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THE PARTS OF CINEMA:A Definition

By Robert GessnerProfessor of CinemaNew York UniversityWhen a teacher brought into a classroom in 1930 a

circular tin can containing silver nitrate salts fixed ona cellulose nitrate base, the contents were called a motionpicture. If he got the tin can from the Hays Office it wascalled a motion picture classic. In 1935 this circular tinunder the teacher's arm was called an audio-visual aid. By1940, thanks to the British documentaries, our tin can wascalled a film. By 1945 the Sociologists began bringing thecan into their classrooms, and calling it a frame of reference.In 1950, when television began to boom, the tin can was calleda kine. By 1955, educators, repackaging curricula, called thecan a communication. To the more imaginative who wished todistinguish the can from the slightly obscene phrase, massmedia, it was called a communication art. Finally, in 1960,thanks in part to the existence of The Society the can in thiscountry is being called cinema, which, Fowler points out (tocompound the confusion), "is not the Greek word kinema at all,but a curtailed form of cinematograph . . " And cinemato-graph originated in Britain, from whence came the four-letterword, film.

When the people who teach and practice the subject donot agree on what to call it, what, we wonder, is being taught

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26and practiced? In Florida, college students study the subjectas part of library science. Harvard is contemplating instruc-tion in the subject under the label Light, and thus demonstra-ting that the powers of darkness can dwell along the Charles aswell as the banks of Siwash, The Speech departments in theMidwest are beginning to teach the subject so that their tele-vision majors will be able to "work with film", as they describethe relationship between the broadcasting tail and the cinematicdog. Similar confusions exist wherever techniques are taughtapart from genesis of craft development and art history. Nosuch confusion exists in the teaching of the arts of antiquity,music, painting, sculpture, poetry (literature), and architecture.Cinema, curiously, is the only art in which technique has maturedin advance of theory. Practice can not make for perfection, how-ever, without comprehension6

Here, ironically, in the field of technical accomplishmentwe find the greatest confusion in terminology as well as concept,There is no commonly employed nomenclature. Let us look at theterms used in editing, which Pudovkin called "the foundation offilm art," In this fundamental area we find so many contradictory,duplicating, meaningless, insipid phrases as to make the Tower ofBabel sound like an Easter choir.

Here are the most common: cut-in, such as from a long shotto a close-up; cut-out, from close-up to long shot; cut-on-action,or the match cut or action cutS cut on reaction, or from face tofaces insert cut, a close-up of a face or prop; cut-away to newmaterial; the crosscut, sometimes called the intercut, or inter-

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cutting; ithe linkage for symbolical transition, confused withmontage in which there may be no subject relationship; the upcut which omits action. These are generally considered motivatedcuts.

Other phrases commonly employed and considered unmotivatedcuts are: cut from out of frame, cut with wronq screen direction,cut with improper time lapse, cut with mismatched elements, cutwith repeated action, jump cut when not motivated, cut afteraction, cut before action is completed, or has settled.

Karel Reisz has a glossary of terms in The Technique of FilmEditing, Focal Press, 1953, in which he contributes three additionaldefinitions: "the bridging shot, used to cover a jump in ti orother breaks in continuity;" "the cheat shot, in which part ofsubject or action is excluded;" and "the master shot, a singleshot of an entire piece of dramatic action taken in order tofacilitate the assembly of the component closer shots of detailsfrom which the sequence will finally be covered,"

"Covering a sequence" betrays a non-cinematic attitude,typical of an inability or refusal to see the generic dynamicsin the art form. Cheat shot indeed' "The bridging shot" soundslike a transplantation from radio; the master shot is a sceneconcept from the theatre. I submit, this type of terminology iswhat happens when the plumbers and carpenters tace over architec-ture in the name of low-cost housing.

What is most painfully lacking in the use of these editingterms is the most elementary comprehension of cinema as ahumanistic art; as such it has the power to convey feeling and

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thought. Consequently, there is no appreciation of techniqueas a means toward subjective concepts, emotional and intellectual.This is aesthetic ignorance which cannot excuse a lack ofcuriosity about the unique characteristics of cinema.

