by Paolo Braga
Sight is more reliable than sound.
For example, in an uncertain situation where a speaker surprises the audience by saying something out of character, it’s logical to think: “I want to look you in the eye while you say that”. This sentence alone is proof that we have more faith in what we see than what we hear. Attention is focused on visual images because that is where we expect to find final confirmation of intentions and states of mind. Gestures relay the meaning of intentions, the real objective of actions. This is why film limits its use of dialogue. Given the instinctive attitude and fixed ideas of the audience, words are always a bit superfluous. A story, thus, heads down the track of visible actions. Words are deviations it comes across along the way.
Stage-to-film adaptations prove the importance of terseness
By saying the perfect dialogue has no words does not mean dialogue is not important in a film. It almost goes without saying that dialogue is ← 8 | 9 → an important element of a film, that bad dialogue can ruin a script, that if cinema wants to be realistic, it cannot be mute.
Limiting the amount of words means recognizing that successful film scripts must first take the screen into consideration. From this perspective, a screenwriter should always have “dialogue without words” as a constant objective, even though this objective can only be realized in very few scenes. One could say that dialogue without words is the aesthetic model that screenwriting aspires to even in the composition of spoken dialogue, when this latter is necessary, in order to make it effective and engaging. Silent interaction is the main regulatory that one can never completely exclude. It is the force of attraction (even if sometimes bland) that scenes and dialogue should gravitate to.
Film adaptations, which represent a significant share of world production, show how dialogue supports visible action in film. In a paper on this topic, Armando Fumagalli cites many examples of how adapting a novel to a screenplay requires cutting out a great deal of dialogue. The author states:
as a novel becomes a film, dialogue goes through a process of essentialization, which usually means a significant reduction in quantity. This reduction can be radical and extensive with regards to novels filled with dialogue or even verbose like The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James, where the relationship between dialogue in the novel and dialogue in the film could be described 10:1. There is less reduction with modern authors who have already attributed characteristics of dialogue for film to the novel. Some of John Grisham’s novels are already quite essential and reducing the amount of dialogue in writing the screenplay is often simple and contained10.
With stage-to-film adaptations, Fumagalli refers to a classic example of this, citing the considerations of Linda Seger11 about the film A Chorus Line (1985), which was unsuccessful in re-producing the power of the original because the original was based on the intensity of words. The words of the protagonists, aspiring ballerinas, awoke desires and ← 9 | 10 → insecurities on stage as they tried-out for a musical. The audience’s involvement in the story relied on their direct and intimate connection with the characters and the actors. These are situations that cannot be re-produced on film12.
Two more examples can be made13.
The first is found in the film A Few Good Men (USA 1992), directed by Rob Reiner, an incredibly successful adaptation of a play by Aaron Sorkin, who also wrote the screenplay. In this case, an important plot twist in the original theater script was completely based on dialogue. It was therefore changed. This modification greatly aided to the success of the film.
In the investigation in which the young and brilliant lawyer Daniel Kaffee (Tom Cruise) finally manages to incriminate his antagonist, the terrible colonel Jessep (Jack Nicholson) who is suspected of having ordered the “violent punishment” of a marine killed by two fellow marines at the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba.
In the theater, Kaffee uses his decisive intuition to decode a message secretly sent by Jessep’s executive officer. There are initials on an envelope containing the log from a flight with the identification code “AF-40”. Kaffee remembers the same code being mentioned on other occasions, in circumstances and with people that allow him to deduce the identity of the sender. He understands that he has been sent a clue to help him. Jessep indeed denied the existence of the same flight, as he had eliminated every trace of it to hide his guilt as an accomplice to murder.
Following the protagonist in putting all the pieces of this clue together clearly requires great effort on the audience’s part. It must concentrate on the words of the dialogue when the clue is finally explained and it must recall the trivial lines spoken in precedence to piece it all together. This type of mental effort linked to listening can be asked of a theater audience, but not a film audience.
← 10 | 11 → In fact, Sorkin said that director Reiner asked him to work on it14. Sorkin had to think of a different kind of clue for the screenplay, a clue with visual impact that didn’t need a series of long explanations. Thus, in the film, Kaffee stands in front of his own closet of clothes, all in proper order, and thinks back to the crime-scene, the room of the marine who was killed. The victim’s clothes were all there, in proper order. The fact is, the victim was expected to be transferred off the base in Cuba as soon as possible and he hadn’t packed his bags. From this, Kaffee concludes the marine had never received a transfer order, despite Jessep’s guarantees, which he obviously only confirmed to hide his own guilt.
These visual images make everything easier for a film audience to grasp. The clothes hanging in the closet represent an idea that is immediately comprehensible because it is shown and not spoken about. The row of clothes is so easily impressed in the mind, that Reiner needs only one quick close-up on the marine’s closet at the beginning of the film to instill an image that is later recalled with another brief close-up on Kaffee’s closet.
