Cinema- Concept & Practice

by Edward Dmytryk

  The purpose of the second step is to stimulate the viewer into his own interpretation, at his own level, in his own words, of the filmmaker’s concept. It is this singular characteristic which has made motion pictures the most universally popular artistic medium in the history of the world.

  Perhaps the most abstract, yet completely understandable cinematic sequence ever made is Hitchcock’s “murder in the shower” montage in Psycho. During nearly one hundred cuts, all short, many undecipherable, and none explicitly showing a knife entering the victim’s body, the verbal message is, “My God! She’s being killed in the bathtub!” And the montage allows each viewer, thinking in his own language and using as many of his own words as he cares to use, to deliver the verbal message to himself. Let us consider a few other examples, from simple to abstract.

  In Murder My Sweet, Philip Marlowe (Dick Powell) and Moose Mulloy (Mike Mazurki) leave Marlow’s office to visit a night club. As they exit the room, the camera swings into a close shot of a water cooler, surmounted by a five gallon bottle of water. A large air bubble “blubs” to the water’s surface, and the scene dissolves into the night club’s neon sign, FLORIAN’s. Two of its letters flicker fitfully, and the viewer’s mind immediately registers, “A dive!” He not only knows what kind of a joint he is about to enter, he also begins to anticipate its possible dangers.

  All this information is not delivered by the sign alone, but by a layer of images. It is introduced by the shot of the bottled water. (The image, filmed in 1944, has since been borrowed for a few other films.) Accompanied by its distinctive sound, the shot serves several purposes. First, it always elicits a laugh, a welcome break in a series of tense sequences; it furnishes a short breathing space while holding the viewer’s attention; it provides both an audible and a visual “springboard” into the next scene. Here the image of the amorphous bubble is augmented by the shot of the sputtering neon, and its vulgar “burp” enforces the tawdriness of the sign and the enterprise it advertises. There is no need to further “establish” the character of Florian’s Bar—we can proceed with the plot.

  In The Caine Mutiny, shortly after taking command of the ship, Captain Queeg (Humphrey Bogart), while talking to his junior officers, is faced with a troublesome situation—the shirttail of one of the ship’s crew hangs outside his pants. Queeg, a martinet, frowns, then his right hand slips slowly into his right pocket. Is he reaching for a pack of cigarettes? At this point, both the attendant officers and the viewer can only guess. But when Queeg’s hand reappears it holds two steel balls. Spasmodically, his fingers knead them in the palm of his hand, and only their metallic clicking is heard as the junior officers watch in disbelief.

  The viewer’s first reaction is laughter, but he quickly realizes that for Queeg this is a crisis, and that the steel balls are his security blanket. From then on throughout the film, whenever Queeg’s hand slips into his right hand pocket, the viewer knows that the Captain is suffering an attack of paranoia, and he reacts accordingly.

  Until the film’s climax the routine of the steel balls is a device, a sure source of humor which firmly establishes Queeg’s problem, but at the mutineers’ courtmartial it plays a leading role. As Queeg testifies to the events leading up to the “mutiny” he maintains the calm demeanor of a well-balanced man and officer, smoothly refuting the junior officers’ testimony. Then the defense attorney catches him in a lie. Queeg stammers, his hand slips into his pocket, brings out the steel balls, and the viewer knows that the Captain is finished, that he will expose himself and his paranoia. No words are needed to bring home the point and none could possibly do so in such a remarkably short time.

  This excellent cinematic device was taken in its entirety from Wouk’s novel, but it truly reached its fulfillment in the film, where the viewer could see it all happening instead of taking someone’s word for it.

  Another scene which lends itself to imagery was written by John

  The perfect metaphor—Humphrey Bogart’s steel balls in The Caine Mutiny.

  Fante in Full of Life. Here a young hollywood writer, a second generation Italian, returns to his family home in Northern California to fetch his father back to Los Angeles for the birth of his first grandchild.

  The place is typical of many rural homes; the spacious yard is littered with rusty odds and ends and used-up pieces of ancient equipment, in the midst of which, prostrate on a worn-out settee, the father is taking his afternoon nap. The writer makes his way through the clutter to his father’s side and looks down at the old man—at his wrinkled features, his gnarled hands, his used-up body which seems too small for the work clothes he wears—and his eyes fill with tears as he remembers the powerful stonemason he knew when he was a boy.

  A fly drones lazily in the humid summer air. And suddenly, like a striking snake, the father’s hand darts out and snatches the insect in mid-flight. The image of the lightning move instantly transforms the pitifully weak old man into a forceful patriarch, and establishes a character that will remain consistent throughout the story. The tale is well-written—but seeing is believing.

  In Crossfire, a young man narrates his movements of the past evening. He has left an apartment and gone out into the street for a breath of sobering air. As he talks, a subjective camera, its fuzzily-focused lens standing in for his alcohol-befogged eyes, moves down the sidewalk recording an undecipherable street sign and some shadowy, shuttered store fronts. At the end of a short, aimless cruise, it swings over to the curb and focuses in on a large metal trash can just as a jazz trumpet smears out a harsh opening blast. Simultaneously with the sight and sound, a quick, short dissolve discloses a huge close-up of a smiling Ginny. No words are needed.

