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| Preface | |
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| Picture Credits | |
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| Introduction to Film Analysis | |
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| Introduction | |
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| Cinema: A Confluence of Artistry, Industry, and Technology | |
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| How This Book Is Organized | |
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| Technical Tips | |
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| An Approach to Film Analysis | |
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| Understanding Audience Expectations | |
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| Expectations and Modes of Organization | |
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| Expectations about Genres, Stars, and Directors | |
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| The Orchestration of Detail | |
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| Motifs | |
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| Parallels | |
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| Details and Structure | |
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| Parallels in Openings and Closings | |
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| Structure and Turning Points | |
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| Repetition and Non-chronological Structure | |
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| Creating Meaning Through the World Beyond Film | |
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| Historical Events and Cultural Attitudes | |
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| Stars as References | |
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| Public Figures and Celebrities as References | |
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| Intertextual References | |
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| Avant-garde and Documentary References | |
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| Meaningful References with Objects | |
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| The Goal of Film Analysis: Articulating Meaning | |
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| The Importance of Developing Interpretive Claims | |
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| Summary | |
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| Film Analysis: Reading Significant Details | |
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| Historical References in Devil in a Blue Dress | |
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| Writing About Film | |
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| Getting Started | |
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| Keeping a Film Journal | |
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| Formulating a Thesis | |
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| Four Types of Writing About Film | |
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| The Scene Analysis Paper | |
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| "The Divided Human Spirit in Fritz Lang's The Big Heat" | |
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| The Film Analysis | |
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| The Anxieties of Modernity in Steamboat Bill Jr. | |
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| The Research Paper | |
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| The Evolution of an Idea: The Changing Hollywood Aesthetic in The Conversation and Enemy of the State | |
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| Works Cited (in the research paper) | |
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| Conducting Archival Research | |
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| The Popular Review | |
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| Film Analysis | |
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| Narrative Form | |
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| Defining Narrative | |
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| Framing the Fictional World: Diegetic and Non-Diegetic Elements | |
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| Within the Diegesis: Selecting and Organizing Events | |
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| Narrative Structure | |
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| Techniques in Practice: Narrative Structure in Stagecoach | |
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| Alternatives to Conventional Narrative Structure | |
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| Variations on Narrative Conventions: Beyond Structure | |
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| Perspective and Meaning | |
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| Character Subjectivity | |
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| Techniques in Practice: Noticing Shifts in Perspective | |
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| Summary | |
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| Film Analysis: Analyzing Narrative Structure | |
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| The Narrative Complexity of Rashomon | |
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| Mise en Scene | |
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| Setting | |
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| Describing Setting: Visual and Spatial Attributes | |
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| The Functions of Setting | |
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| Techniques in Practice: Same Film, Different Settings | |
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| Techniques in Practice: Same Setting, Different Film | |
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| The Human Figure | |
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| Casting | |
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| Acting Style | |
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| Acting Brechtian: Distancing the Audience | |
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| Actors' Bodies: Figure Placement | |
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| Techniques in Practice: Figure Placement in Citizen Kane | |
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| Actors' Bodies: Costumes and Props | |
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| Actors' Bodies: Makeup | |
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| Techniques in Practice: Physicality in Raging Bull and Ali | |
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| Lighting | |
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| Composition | |
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| Balance and Symmetry | |
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| Lines and Diagonals | |
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| Framing | |
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| Foreground and Background | |
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| Light and Dark | |
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| Color | |
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| Two Approaches to Mise en Scene | |
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| The Frame in Two Dimensions: Mise en Scene in German Expressionism | |
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| Combining Mise en Scene and Camerawork: The Frame in Three Dimensions in French Poetic Realism | |
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| Summary | |
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| Film Analysis: The Functions of Space | |
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| Spatial Oppositions in Thelma and Louise | |
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| Cinematography | |
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| Camerawork: The Camera in Time and Space | |
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| Creating Meaning in Time: The Shot | |
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| Altering Time: Slow and Fast Motion | |