The absence of conceptual goals produces a terminologydevoid of any significant understanding of the inter-lockingroles of content and form. The resultant chaos is perfectlyillustrated in an alleged textbook, Film and the Director, byDon Livingston, which has gone through four printings byMacmillan since 1953. Livingston lists "Twelve Basic Movements"as 1. the truck-in; 2. The truck-out; 3, The walk-in (subjectmoves toward camera); 4. The walk-away (opposite of the walk-in);5, The follow shot (both subject and camera move); 6. Followingone subject to reveal and concentrate on another subject;original subject exits; 7. Following one subject to includemore subjects; 8. Transition from a group to an individual;9. Following a subject leaving a group; 10. Correcting forcomposition. Here is the exact description of that puzzle: "Thecamera must either pan, tilt, or truck slightly in order to main-tain composition on one or more moving subjects. For example,we have a medium close-up of a man seated in a chair. He rises,and in order to hold him in the picture and keep a balanced frame,the camera either tilts up with him as he rises or trucks backto include more area." What would happen to painting if thistyranny of the balanced frame dictated composition? 11. Subjectsreversing; and 12. Countering, which is "One subject moves andanother subject 'counters' or moves into a predetermined position

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which will maintain picture composition."Is it not a compliment to students that immediately upon

completion of a course so many sell or give away their textbooks?There has been regrettably only one notable attempt to

chart order out of the chaos, the all-inclusive diagram ofRaymond Spottiswoode, when audaciousley youthful, in A Grammarof the Film, but alas' the confusion of terms and definitions,compounded by the lack of any artistic delimitation or aestheticambitions, has given rise to a colleague's quip: "You can'tsee Spottiswoode for the trees."

Not until cinema becomes a humanistic discipline can theartisan and the academician recapture the authority now vestedby default in the hands of plumbers and carpenters. Even awell-intended methodologist like Spottiswoode fails in his pre-sentation of no less than 77 items in his chart simply becausehe does not distinguish between objective elements, coordinativefactors, and subjective qualities,

In the absence of a discipline in cinema, the embarrassingquestion is: how does a typical teacher (which omits usT) go aboutanalyzing or discussing a film? Apparently he does so, if anattempt is made, in terms of either contentual disciplines, suchas anthropology, sociology, and literature, or in terms of forma-listic patterns applied out of the sister arts, such as drama andfine arts. The cinematologist, searching for what is unique, isthe exception on any campus. Without this search for the exclusivelanguage of cinema, teaching then resembles a course in Frenchliterature conducted entirely in English translations, or a study

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30of operas in terms of synopsized librettos.

What remains today the truest statement on the natureof cinematic aesthetics was published in 1934 in an essay,Style and Medium in the Motion Pictures by Erwin Panofsky,and revised twelve years later in Critique, Vol, 1, No. 3.The statement is: "nTese unique and specific possibilitiescan be defined as dynamization of space and, accordingly,spatialization of time." Although Dr. Panofsky goes on tosay "This statement is self-evident to the point of trivialitybut it belongs to that kind of truths which, just becauseof their triviality, are easily forgotten or neglected."Twenty-seven years later the self-evidence is still beingneglected.

Gyorgy Kepes has taken Panofsky's "dynamization ofspace" another step by his emphasis upon "sensory pattern.""Structure is specific," Kepes says in his introduction toyne Visual Arts Toda, issued first as Vol. 89, No. 1, of the

Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences."An artistic form is a symbolic form grasped directly by thesenses but reaching beyond them and connecting all the strataof our inner world of sense, feeling, and thoughrt * . * hisessential unity of primary sense experience and intellectualevaluation makes the artistic form unique in human experienceand therefore in human culture .. * in my search for idiomswith breadth and power I turned toward film as the mostadvanced, dynamic, and accordingly potent social form ofvisual communication,"

In a parallel way, what needs to be done to Panofsky's

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31"spatialization of time" is a similar appreciation of thepowers inherent in the various rhythms which project time,Movement is action, and by itself may be a craft terms rhythm,on the other hand, is measured motion, and as such should be anart term-

Accordingly, I should like to define cinema as theforms of visual rhythms, supplemented by sound, to describe,narrate, inform, and symbolize. In order to perceive formsin terms of their visual rhythms, which is to perceive a-fresh, we need to reorganize our habits of vision, or teachthe young new habits, so that we shall see in terms of timeand space, and in the inter-relations between surface imageand inner associations. To achieve this revolution in visualexperience we need to become acquainted above all with theparts of cinema that are as elemental to an understanding ofthis art as the octave in music, the basic colors in painting,or the parts of speech.

