the use of montage can make the connection of shots have a new meaning, greatly enrich the expressive force of film art, and thus enhance the appeal of film art. On this topic, we can also get great inspiration from a phenomenon in physics: as we all know, carbon and diamonds are two substances. As far as its molecular composition is concerned, it is the same. But one is surprisingly brittle and the other is unusually hard. Why do scientists' research results prove to be caused by differences in molecular arrangement (personality structure)? In other words, the same materials, due to different arrangements, may produce such diametrically opposite results, which is really thought-provoking.

Hungarian film theorist Bella. Balaz also pointed out: "Once the last shot is connected, the extremely rich meaning hidden in each shot is emitted like an electric spark." It can be seen that this kind of "electric spark" meaning is "hidden" by people's unconscious single lens, which needs to be "assembled" before the audience can have a new and special imagination. When we say montage, we first refer to the combination relationship between shots, including the combination relationship between time and space, sound and picture, picture and color. And the significance and function of these connections.

In a word, "montage" is the connection of movies. The whole film has a structure, and every chapter, paragraph and paragraph should also have a structure. In the film, this connection is called montage. In fact, it is to combine the lens group into a segment, then combine the short segments into a large segment, and then organize the large segment into a movie. There is no mystery or trick in this process, which conforms to the logic of rationality and sensibility, the logic of life and vision, and looks' smooth',' reasonable', rhythmic and comfortable. This is a splendid montage, and vice versa. There is no such simple explanation and elaboration as montage.

Parallel montage and cross montage are the two most common ways to describe several actions at the same time, with the same plot and theme. It is worth noting that the actions described in cross montage overlap more frequently, and are mostly used in car chasing scenes or thrillers. Its main theoretical characteristics are: strict simultaneity, close causality and frequent shot switching. ...

Parallel montage, that is, parallel narration of events on different occasions in the same time period; Cross montage, alternately describing parallel actions or scenes at the same time and in different places, in order to achieve mutual reinforcement and create a thrilling impression; Cumulative montage, which connects a series of lens groups with similar properties and the same content to produce the superposition of visual impressions; The repeated montage makes the scenes that have appeared in front of the film appear repeatedly, resulting in the effect of echo; Inverted montage turns the plot from the present to the past and from the past to the present, resulting in flashback or interpolation.