Transcript The cinematic technique
The cinematic technique
Performer - Culture & Literature
Marina Spiazzi, Marina Tavella, Margaret Layton © 2012
The cinematic technique
1.
The cinematic technique
• The so-called ‘ cinematic ’ novelists of the 19 th anticipated the cinema .
century • They cultivated the camera-eye and camera movement , moving into their subjects.
from the city into the street, from the street into the house, and taking the reader from room to room.
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The cinematic technique
2.
The camera eye Film viewers tend to take the camera eye for granted and to accept its truthfulness.
Its perspective is close enough to the ordinary human vision to seem a transparent medium for the rendering of reality rather than an artificial system of signs.
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The cinematic technique
3.
The cinematic novelist
The cinematic novelist
deliberately renounces some of the freedom of representation offered by the verbal medium ; imagines and presents his materials in primarily visual terms ; has a power of visualisation similar to the visual effects typical of film.
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The cinematic technique
3.
A cinematic novelist: Thomas Hardy
Among Victorian novelists, Thomas Hardy anticipated the cinema in the choice of some techniques, as the last pages from his novel
Tess of the D ’Urbervilles
(1891) clearly show.
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The cinematic technique
4.
The wide, panoramic, aerial views
The wide, panoramic, aerial views Performer - Culture&literature
ways of introducing an action May be ‘bird’s-eye’
=
not too high, simply from elevated ground
The cinematic technique
4.
The wide, panoramic, aerial views
aerial views
‘
The city of Wintoncester , that fine old city, a foretime capital of Wessex, lay amidst its convex and concave downlands in all the brightness and warmth of a July morning
.
’ (Thomas Hardy,
Tess of the D ’urbervilles
, 1891)
The city is seen from above.
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The cinematic technique
5.
Zooming in
‘
The gabled brick, tile, and freestone 1 houses had almost dried off for the season their integument of lichen 2 , the streams in the meadows were low, and in the sloping High Street from the West Gateway to the medieval cross and from the medieval cross to the bridge, that leisurely dusting and sweeping was in progress which usually ushers in 3 fashioned market-day
. […]’
an old-
(Thomas Hardy,
Tess of the D ’urbervilles
, 1891)
The narrator focuses on some details of the city.
1.
gabled … freestone.
Munite di frontone, di mattoni, mattonelle e pietra da taglio.
2.
integument of lichen.
Tegumento di lichene.
3.
Ushers in.
Inaugura.
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The cinematic technique
6.
Low-angle shot
‘
Up this road from the precincts 4 of the city two persons were walking rapidly, as if unconscious of the trying ascent – unconscious through preoccupation and not through buoyancy 5 . They had emerged upon this road through a narrow barred wicket 6 in a high wall a little lower down. […]’
(Thomas Hardy,
Tess of the D ’urbervilles
, 1891)
The narrator looks at its subject from below.
4.
precincts.
Dintorni.
5.
buoyancy.
Esuberanza, allegria.
6.
wicket.
Cancelletto.
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The cinematic technique
7.
Close-up
‘
One of the pair was Angel Clare , the other a tall budding creature – half girl, half woman – a spiritualized image of Tess, slighter than she, but with the same beautiful eyes – Clare ’s sister-in-law, Liza-Lu . Their pale faces seemed to have shrunk to half their natural size.
[…] (Thomas Hardy,
Tess of the D ’urbervilles
, 1891)
The narrator identifies the characters and highlights their faces.
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The cinematic technique
8.
Panoramic view
‘When they nearly reached the top of the great West Hill the clocks in the town struck eight. Each gave a start at the notes, and, walking onward yet a few steps, they reached the first milestone , standing whitely on the green margin of the grass, and backed by the down, which here was open to the road . [...] ’
(Thomas Hardy,
Tess of the D ’urbervilles
, 1891)
The characters have a panoramic view of the city from the top of the hill.
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The cinematic technique
9.
Wide-panoramic view
‘From the middle of the building an ugly flat-topped octagonal tower ascended against the east horizon , and viewed from this spot , on its shady side and against the light, it seemed the one blot 7 on the city ’s beauty . Yet it was with this blot, and not with the beauty, that the two gazers were concerned
.
’ (Thomas Hardy,
Tess of the D ’urbervilles
, 1891)
The two characters have a wide view of the east horizon which includes the prison where Tess is waiting for her execution.
7.
blot.
Macchia .
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The cinematic technique
10.
Zooming in
‘
Upon the cornice of the tower a tall staff was fixed. Their eyes were riveted on it. A few minutes after the hour had struck something moved slowly up the staff , and extended itself upon the breeze. It was a black flag
.
’ (Thomas Hardy,
Tess of the D ’urbervilles
, 1891)
The eyes of the two characters zoom on the black flag announcing Tess ’s execution.
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