HIere follows what Panofsky most generously calls "theGrundbegriffe of cinematology," This enumeration should beconsidered primarily as a convenience enabling a more compre-hensive evaluation of craft and art. Since these parts areunique and derivative, unequal and idiosyncratic, they cannot comprise a pattern to be arbitrarily superimposed, norare they magical numbers to be manipulated by critic or creator,On the contrary, it is their presence or omission, conflict orfusion, which make cinema an independent art. These iderntlties,arrived at empirically over the past twenty-five years, arepossible as units or corbinations, never separate but always

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multiple, in every shot. The shot, or so-called "take" inlive television, should aim to be an indivisible unit ofcinematic expression, aiming at one or a combination of thefour subjective qualities: descriptive, narrative, expository,and symbolical. It is obligatory that methodology in cinemabe in terms of shots; only by a shot-by-shot interpretationcan there by any serious study or cinematology. If I maybelabor the obvious, the shot is to cinema what the sentenceis to literature, the brush stroke to painting, the bar tomusic, the beat to the theatre. The shot, finally, becomesthe natural item of reference, eliminating generalizations,or references in terms of other disciplines.

Every shot in cinema, including the reproduction of astill photograph, is measured by one or more, out of a possibleseven, rhythms unique to cinema. They are, in a way, theseven faces of time, some of which overlap in compositecountenances. They are all means to be edited with subjec-tive qualities, or conceptual goals, in mind. Each of thesehas its varying power, and are not listed according to theircinematic strength.

1. Subject motion that is normal, fast, slow, or reverse.2. Frame movement as pans, trucks, tilts, or zooms.3. The cut for continuous action,4. The cut for parallel action,5. The cut for accelerated action,6. The cut for decelerated action,7. The cut to previous action,These seven varieties of time, shape forms, in the way

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a magic wand awakens, moves, and ends the life of objects,animate and inanimate. Similarly, these seven varieties oftime affect composition and audio elements. The substanceof cinema, Panofsky observed in his pioneering paper, is"held together by an uninterrupted flow of movement in space(except, of course, for such checks and pauses as have thesame compositional value as a rest in music) . . ."

This "uninterrupted flow" requires the conceptualcontrol of an artist if the flow is to become measured andthereby significant. Listing the seven rhythms under thegeneral heading of editingr the three areas the flow affectsare: objects. composition. and auditory. Continuing theenumeration, the Grundbegiffe now reads:

OBJECTS:8. Animate life (actors, persons, animals)9 * Makeup

10. Costumes11. Inanimate objects (props, furnishings)12, Locale

COMPOSITION:13. Light14. Color15. Size(a) Camera: close-up, medium, long shots

(b) Projection: screen, glass16. Perspective

(a) Linear (line, point, mass, depth)(b) Optical (lenses)

AUDITORY

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17. Voice18. Music19* SoundBeyond this enumeration is 19 Plus, the intangible part

of talent and taste. Direction is a humanistic control ofthe whole, not an indivisible factor in itself. Similarly,acting is a combination of subjective qualities, rhythms,as coordinative factors, and objective elements. I canwell appreciate the resentment of actors being consideredan animated object, whereas in a theater, where space isstatic, he is a king. "But any attempt to convey thoughtand feeling exclusively, or even primarily, by speech,"Panofsky observed early, "leaves us with a feeling ofembarrassment, boredom, or both."

To summarize, the 19 parts of cinema fall into the fourareas of EDITING, OBJECTS, COMPOSITION, and AUDITORYwithEDITING being the primary rhythm1s that control the whole, inaccordance with concepts that describe, narrate, inform, andsymbolize, singly or in combinations.

For those who might wish for a more ethereal discipline,let us appreciate that cinema, more than any art, manipulatesphysical objects and utilizes machinery. Reality may be themost natural medium for cinema, and fantasy and symbolismthe most difficult. Reality is arranged for, more than it isaccommodated. For example, in Melies's The Doctor's Secret(1908), the subject motion is, in different shots, normal, fast,and slow, with the resultant fantasy being anything but real.In Malle's The Lovers (1959) the traveling shots under the

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moonlight through the trees, over the fields, along the riverwere so exquisitely fluid that for the first time we believedin the romance; fantasy of pictorial beauty blended perfectlywith the reality of the lovers.

