Continuity Editing in the Opening Scene of Drive

N.B. the scene I am referring to can be found here - http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xqei6w_drive-opening-scene-gateway_shortfilms

“Editing supported by specific cinematic strategies and mise-en-scene, was used to ensure narrative continuity” (Bordwell 1993 p 15). The influence of editing on the narrative continuity is seen in the opening sequence of Drive, which eshews the typical bombastic car chase scene, for an altogether more focused and character centric take on a getaway scene.

During the opening scenes of the film Drive, the audience is given an instant insight into the focus of the entire film, the mysterious character of the Driver, who throughout the piece, is in total control.

Rythmically, the editing emphasizes the character’s control. In terms of the overall rhythm of the piece Bordwell argues that a steady metrical pace can be obtained by making all of the shots approximately the same length” (Bordwell 1993, p10). This is certainly true of the opening scene of Drive, which sees two distinct rhythmic patterns deployed effectively with shots in the 2mins 40 typically lasting around 4 seconds (with slightly longer added to the facial close ups). This pacing significantly changes when the helicopter appears and the driver applies the accelerator, leading to a number of fast 1-2 second cuts. In this case, the rhythm of the editing is matched by the action on screen, and the character’s control over it (through the car).

Although the opening sequence is told in a linear fashion, so that the editing does not jump in terms of temporality, it involves a complex use of shots. Unlikely fairly run of the mill getaway scenes where the main focus is on the action of the car chase shot from outside of the car, this has a highly personalized feel to it, with the main focus being the cold, mysterious protagonist, showing a total mastery of his own emotions in the face of stress, in a modern day example of how the Kuleshov effect may be employed. This is done through the repeated use of hyper close up shots of the protagonist in the car, focusing on his emotions (or lack thereof), and the frequent use of gaze matching shots. Furthermore, the use of shots showing the protagonist through the rear view mirror, emphasise the “mutation from seeing subject to seen object”, in that the protagonist is watched by others (the police).

In terms of action, we can perhaps split the scene into two broad sections, the section where the car is stationary, and the section after the car begins to move, and with this in mind we see the use of extreme close ups and POV shots which suggest

During the opening minute we are presented with a great deal of close up shots of the driver in profile looking off screen, followed by eyeline matches of the Driver to establish a sense of place. This is employed 4 times in the opening minute. Certainly one could say that through the sequence of close ups and gaze matching, the Kuleshov effect could easily be applied. The Kuleshov effect argues that only through the editing can the audience infer a sense of spatial locale, particularly when there is an absence of an establishing shot (Bordwell 1993, p12).  The protagonist in question rarely shows any discernible emotion, giving very little indication to what is going on in the sequence on there own, however, in the context of other shots, we are aware of what is going on. Furthermore, there is not real sense of an establishing shot in the sequence until the 8^th shot in the sequence, which is from the character’s POV, establishing that we are outside of a compound.

Although Noel Carroll argues that the Kuleshov experiment is not coherent with POV editing, as “the Character’s face is not …emotionally amorphous, merely awaiting emotive shaping from ensuing shots”, (Orpen 2003, p29) there is an argument to say that the principle of the Kuleshov effect – “that POV shots do not necessarily reveal what the character is thinking” (Orpen 2003, p30).  Certainly we can see that an interest is piqued in the driver, but emotionally, the film seems to be at pains to say that this is a person who is mysterious, cold, and lacking emotion. In that sense, it is difficult to see how the Kuleshov effect could not work in this situation.

Once the car has moved the editing moves towards an even greater use of close ups and gaze matching shots. Frequently we see close ups of the Driver’s emotionless face concentrating on the road ahead, to the right of the frame, often followed by a point of view shot looking out onto the road through the windscreen. This is used a total of 16 times once the car has started moving. As we see the police helicopter come into view, the close ups begin to change angle, preferring a more front on angle followed by a point of view shot of the driver, to perhaps give emphasis to the fact that he is the man under surveillance, he is being pursued, and perhaps framed as the police might frame a suspect in an issued photo.

Again the use of extreme close up shots does not exactly follow conventional patterns of continuity editing in terms of the pacing of the shots. One might expect a wide establishing shot to be lingered on for a great length of time and close up shots to be for shorter spaces of time (Bordwell 1993 p16), however, in the Drive sequence the hyper close up shots are frequently lingered on for a number of seconds longer than one might normally expect, again emphasizing the driver as the focus of the on screen action.  The editing here, as discussed previously, provides our frame of reference for what is happening in the scene, with the close ups followed by eyeline match/POV shots that ‘create’ the narrative, which otherwise would be unclear.

One final key aspect of this opening sequence is the aspect of graphic matching between cuts. In adapting an almost film noir take on mise-en-scene composition (particularly in the use of mirror and low lighting), between all shots, as an audience the editors have ensured the narrative continuity as mentioned by Bordwell.