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| The Camera and Space: Height, Angle, and Shot Distance | |
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| Camera Height | |
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| Camera Angle | |
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| Camera Distance | |
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| Camera Movement: Exploring Space | |
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| Horizontal and Vertical Movement | |
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| Movement in Three Dimensions | |
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| Techniques in Practice: Patterns of Camera Placement and Movement | |
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| Lenses and Filters: The Frame in Depth | |
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| The Visual Characteristics of Lenses: Depth of Field and Focal Length | |
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| The Zoom Lens | |
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| Combining Camera Movement and Lens Movement | |
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| Through the Lens: Filters and Diffusers | |
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| Techniques in Practice: Lenses and the Creation of Space | |
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| Film Stock | |
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| Characteristics of Film Stock | |
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| Light and Exposure | |
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| Film Stock and Color | |
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| Wide Film and Widescreen Formats | |
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| Processing Film Stock | |
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| Special Visual Effects | |
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| Manipulating the Image on the Set | |
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| Creating Scene Transitions, Titles, and Credits: The Optical Printer | |
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| Optical and Digital Compositing: Assembling the Elements of the Shot | |
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| Computer-Generated Images | |
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| Adding and Subtracting Frames | |
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| Digital Cinema: Post-Production | |
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| Digital Cinematography and Film Style | |
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| Summary | |
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| Film Analysis: Cinematography in Documentary Films | |
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| Cinematography in Two Documentaries | |
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| Editing | |
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| The Attributes of Editing: Creating Meaning Through Collage, Tempo, and Timing | |
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| Joining Images: A Collage of Graphic Qualities | |
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| Tempo | |
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| Shot Length | |
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| Shot Transitions | |
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| Adjusting the Timing of Shot Transitions | |
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| Techniques in Practice: Using Contrasting Imagery and Timing to Romanticize the Outlaws in Bonnie and Clyde | |
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| Story-Centered Editing and the Construction of Meaning | |
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| Editing and Time | |
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| Condensing and Expanding Time | |
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| Suggesting the Simultaneity of Events | |
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| Arranging the Order of Events | |
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| Editing and Space | |
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| Shot/Reverse Shot | |
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| Eyeline Match | |
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| Cutting to Emphasize Group Dynamics | |
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| Cutaways | |
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| Beyond Narrative: Creating Meaning Outside the Story | |
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| Continuity Editing: Conventional Patterns and "Bending the Rules" | |
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| Continuity and Space | |
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| Continuity and Chronology | |
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| "Breaking the Rules": The French New Wave and its Influence | |
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| Associational Editing: Editing and Metaphor | |
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| Soviet Montage | |
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| Techniques in Practice: Soviet Montage Aesthetics in The Godfather | |
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| Summary | |
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| Film Analysis: Classical Editing | |
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| Editing in Notorious | |
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| Sound | |
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| Film Sound: A Brief History | |
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| Critical Debates over Film Sound | |
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| Freeing Sound from Image | |
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| The Relationship Between Sound and Image | |
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| Emphasizing the Contrast Between Onscreen and Offscreen Space | |
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| Emphasizing the Difference Between Objective Images and Subjective Sounds | |
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| Emphasizing the Difference Between Diegetic Details and Non-diegetic Sound | |
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| Emphasizing the Difference Between Image Time and Sound Time | |
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| Emphasizing Differences in Image Mood and Sound Mood | |
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| Three Components of Film Sound | |
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| Dialogue | |
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| Text and Subtext | |
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| Volume | |
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| Pitch | |
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| Speech Characteristics | |
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| Acoustic Qualities | |
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| Addressing the Audience: the Voice-Over | |
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| Sound Effects | |
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| Functions of Sound Effects | |
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| Characteristics of Sound Effects | |
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| Techniques in Practice: Sound Effects and the Construction of Class in Days of Heaven | |
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| Music | |
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| Functions of Film Music | |
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| Five Characteristics of Film Music | |
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| Techniques in Practice: Bernard Herrmann's Score and Travis Bickle's Troubled Masculinity in Taxi Driver | |
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| Summary | |
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| Film Analysis: Sound and Language | |