The second example of how problematic it can be to transfer dialogue from stage to screen can be seen in Frost/Nixon (directed by Ron Howard, USA 2008). Once again, the same author, Peter Morgan, wrote both the theater script and the screenplay. Inspired by historic facts, Morgan tells the story of how the hard-hitting TV interview between Australian journalist Peter Frost and the elderly ex-President of the United States, Richard Nixon, was both planned and accomplished. Through this interview, Nixon was brought to admit his guilt in Watergate. The entire event was construed around the tragic figure of the antagonist, Nixon (Frank Langella), who was perceived as a pathologically incompetent man who was incapable of a good relationship with the public and had the tendency to make self-destructive choices – above all by pursuing a career in politics, where skilled communication is everything.
← 11 | 12 → From the original script to the adaptation, the story is essentially the same, but the ending was changed significantly. Morgan explains that the end of the play was too “theatrical” because it was made up of a very “reflective monologue”15. In the play, Reston, Frost’s assistant who acts as the narrator, says goodbye to the audience by turning to them from a scene at a mundane party held by Frost. Reston’s words reflect on one of the themes in the story, the close relationship between politics, media and show business16:
RESTON
Once, when I was in Europe
researching a book, I was invited
to one of his parties. I didn’t
know anyone. I didn’t stay long.
Walking through the crowds of
air-kissing politicians, actors and
high-fliers, it was tough to tell
where the politics stopped and the
showbiz started. Maybe that was the
point. Maybe, in the end, there is
no difference. And David understood
that better then all of us.
The film presents a different ending, a silent ending with a dramatic tone. Nixon is all alone in his Californian villa gazing melancholically at the ocean. He holds a pair of Italian loafers that Frost has just given him. They are the same ones the journ
alist wore during the film. The audience knows that the politician couldn’t accept them. Victim of his complex psyche, behind the scenes of the interview, Nixon never did manage to comprehend the confidence with which Frost wore loafers, shoes that, in his own opinion, were “effeminate”. Throughout the story, the loafers became a metaphor for just how different Nixon was from ← 12 | 13 → his interviewer, a man who, unlike him, was completely at ease under the spotlight.
The film adaptation ends on this shot, on an image that “says” Nixon remained prisoner of his own self forever17. It is not a thematic reflection, but an action that gives the sense of an unfulfilled life.
Three functions of dialogue in film
Despite the nearly unanimous agreement that words are secondary to images on film, Sarah Kozloff gives dialogue such a key role in her book Overhearing Film Dialogue18. She asserts that both scientific literature, as well as experts in the business, have always neglected the importance of dialogue in discussions on cinema19. In Kozloff’s opinion, the role of dialogue seems to have been concealed by the absolute attention that has been placed on images. Kozloff says this is due to a series of different cultural influences that have generated an authentic, familiar “mantra” that everyone repeats – “the less dialogue there is, the better”. But this is not the reality of a film, where dialogue abounds.
According to Kozloff, the first reason dialogue has not been given due importance is the enduring influence of film theorists such as Arnheim, Eisenstein and Kracauer – intellectuals that sharpened their aesthetic ideas by focusing on silent film.
← 13 | 14 → The second reason is the influence of literary origins attributable to Henry James and his theory on the advantage of showing over telling. Kozloff claims that James’ ideas of favoring action (showing) over narration (telling) in a story has opened the door to a general feeling of diffidence with respect to what goes beyond the simple development of action, including, ultimately, the dialogue. James felt that showing the development of a story through action would bring it to a new level of authenticity, guaranteeing the story to be realistic and engaging.
Thus, with regards to James’ lesson, which was a reaction to the excessive amount of narration present in Victorian literature, Kozloff says a long-term cultural tendency prone to considering words as lies has gained new impetus. Kozloff goes on to say that even proverbs that commend silence (“silence is golden”) and contrast action, seem to manifest this centuries-old and excessive inclination towards skepticism with respect to language.
According to Kozloff, however, there is a third, cultural reason that is even more widespread – the negative association of dialogue to the female gender: dialogue automatically becomes an expression of “female” petulant frivolousness. With its hidden influences, this element has greatly contributed to making film dialogue slip into the shadows.
Some of these explanations, however, have little or no philological basis. For example, the influence of the first film theorists on the work of those that work in the field today has never been proved. Even the legacy of literature on showing must still be elaborated on. We could, for example, reverse Kozloff’s argument and maintain that film has adopted a writing style that is more essential and more pertinent to action given the aptness of its characteristics. We could even add that, in many cases, it has been film that has influenced many author’s literary style (i.e. Graham Greene or more recently, James Ellroy and Stephen King)20.