References

David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson, 'The Relation of Shot to Shot: Editing' in David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson, Film Art: An Introduction 4th ed. (New York: University of Wisconsin Press/McGraw Inc., 1993)

Extract from Valerie Orpen, Film Editing: The Art of the Expressive (London: Wallflower, 2003)

The Genre Film

The idea of Genre in film is one that is shifting and not well defined. Certainly, when considering what makes a ‘Genre Film’, it may seem at first particularly easy to focus on certain stylistic or iconographic aspects of the film, but a closer inspection reveals certain problems with this means of analysing film. For Andre Bazin the Genre film centres around the idea of ‘the myth’, and in describing the Western as the ‘American Film par Excellence’, he focused on the universal, the popular notion of good versus evil (Hutchings, 1995, p62). Furthermore, Bazin focused on the changing nature of the Westen Genre, noting a 30s classical perfection that then led to Baroquish tendenceies, thus highlighting the important aspect of genre theory, that in terms of the time in which it was produced, the important aspect is not the production process, but rather what the Western is saying about society itself in that period (Hutchings, 1995 p62). Warshow also posits a similar line, that the most important aspect of a ‘Genre Film’ is its cultural and historical specificity (Hutchings, 1995, p63). However, more recent writing on the notion of Genre (Grant 2006 p4-10) has placed a little more emphasis on the conventions (such as the mise-en-scene or narrative flashbacks), setting (i.e. space being a sci-fi), and iconography (pinstripe suits and hats in the gangster film), in defining genre (Grant, 2006, p10-12).  Significantly, this structuralist view of film focuses on how these certain feautres produce meaning in the film on the part of the audience, who expect to see certain aspects of a genre film as part of their cultural consensus.

If the definition of the Genre is based around the audiences expectations rather than the cultural and historical specificity of the film, then it is necessary for us as critics to try to understand where this consensus on genre conventions come from. How did we know that the bad guy in a Western always dressed in black, or that the pinstripe suit was the uniform of the Italian-American wise-guy gangster? Received knowledge of film from media outlets, discussion, study and word of mouth surely plays a part for the modern day viewer, as well as the fact that nowadays, the viewer would feel that a Genre film had broken the “implicit contract” (Grant, 2006, p21), that we expect of a film were these aspects not there.  Certainly with Genre films such as the Gangster film or the Sci-fi film a huge part of the draw of the film is the satisfaction in the production and recognition of these genre conventions. However, returning to the problem of definition, Genre theory, would again struggle to identify how these expectations have developed. Perhaps then it is necessary to return to the idea of ‘the myth’ in film being the key aspect of genre, as asserted by Bazin. Certainly, we can see the idea of good versus evil as key to Westerns, however, the problem here is two-fold, firstly that this idea is too general to be considered relevant to the Western genre (since this idea of good versus evil can be seen in sci-fi epics e.g Star Wars), and that the idea of who the good guy and the bad guy is doesn’t always translate culturally.

In terms of Genre theory, I think that it is easier to say which film belongs to a Genre, rather than to define the Genre itself. Certainly the nature of the Genre shifts and is subject to cultural and societal influences, but I think on a personal level, the idea of genre is more useful in providing a shorthand for describing a film to other potential viewers than it is for providing any real critique. Furthermore, the nature of Genre in terms of film, as well as other art forms such as music, is ever changing, and more and more I believe to driven by the commercial pressures of marketing and finance. Films such as The Expendables easily fit into the ‘Big budget action’, and ‘The Avengers Assemble” fit into superhero films, and ‘Paranormal Activity’ into the horror genre often because Marketing executives promote them as such. In fact, even when considering films such as ‘Let the Right One In’, we may reflect on how marketing and commercial interests strip down the original genre fluidity of the film into a more palpably ‘Horror’ film, in order for the average horror film goer to quickly engage with the piece. Furthermore, when films are deemed to be 'genre busting', quickly we will see radio and newspaper coverage positing the creation of a new 'genre', often made up as a hybrid of two existing ‘genres’, in order to communicate effectively what you are going to spend your money on. While this is a commercial driven critique of genre theory in film, that is not to say that the audience does not participate in this. Certainly, if the potential viewer had no idea what a horror film was, it is unlikely that the description will produce any reaction at all. In this sense, the marketeers of film rely on the viewers own personal experience of film.The audience watches a film, is then being told it is a horror through media outlets, which solidifies and simplifies the viewer’s own perception of the film. This is then played on in the marketing of new films in that ‘genre’ thus creating reinforcement of the genre construct and a film classification feedback loop.

