Film Lecture Series #4 - Time & Storytelling + Film Review.

Recap:  Linear storytelling is where there is no time displacement and keeps with a consistent reality of always moving forward with the plot and keeping with the linear time of the film. There are also no Flashbacks/forwards within the linear narrative of the film.

Non-linear storytelling is where the plot jumps backwards and forwards in time. So an event that has already happened could be retold in the present, for example The Titanic starts with meeting the lead character Rose as an old women with the dive team and then she retells the story of when she was young in the past on the Titanic, only to then finish back with the older Rose with the reaction of the dive team.

With Non-Linear storytelling comes reality framing, this can be where the story starts in one place and then you ‘go’ back in time where the event is retold; to then go forward in time to where the story started. An example of this can be seen in Forrest Gump where he goes through his life story to strangers on a bus stop bench; with this you pop in and out of flashbacks with the lead character, which then helps frame the story line as Forrest acts as a narrator to the flashbacks that are happening on screen. Another example of this can be seen in the Princess Bride where they frame the reality of the grandfather reading to his grandson a fantasy story, with then cutting to the fantasy plot of the book the grandfather is reading; creating a story within a story making it a metanarrative as it is a film that references its self.

Flashbacks/forwards can be over used and sometimes can be a way to give ‘cheap’ information to the audience and can be considered as ‘lazy’ story writing, but the main purpose of flashback is to take the audience out of the reality, slow the pacing of the film and can stop you from using more creative techniques to give info. They can also be effective when they support the core narrative and are made in a creative refined manner; such as the opening scene in the film Up (2009) where that silent montage gives you all the information you could need about the lead character Carl Fredricksen.

Hooks and twists are just as important in a non-linear narrative as they can add intrigue and help draw the audience in to what they are watching. Twists also help add drama within a cinematic as it then changes the audience’s perception of what is going on, for example in murder mystery TV shows the creators lead you to believe its one character, but it turns out to be the unassuming character the audience never took any note of.

Ten Plot Twist Categories

Red Herring – All clues lead to the wrong suspect.

Chekhov’s Gun – Every detail of the story is vital to audience comprehension

Flashback -

-In media res – ‘Starts in the thick of it’ – e.g. in the middle of a fight scene.

-Reverse Chronology – Story Flashbacks.

- Non-linear Narrative – Reveal plot details in Flashback.

Eucatastrophe – Everything suddenly goes right.

Peripeteia (Peripety) – Major narrative U-turn – starts going down once line of narrative and then does 180 goes off down a completely different route e.g Dust til Dawn.

Deus ex machina – Sudden or illogical stop to a narrative.

Anagnorisis – Internal change in understanding – E.g. in a character or story.

Poetic Justice – Death by own device – e.g. a villain is killed by their own invention.

Unreliable Narrator – Narrator as truth, meaning you don’t know if the story is being told is true, so the narrator could be lying to make the audience believe that what is said is true – E.g. Fight Club (1999) and Cabinet of Dr Caligari (1920).

False Protagonist – Not what the narrative is telling what he is.

 

Breaking the Forth Wall and Stream of Consciousness.

Another technique used in some films is where the narratives break the ‘Forth Wall’ and ‘talk’ to the audiences as if they could respond to the characters. With these scenes you hear the characters inner thoughts, them explaining the world, and suspension of disbelief and ‘hanging the lantern’ – where the characters lets the audience know that they know like in The Wolf of Wall Street (2013). Examples of breaking the ‘forth wall’ include Ferris Buellers Day Off (1986) and Deadpool (2016).

Time and Editing:

Time and editing are also key in narrative structure as it helps the film come together in a coherent manner with narrative timing and scene flow and allows the editor to create meaning from cuts. For example, The Kuleshov Effect by Lev Kuleshov; is a film editing montage/effect that is a mental phenomenon in which viewers derives meaning from the interaction of two sequential shots, rather than from a single shot in isolation. As seen below where the first image is of a man but the second image will then denote the emotion in the image that follows.

Montage Cinema is also another form of editing to condense a length of time to show progression with a film. E.g. the Rocky Films – the montage shows the training process, before they can’t fight and after the montage they now can.

Thematic Groups are also useful as they can group people together and show a timeline of events in their lives and rather than through flashbacks. E.g. TV Show Stranger Things.

Non-linear films use a collection of these techniques mentioned above to tell it’s story.

Non-Linear Narrative - Building blocks:

Chronicle: Linear storytelling

Retrograde: Events in reverse order

Zigzag: Jumping between events (same period).

Analepsis: Flashbacks

Prolepsis: Flash-forwards

Syllepsis: Thematic groups connecting narrative

Achrony: Randomly ordered events

 

Non-linear Storytelling: Rejection of the Form:

Films that reject the traditional narrative structure (linear and non-linear) and often the film end where they start. Such as in Run Lola Run (1998) where the story restarts it’s self-three times before we see a conclusion/resolution to the film. Another would be Pulp Fiction (1994) where Tarantino jumps the audience in and out of different mini plots within narrative, ultimately leading the audience back to the beginning of the film in the diner where the film initially started.