  The viewer understands her character at once, and he supplies his own epithet, which is in no way abstract. The subsequent scenes fill out and modify the original impression, but the image of the garbage can and the sound of the blaring trumpet have given him a great deal to build on—all in a matter of seconds. No verbal description could have been as concise, as colorful, as universally understandable, yet as specific in revealing appearance and character as these three or four seconds of carefully abstracted metaphor.

  However, speed is always a relative consideration. The viewer’s response to the scene’s recommendation is not always immediate,and sometimes he must be allowed an extra moment to work out the relevance of his own experience to the image’s implication.

  In The Verdict, Frank Galvin (Paul Newman) is trying what may be his last case in a Boston court, a case of medical malpractice. The defendants—a hospital and two doctors—are playing with a stacked deck. They have the best and the slickest lawyers, a friendly judge, an attractive “mole” ostensibly helping Galvin, and the advantage of disappearing witnesses. It is not surprising that Galvin has lost all hope. But in a last minute effort he succeeds in locating the nurse who admitted the victim for the operation. Because she can deliver evidence supporting the patient’s cause, she has been threatened, forced to leave Boston, and to give up nursing. She now works as a teacher in a New York nursery school.

  Fortuitously, the trial extends beyond the weekend. Galvin flies to New York and finds the ex-nurse, Kaitlin Costello (Lindsay Crouse), playing with a group of children in the school playground. He pretends to be casing the place on behalf of his 4 year old nephew, and exchanges a line or two of small talk. Then, in a full shot, across Kaitlin and the children, with Galvin in the background, he says:

  GALVIN

  Oh, you’re the - you’re the one they said was a nurse.

  KAITLIN

  Who told you that?

  GALVIN

  Oh, I don’t know - uh - Mrs. . . .

  CLOSE GROUP SHOT   KAITLIN AND CHILDREN

  During this cut the camera dollies in to a CLOSE SHOT of Kaitlin.

  KAITLIN (helping out)

  Mrs. Simpson?

  GALVIN’S VOICE (off-screen)

  Yeah.

  KAITLIN (after a beat)

  I u
sed to be a nurse.

  GALVIN’S VOICE (o.s.)

  It’s a wonderful profession. My daughter-in- law’s a. . . .

  (lie pauses)

  CLOSE SHOT   GALVIN

  GALVIN (cont.)

  What’d you do - just stop?

  CLOSE-UP   KAITLIN

  KAITLIN

  (another beat)

  Yes.

  (she starts to turn away)

  CLOSE-UP   GALVIN

  GALVIN

  Why’d you do that?

  CLOSE-UP   KAITLIN

  She turns back toward him - is about to answer - stops as she sees something.

  CLOSE INSERT

  A New York to Boston shuttle ticket envelope sticks out of the breast pocket of his overcoat.

  BIG CLOSE-UP   KAITLIN

  She looks up at Galvin - a long, long look as it all begins to sink in.

  BIG CLOSE-UP   GALVIN

  He moves up into a CHOKER - finally;

  GALVIN

  Will you help me?

  BIG CLOSE-UP   KAITLIN

  Near tears, she looks at Galvin. Finally the scene;

  DISSOLVES OUT:

  This is truly a cinematic sequence in the modem sense—a sequence of mental movement. Both minds are working and the viewer’s mind works with them. Only the final question deals directly with the substance of the scene, but the viewers, who fully understand the lawyer’s need and the nurse’s predicament, follow the working of her mind as she silently deciphers the implications of the shuttle ticket. The viewers empathize with both characters, and though the nurse’s decision is withheld in the scene (it would be counter-dramatic at this point) they know she will show up in court, and they look forward with hope and apprehension to that appearance. The filmmakers have supplied the background and the need; now they permit the viewers to live through the crucial scene with the people on the screen. Like all good drama it is subtle, suspenseful, and inevitable.

  In all these examples the viewérs are allowed, encouraged, to supply their own interpretations and descriptions, in their own words, of what they see. They need not know the definition of paranoia, or even the word itself, to recognize the basis of Queeg’s behavior; they need never have met Ginny to instantly have more of an inkling of her character; and they need never have been to Boston or New York to recognize the complete meaning, in this particular situation, of an air shuttle ticket.

  Spoon-feeding viewers to make sure they get your, and only your, version of the message results in mediocrity. It may require some suppression of the ego, but creating a scene that offers the viewer a sense of discovery and involvement is certainly most desirable.

  Finally, another of the filmmaker’s collaborators who can contribute creatively to the “auteur’s” benefit is the actor.

  12

  Auteurs, Actors, and Metaphors

  In most successful motion pictures, the director seeks the creative contributions of the cast Here, on the set of Raintree County, an M.G.M. film, the author discusses a scene with members of the cast, including Elizabeth Taylor and Montgomery Clift.