← 14 | 15 → In other cases, Kozloff’s explanations appear exceptionally complex. For example, it seems quite twisted to state that anyone who upholds the importance of limiting dialogue is prisoner of a male-dominant view of the world. It’s easier and more appropriate to claim that too much dialogue burdens the image. Perhaps the diffidence in words referred to above should be reformulated in terms of the ability of different senses to confirm a truth. It’s not that there is cultural prejudice towards dialogue, it’s just that visual confirmation (i.e. a feeling or an intention seen on the speaker’s face) creates more certainty and makes words more authentic. Kozloff’s considerations are based on ideological concern and, above all, her own personal passion for dialogue, which has caused her to overlook one fundamental point – dialogue comes second. Even films with an abundance of dialogue have been condensed to make sure action remains the focal point.
This oversight has, in fact, prevented Kozloff’s lengthy volume from highlighting some of the most typical aspects of film dialogue. According to the author, dialogue fulfills the following functions:
•anchorage of the diegesis and characters, or rather, giving information on the setting and the protagonists (name, historical and geographical position);
•communication of narrative causality;
•enactment of narrative events;
•character revelation;
•adherence to the code of realism;
•control of viewer evaluation and emotions.
Not one time, however, does Kozloff’s dissertation bring into focus the characteristic way in which film dialogue conforms to the functions mentioned. And yet there is a characteristic way in which film dialogue triggers narrative events. There is a characteristic way in which it informs… and this depends on the primacy attributed to image and action.
← 15 | 16 → By adopting this premise, it becomes easier, when watching a film or reading a script, to pick up on the specific form and dynamics of film dialogue, which fulfill three fundamental functions that all other functions are influenced by. Screenwriters, editors, directors and actors generally agree that well-written dialogue fulfills the following three goals:
•develop conflict;
•fuel subtext;
•give as much information as possible with the least amount of words.
The other functions, some conveniently highlighted by Kozloff, but which are common even in literature (i.e. provoke emotion and evaluation, enforce realism, reveal the character), are carried out by film dialogue at the same time it carries out, or at least tries to, these same three principles21. Furthermore, by fulfilling these three principles, the other functions find characteristic undertones as well (revealing the character in conflict with a speaker and revealing the character while he talks to a speaker are not the same thing)22.
← 16 | 17 →
The aim of this book
Taking mostly into account texts on screenwriting, this book examines film dialogue in three chapters, elaborating first on the essence of conflict in dialogue, then its multiple levels of meaning and interaction and finally how it astutely relays information.
The arguments made in this book have been largely based on the ideas of professionals with formal experience in the audiovisual industry (McKee, like other authors of screenwriting handbooks, has been a lecturer and consultant for production companies).
This book, however, is also quite essentially the product of film analysis and constructive discussions with students and professionals working in the TV and film industry (in some cases, even with the authors of the films analyzed), opportunities the author of this book was able to benefit from working at the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart in Milan as both researcher and professor of a Masters in Writing and Production for Fiction and Cinema.
A topic such as film dialogue must be examined through the use of concrete examples. It is a topic with an infinite number of variations that take on new form with each and every original new work, reflecting the personal sensitivity of the screenwriter.
It is a general rule that knowing the power and potential of a means of expression aids in understanding the choices an author makes and calls attention to his own technical abilities, allowing for his creativity to be appreciated.
The same is true for film dialogue, which is focused on here.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Armando Fumagalli for having read this book, for his corrections, encouragement and suggestions. Once again he generously gave his advice, which,
as usual, was essential.
← 17 | 18 → I am also grateful to Annamaria Cascetta and Savina Raynaud who, from the very beginning, appreciated the idea for the book and offered such precious suggestions.
I thank the Department of Communication and Performing Arts at the Catholic University for having organized a seminar on film dialogue in June 2011, when I was just at the beginning. The observations made by Piermarco Aroldi, Roberta Carpani, Stefano Locatelli, Marina Villa and Nicoletta Vittadini helped me bring into focus the right path to take.
Among the film and TV professionals that I spoke with, I am particularly thankful to Bobette Buster and John Truby for having read parts of this book and for their precious feedback.
Finally, I would like to thank Massimo Venier for, after reading the first two chapters, supporting me in the direction I chose to take, and Niccolò Dal Corso, because the first-hand working experiences we shared were a constant reference point for me.
_______
1Lauren Weisberger, The Devil Wears Prada, Broadway Books, New York 2003.
2Chuck Hogan, Prince of Thieves: a Novel, Simon & Schuster, New York 2004.
3Cfr. Jeff Goldsmith’s audio interview with Ben Affleck, who starred, directed and co-wrote the film, “Ben Affleck – The Town Q&A”,
4In adapting Hogan’s book to the big screen, the screenwriters toured American prisons to interview bank robbers. Each interview ended by asking the criminal to think of one interesting or curious event that happened during a robbery. Affleck tells that this scene was recalled by a criminal who actually found himself in the same circumstances. Cfr. Jeff Goldsmith, “Ben Affleck – The Town Q&A”, cit.
5François Truffaut, in collaboration with Helen Scott, Le cinéma selon Hitchcock, Editions Robert Laffont, Paris 1966.