Film Review: Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind (2004).

Written and directed by Michel Gondry comes the romantic sci-if drama that is Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind (2004) the delves it the collective unconscious mind of lead character Joel Barish (Jim Carrey) as he under goes a procedure to erase his memories of Clementine Kruczynski (Kate Winslet) after their relationship deteriorates from a late night argument. The film explores arrange of non-linear filming techniques to retell the story of Joel and Clementine to the audience. (Fig 1. see below).

Fig 1. Eternal Sunshine Film Poster.

The Chronicle order of the film doesn’t follow the traditional sense of Linear storytelling. This is because the film starts at the end, although this isn’t noticeable till the audience are jolted back in time to when Joel remembers Clementine, but she doesn’t remember him. We soon learn why Clementine erased Joel – they argued and broke up – so Joel in spite goes through the same procedure. It could be argued that the middle section of the film – Act 2, when Joel’s memories are being erased (fig 2. see below) – flows in a sort of a reverse linear structure as it begins with the most recent memories of Clementine and then delves further into his psyche to when he first met Clementine and even before he met her when they are trying to ‘hide’ from the memory easer, when Joel’s becomes aware of what’s happening and wants it to stop.

Fig 2. Mind Eraser Machine.

In this sense it brings in the retrograde idea in to the cinematic as the film works in reverse order through beginning with the day after Joel’s memories are erased and then jumps back in time to before they were and the decision that then lead to Joel erasing his memories of Clementine. At first Joel in his childish mind may have done this to spite Clementine as she erased him first; but half way through the procedure he realizes he has made a mistake but has no power to stop it, as the mind easer machine has more or less incapacitated him, so even when he opens his eyes he’s not really awake as he can’t move. Giving the idea of a lucid dream as Joel becomes aware, he is reliving past memories and wishes to hold onto those moments in time.

This could be seen as the zigzag in the film where Joel jumps between his conscious mind and his collective unconscious as seen with the example above where they – clinic staff - are erasing his mind. Joel is able to ‘wake himself’ to break his steam of conciseness. This can be seen with the constant flickering between deleting Joel’s memories of Clementine to reality where he can hear the people supposed to be erasing his mind conversations about their past clients and them -Mary/Stan -mucking around and are not paying attention to the task at hand.

Analepsis can be seen throughout the film where there are flashbacks to Joel’s memories with Clementine before the erasure. This also combines with prolepsis -flash-forward in time- as the film starts in the media res; where film starts after the memories are erased. Making the film not make sense at first but begins to make sense the more the audience watch/get into the film. Come the end of the film is where the prolepsis comes into play as after the nights events has occurred the story then jumps back to the beginning of the film; when Joel wake up in his bed feeling groggy and proceeds to rush through the morning actions that occurred at the start of the film right up until Joel stops at Clementine’s apartment so she can grab her toothbrush before going back to his. Until this point the audience as already seen these events up to that point; anything after this then happening in real time within the film time frame.

The syllepsis of the film refers to the thematic groups within the story, in this case it would be the clinic characters that erase his mind. They all live different lives and we get a glimpse of that throughout the film -Patrick -falls for Clementine when he helps to erase her memories of Joel – Mary –  we see her fooling around with Stan, but really she was once in love with Dr Miezwiak and had her memories had been erased so she could continue to work at the clinic. But this didn’t erase her emotional connect to Dr Miezwaik – Stan – likes Mary but didn’t know how to come to terms with the fact Mary once liked Dr Miezwaik.

Achrony and clearly be seen within the film narrative as it shows the randomly displaced memories throughout the film. Especially seen in scenes where Joel escapes the memory eraser by going to younger memories of himself to get ‘off the grid’. These seen in a couple of scenes where ‘young’ Joel is hiding under the kitchen table, when bullies are pressuring him to hit a dead bird with a hammer and awkward teenage moments. In between those you can see Joel constantly going back to a past memories that have already been deleted; this can be seen where he’s in the office talking to Dr Miezwaik about the procedure to come. Creating this discord of events within the film as it jumps through Joel’s hyperconscious reality. (fig 3 and 4. see below).

Fig 3. Baby Joel. 

Fig 4. Escape Awkward Teenage Moment.

Illustration List:

Fig 1. Eternal Sunshine Film Poster. (2004) [Film Poster, Advertisement] At: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0338013/mediaviewer/rm2954530560/  (Accessed: 25/11/2020)

Fig 2. Mind Eraser Machine. (2004) [Film Still] At: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0338013/mediaviewer/rm3895200512/   (Accessed: 25/11/2020)

Fig 3. Baby Joel. (2004) [Film Still] At: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0338013/mediaviewer/rm2686322432/   (Accessed: 25/11/2020)

Fig 4. Escape Awkward Teenage Moment. (2004) [Film Still] At: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0338013/mediaviewer/rm3071971072/  (Accessed: 25/11/2020)