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| Language, Nationality, and Class in The Grand Illusion | |
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| Alternatives to Narrative Fiction Film: Documentary and Avant-garde Films | |
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| Three Modes of Filmmaking: A Comparison | |
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| Documentary Film: "The Creative Treatment of Actuality" | |
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| Narrative Documentaries | |
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| Documentary Form | |
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| Voice of Authority | |
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| Talking Heads and Director-Participant | |
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| Direct Cinema | |
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| Self-reflexive Documentary | |
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| The Mockumentary | |
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| Ethics and Ethnography | |
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| Avant-garde Film | |
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| Surrealist Cinema | |
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| Abstract Film | |
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| Techniques in Practice: Interpreting Abstract Films | |
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| The City Symphony | |
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| Structuralist Film | |
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| The Compilation Film | |
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| Conducting Research on Documentary and Avant-garde Films: Locating Sources | |
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| Summary | |
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| Film Analysis: Interpreting Avant-garde Films | |
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| Analyzing Meshes of the Afternoon | |
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| Cinema and Culture | |
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| Social Context and Film Style | |
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| Hollywood's Industrial Context: The Studio System as Dream Factory | |
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| Classical Style | |
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| Economic Practice and Hollywood Convention | |
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| Censorship and Hollywood Convention | |
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| American Ideology and Entertainment | |
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| Reaffirming or Resisting Dominant Ideology | |
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| International Art Cinema | |
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| The Ideology of "Art" | |
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| Italian Neorealism | |
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| Third Cinema | |
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| Film and Ideology | |
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| Ideology and Film Analysis | |
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| Ideology and Film Spectatorship | |
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| Anti-Communist Witch Hunts and Hollywood Cinema | |
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| Racial Ideology and American Cinema | |
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| Gender and Cinema | |
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| Sexuality and Cinema | |
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| Disability and Cinema | |
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| Film Stardom as a Cultural Phenomenon | |
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| Stars and the Movie Industry | |
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| The Dynamics of Performance | |
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| The Star Persona | |
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| Stardom and Ideology | |
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| Stars and Subcultures | |
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| Fan Culture | |
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| Genre | |
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| What Makes a Genre? | |
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| Major American Genres | |
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| The Western | |
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| Film Noir and the Hard-boiled Detective Film | |
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| The Action Film | |
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| The Science Fiction Film | |
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| The Musical | |
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| Genre, Film Production, and Audiences | |
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| Genre Film and Aesthetic Appeal: Cliche or Strategic Repetition? | |
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| Genre and the Status Quo | |
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| Genres as Culturally Responsive Artifacts | |
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| Genre and Film Authorship | |
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| Film Authorship | |
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| The Idea of the Auteur: From Cahiers du Cinema to the Sarris-Kael Debate | |
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| Auteur as Marketing Strategy: Old and New Hollywood | |
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| Studio-era Auteurs: Welles and Hitchcock | |
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| Blockbuster Auteurs: Spielberg and Lucas | |
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| Using the Auteur Approach to Interpret and Evaluate Films | |
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| Readings in Auteur Criticism | |
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| Ousmane Sembene | |
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| Kathryn Bigelow | |
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| Ang Lee | |
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| Wong Kar Wai | |
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| Jafar Panahi | |
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| Cinema as Industry: Economics and Technology | |
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| The Changing Structure of the Film Industry | |
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| From Oligopolies to Conglomerates | |
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| Horizontal Integration and Synergy | |
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| Globalization | |
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| Industry Labor Practices | |
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| Outsourcing | |
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| Runaway Productions | |
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| Creative Centralization | |
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| Films as Products | |
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| The Blockbuster | |
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| The High Concept Film | |
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| Saturation Marketing | |
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| Independent Film Culture | |
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| Two Independent Institutions: Sundance and Miramax | |
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| Film and the New Technology | |
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| The Rise of the DVD | |
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| Film and Digital Technologies | |
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| Glossary | |
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| Bibliography | |
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| Index | |