References

Peter Hutchings 'Genre Theory and Criticism' in Joanne Hallows and Mark Jancovich, eds., Approaches to Popular Film (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1995)

Barry Keith Grant, Film Genre: From Iconography to Ideology, (London: Wallflower, 2006)

Lynch, Auteurism, and the Myth of the Author

David Lynch's directorial films such as, Wild at Heart, Blue Velvet and Mulholland Drive offer us good examples for discussing the difficult subject of the author in Film. From watching and experiencing films such as these, the audience may often be able to pinpoint the very 'Lynch' like qualities of the film, which as we know, boil down to some rather glaring stylistic qualities that are shared between his films. Noticably the juxtaposition of jarringly different music in the opening scenes, melodrama, hyper close up shots (showing some sort of imagery) are some aspects that we may decipher to be very Lynch-like. This focus on the 'autuer-structuralism'' (Crofts 1998, p89) may give rise to the idea that these stylistic decisions might imbue on Lynch the position of an author. This is however a false assumption. Particularly, the elevation of the director of the piece disempowers the 'authorship' of say the set designer, scriptwriter or the producer in the collaborative process of film-making, in the sense that the director cannot fully control the individual's organic interpretations of the original piece of film writing, based on their own cultural, creative and societal skills, experiences and beliefs. Sure, a director may well modify the product of these, criticise and harmonise these together, but he does not have ownership of the crew's thoughts and ideas in relation to the concept or idea. As Croft posits, the challenge to Autheur theory is the idea of communication, and that later theory has criticized the idea of a "transcendental subject in full control of the meanings she or he somehow directly communicates to the reader". (Crofts 1998, p.89) Furthermore, as I personally watched clips from Lynch directed films, I noticed a number of significant differences in the pieces (particularly when considering Inland Empire), where opening credits were removed, human faces were blurred out, and the lack of a jarring juxtaposition of the narrative, and music. What we see to be structural authorship, based on clear similarities between work, is actually a rejection of the problem of difference in the acceptance of homogeneity through the director. Perhaps, though, as argued by the writers of Cahiers du Cinema, the authorship lies in the pure aesthetic of the mise-en-scene - in essence the 'style' of the piece. I think that in considering this standpoint, it must not be forgotten that, the Cahiers' point of view was inherently political (To elevate film into the same landscape as fine art), in describing the similarities between art forms asserting that as much as the painting has an creator, the film therefore must have an author - the director. However, by limiting the film to the style of the mise-en-scene, we see then that the supposed author has appropriated and interpreted the idea, an idea that, prior to his interjection, was perhaps not his own. A tricky idea then is that of creation vs interpretation. For me, at the bottom line of authorship lies in the creation of the idea - surely the true author is the holder of the idea, the 'work', and therefore anyone who employs this idea interprets and influences the piece based on their own culture and experiences. This applies to the director, the producer, the scriptwriter. I firmly believe that there are no 'original ideas', since these ideas are formed out of our cultural and societal existence. Barthes' 'The Death of the Author' (1967, '77), implies that the focus should then be on the reader or audience, who populates the work with meaning, and this is true, in the sense that there never was, or has been an 'author' in the classical sense (Barthes, 1967, '77). So why do we continue to foster the myth of the director as the author, and particularly in reference to Lynch, why are there, Lynch 'fans'? I think the answer lies in the idea of belonging and expectation, based on a cultural reverence of the individual and the name. As Croft points out, the name David Lynch cannot be void of meaning, and taps into our semantic memory, providing associations and expectations of a piece of work he is attributed to. This point is further developed in Foucault's writings - "an author's name performs a certain role with regard to narrative discourse, assuring a classificatory function...It establishes a link between the texts."(Foucault, 1969, p.107). This is certainly true of Lynch, one cannot say the name David Lynch without bringing to mind a swathe of cultural and filmic references, often classified together. This however is the crux, of the matter, in that David Lynch himself is no longer the author of these films, but the works are appropriated by the audience to give reference to a single figure, rather than the author being the single owner of 'The Work'. In fact, the author is in fact a "projection...of the operations we force texts to undergo...the continuities we recognize"  (Foucault, 1969 s p.110).
The film going experience is said to be 'a suspension of belief', I believe that in the reverence of the director such as Lynch, we are trusting an almost God-like figure, who will deliver to us the pleasure of the satisfaction through the use of particular techniques, particular to the director's style of film making. The suspension of belief requires trust, and we place that in a person attributed to the film, often the director or perhaps even an actor. In essence the audience are the subjects and we place our faith, or even our love into the piece. Furthermore, since we are not only the subject of the film, but also the subject of marketing and advertising strategies, we are constantly reminded who directed the film that we enjoyed, and this is particularly focused around the cult of the individual. Since a film title is never the same twice, marketing strategies focus on the constant (the director), who, since the beginning of franco-american auteur theory, has been the predominant figure in film theory in the 20th century. This pre-occupation with the director is a cultural construct, based around our need to hang our beliefs on an individual that we trust, as we would a God, or perhaps in a Freudian sense, a Mother. This belief and trust in the individual director's creative influence on a piece of work, should not be confused with authorship however, as it is clear that the director can never be the sole creator of the moving picture as a piece of art.

References

Roland Barthes, 'The Death of the Author' (1967) in Barthes' Image, Music, Text. (Glasgow: Fontana 1977)

Stephen Crofts, 'Authorship and Hollywood' in John Hill and Pamela Church Gibson (eds.) The Oxfod Guid to Film Studies (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998)

Michel Foucault, 'What is an Author?' (1969) in Paul Rainbow (ed.) The Foucault Reader (New York: Pantheon Books, 1984)