"The problem," as Panofsky sees it, "is to manipulateand shoot unstylized reality in such a way that the result hasstyle." The artist in cinema, then, is not unlike any artist,described by Picasso as a man who captures reality and bendsit to his will so that he might feed his children. Actually,the director in cinema is closest in creative kinship to thearchitect rather than the conductor of a symphonic orchestraWho calls upon sections at certain times, mutes other elements,blends the whole into an instrument projecting the concepts ofthe composer and the conductor. The architect does all thisin terms of plot and landscape, form and feeling, design andpurpose - at least, in the planning stage (although theconductor does present a continuity in performance) - plus(and this is the real reality) the architect's knowledge ofand ability to deal with contractors (actors), building codes(audiences), unions (craftsmen), and new materials (productionvalues).

To see how this works out well and badly in cinema, themost rewarding study I know of is a shot-by-shot analysis ofCitizen Kane. If we approach every shot in Kane in terms ofits rhythm (length and beat) we have the best textbook possiblein cinema. For example, subject motion, which is mainlytheatrical inheritance, is dramatically illustrated in thesinging lesson. The maestro is saying to Susan "Some people

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can sing . . * some cannot*" There is no close-up, nocamera-frame movement. The drama carries itself.

Painting with light for plasticity becomes mosteffective in the cut of the long shot when the nurse entersthe room where Kane has just died, following a close-up ofthe glass ball of snow. The cut from the extreme close-upon the lips of Kane is contrasted to the long walk of thenurse in white, who at the end of the take covers thesilhouette with a white sheet over the dark face. Howdeath-like becomes the black and the white through thecompositional cuts, unique to this art. This technique,or style, is employed in the following projection roomscene, where the anonymous reporters are in shadow, whilethe editor, front-lighted (we are shooting at his back)gives out assignmnents, and as though he were throwing offlight. Perfect satire: Another typical example is in thescene wherein Kane goes to Susan's apartment to cleansehimself of the mud, splashed on him while en route toreview his sled "Rosebud" in storage. Only the door haslight in the left-ihand corner of the frame; all else isdark,. The suggestion of a love nest is sensuously clear,since it is Kane in the foreground in a medium shot whichfollows the long, impersonal shots on the street.

To illustrate every application of the seven factorialrhythms upon the objects, compos-ition, and auditory elementswould necessitate more time and space (sick) than available.One more example from Kane might further illustrate thedeterminative power of editing (rhythm) over interpretation.

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In the newspaper office an outraged Thatcher is upbraidinghis ward, who is grinning with pleasure. It is a medium shotover Thatcher's shoulder. Thatcher sits down; there is nocut. The camera moves slowly into a profile shot of Thatcher,very angry, Kane begins to be firm in his intentions. Thenthe camera moves in very fast, giving conviction to whatKane is saying. All this is one shot. The same intellectual-emotional objective is achieved in the scene in Bernstein'soffice during the interview with the reporter. There is onlyone shot, but it goes from a long to a medium to a close-up,all three compositions so fluid and meaningful no attention hasbeen drawn from the content to the form.

In all, there are approximately 500 shots in two hours, orone every fifteen seconds.

I lack the time to apply the grundbegriffe to the popularterms in editing or to Don Livingston's terminology, andpossibly I lack the inclination. To approach uninterpretedmaterial, or material interpreted in terms of other disciplines,with a cinematic yardstick can have salutatory values if thoseconcerned, student and teacher, would look upon the measurementas a divining rod, capable of discovering water in the desert,provided the searcher is thirsty, What we seek in this art isthe discipline that enables artisans and academicians in thisfield to explore the adventurous highways, which until nowhave been the exclusive property of the older arts,

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The paper, "The Parts of Cinema", has been reproducedabove as read on March 27th, 1961 by the author at the SecondAnnual M1eeting of the Society of Cinematologists, held atthe George Eastman House, Rochester, New Yorlk, U. S. A. Theauthor wishes to make it known that he has in subsequentwritings modified and enlarged the concepts contained in theabove paper.