Movie Makers (Jan-Dec 1949)

292 16mm. scenes by Rockville Cinema Club A TYPICAL SEQUENCE, involving conlinuity device of action and reaction, is pictured above. Medium shot establishes girl fishing stream; semi-closeup of owner reveals that the stream is posted; next three scenes resolve conflict, with last scene a transition to new action. SHOT AND SEQUENCE Motion pictures are built of related bricks, just as you put together a building, says this instructor in film continuity DAVID A. ENGLANDER THE experienced cine cameraman knows that getting correct exposure and focus is only the beginning of movie making. He must also learn the technique of how to build up a movie theme. For a movie maker who knows how to expose film, but does not know the simple principles of motion picture construction, is like a would-be artist who has the right brush stroke but is ignorant of perspective, proportion and harmony. The artist will splash a lot of paint on canvas without achieving any sort of composition; the cameraman will shoot scenes all over the place without creating a related motion picture. In a phrase, the cine shooter must understand not only his movie camera — but his movie medium as well. This thought is basic in the training of any movie maker and is strongly stressed at the New Institute for Film & Television where I teach. The good cameraman, professional or amateur, need never write a movie script. But he must know the elements that go into constructing a connected movie. The word "construction" is used intentionally. For a motion picture is something put together or built up out of long shots, medium shots, closeups, reestablishing shots and a whole variety of in-between shots arranged in smoothly connected sequences. As such, each sequence is a complete unit of the picture, telling its own story as far as it goes. But it must also be joined with other sequences in the film to tell a complete movie story. It is rather like the wall of a building. The wall can stand by itself; but it must be joined with other walls to create a building. The shots within the sequence can be compared to the building blocks of a wall. Like them, they must be carefully mortised and cemented together to make a well rounded sequence pictorially. What are these movie building blocks? First, there is the foundation stone, or establishing shot, which identifies the subject in relation to its setting. It is often a long shot, but not always. We do not need a long shot to establish a housewife in her kitchen busy at her stove; it would be appropriate, however, for establishing the apartment house in which she lives. The typical medium shot builds on the establishing shot and carries us closer to the subject. It is both a working scene and a transition shot for scenes to follow. In the case of the housewife, for instance, once the establishing shot locates her in the kitchen, the medium shot would then exclude just about everything in the scene but her and the stove. Our next step in building up the sequence is the closeup. This is the dramatic and story telling scene of motion picture continuity, or construction. Excluding all extraneous material, it concentrates the attention on a single point of interest. These basic movie building blocks have all sorts of variations whose names are self explanatory: extremes like extreme long shot or extreme closeup, compromises like medium long shot and medium close shot, precisely limited ones such as the full [Continued on page 313]