  The auteur theory, as defined by Andrew Sarris, is applicable to filmmaking practice. However, like most theories of art forms (e.g., Stanislavsky’s on acting) it has bred ridiculous and dangerous excesses. Many young directors now use it as a justification for self-indulgent, dictatorial attitudes, especially when working with actors, just as some insecure actors use a distortion of Stanislavsky’s “method” as a justification for self-indulgent ego trips when working with their fellows.

  The current truth is that good filmmakers, with rare exceptions, reject the concept of sole creativity; while retaining control, which eliminates the manifest shortcomings of corporate thinking, they welcome the actors’ creative contributions. John Huston has said, “In a given scene I have an idea what should happen, but I don’t tell the actors. Instead, I tell them to go ahead and do it. Sometimes they do it better. Sometimes they do something accidentally which is effective and true. I jump on the accident.” He might have added that not infrequently the “effective and true” contributions are not accidental, but the results of original thinking. And while such contributions carry less weight in those first category films which depend largely on camera effects and technical contrivance, they are vital to the optimum realization of the characters in any film of the second category.

  All scripts suffer from an inherent deficiency which is largely ignored or, unhappily, deemed an advantage; a film’s characters are first developed by the writer, and they inevitably reflect some aspect of the writer’s persona. It is impossible to create a group of completely authentic individuals—good, bad, or in between—when each is fashioned in the author’s image, is an echo, however faint or distorted, of some facet of the author’s being. Such characters are clonal versions of a single mind rather than the unique personalities they would be in reality.

  The problem of character construction is further compromised when the film reaches the shooting stage. Auteurs who insist that characters be shaped only on the basis of the auteurs’ interpretations of personal or vicarious experiences surely diminish the range and richness of their work. The film’s characters can be fully realized only if the filmmaker takes advantage of the creative talents of those who must ultimately be those characters—the actors in the film.

  The writer’s script and the director’s guidance can qualify the actor’s interpretation, but they should not confine his intuition. The truth is that a good script is seldom ambiguous, and there are usually few differences of interpretation between writer, director, and actor concerning the character’s broader aspects. But in the search for inner nuances and points of view which can be transformed into pertinent mannerisms and individualized attitudes and reactions, each actor, given the freedom to create, will add his unique persona to his film character. The director who encourages such creativity will find himself in command of as many fundamentally different characters as there are actors. On the other hand, the player who apes, or is forced to ape, the director’s “vision” is rarely at ease with his screen character, and the camera’s impartial eye will faithfully record his discomfort and pretense to the detriment of his performance and the film.

  None of the foregoing should be interpreted as an abandonment of the director’s responsibility. He is always the “yea or nay sayer,” the amplifier, the refiner, the particularizer; the final decisions are always his. If he cedes some creative initiative in the area of performance, he does so in the interest of greater character depth and believability.

  Although it is to be expected that filmmakers should differ in

  On location in the French Alps, the author and Spencer Tracy discuss a scene from The Mountain, a Paramount Pictures film.

  their approaches to directing, to script “doctoring,” and to working with actors, the rather surprising truth is that, broadly speaking, their approaches to the technical methodology of filmmaking are remarkably similar. Huston’s method was neither original nor uncommon, and the more secure the filmmaker the more willing he is to consider an examination of a player’s point of view.

  On their part, experienced screen actors know that they, too, must surrender something to the director; they must give up “acting” as they learned it in drama school or in the theater. Restraint is the key to superior film performance, and knowledgeable actors are aware that directors have at their disposal a number of tools and techniques that help them to realize less “managed,” more honest, more subtly defined human beings by freeing them from the necessity to strain their voices or to exaggerate their physical movements and facial expressions as they labor to delineate their roles.

  The manipulation of lighting, lenses, lens filters, and camera movement can sharpen or diffuse the texture of the actor’s skin, emphasize or soften the angularity of her features, lend menace or compassion to his gaze, and relieve him of the burden of excessive or unnecessary reaction. For inst
ance, a scene requires the actor to maintain a poker face while receiving some shattering information, yet the viewer must realize that the apparent absence of emotion is not due to a lack of awareness or sensitivity. A very slow dolly or zoom-in from close shot to close-up will convey the sense of heightening, of the building of inner emotion, even though the actor’s face and eyes show no reaction at all.

  Sound manipulation can magnify a murmur into a roar or enable an actor’s honest whisper to reach the viewer. And cutting can accentuate, even create, changes in physical pace or rhythm, thus eliminating the necessity for exaggerated or artificial movement, and furnish the surgical means for excising imperfect performances or undesirable appearances. In short, the actor does not have to “act” the character; he can “be” it normally and let the skill of the director and the crew dramatize it as they will.

  It could almost be said that the film was bom to glorify the metaphor, and under the constraints of the censor filmmakers once created metaphors in plenty. But most modem directors, with their proclivity for reality and the explicit, are not even aware of the potential of this remarkable artifice. A pity! Aside from relieving the actors of some difficult and talky scenes, as well as occasional

  If the set-up is good, the best shot in the arsenal can be one of no reaction at all. Close-up of Jack Lemmon in Missing, a Universal Pictures/Polygram Pictures film.