CINEMATIC CODES
A film is never just a film.
A film is made up of images (visual, print, graphics) and
sounds (speech, music, sound effects).
It is always a re-presentation, made up of various signs which
are combined into codes.
For narrative films, the three central kinds of coding are:
Dramatic / Narrative Coding
Sociological / Historical Coding
Formal / Stylistic Coding
Dramatic/Narrative Coding:
What does the title signify/promise?
What are the major narratives?
Is the narration chronological?
Does the narrative flow smoothly, is it compelling, creating
an illusion of reality?
What are the main locations?
In what constellation are the characters grouped?
Which characters change/remain static?
How is change brought about, are characters socially determined?
How is the final outcome anticipated?
Is an alternative ending suggested?
Are all strands of the plot action resolved? (closure)
What are the oppositions at work in the film: men vs. women,
history vs. memory...?
What is the dominant polarity?
What conflicts does the film explore?
Which of these is central, which is marginalized (subplot)?
Sociological/Historical Coding:
What are the social groupings of the characters
(class)?
Which spheres are emphasized (private or public)?
Is the status quo criticized at any level?
Who 'wins' in the end, which interests triumph?
What image of society prevails ultimately?
Are there class antagonisms?
Are the relationships between characters a reflection or comment
upon the time the film was made?
What is the relationship between the time depicted and the time
the film was produced?
Is the outcome ambiguous or clear-cut?
Does it offer alternatives, is it oppositional or affirmative?
In what way does the film appeal to the spectator? What forms
of address does it use?
What kind of audience and what sorts of interests does the film
assume?
Do men influence narrative action more than women?
Is the female body a particular point of focus? Do women function
as objects of spectacle?
Are there suggested points of resistance in the film?
Formal/Stylistic Coding:
What genre is presented by the title?
What do ad campaigns etc. promise?
How does the title sequence lead us into the film? What sorts
of formal devices provide clues for what is to come?
What are the signals given in the first sequence?
Location and character: Which characters does the camera privilege?
Perspective: Whose look guides us? Does the camera follow a
particular character?
Dialogue/sound: Who speaks the first words and what do they
signify?
Is the sound diegetic or nondiegetic?
Camera movement/position: outside-inside, distance, stasis (long or short takes), angles
What does the editing of sounds and images do to influence our response?
Does it try to subvert our formal expectations?
Does the film quote other texts?
Does the film see itself as a window onto a realistic
realm or does it forward a sense of itself as a framed view
of things, i.e. as an artifice and a construction?
Does it use an open or closed form?
Open: Frame is de-emphasized, has a documentary
'snapshot' quality.
Closed: Frame is carefully composed, self-contained, and theatrical.
The frame acts as a boundary and a limit.
Does the film self-reflect, i.e. comment on itself as a fictional product?
© Eric Rentschler and Anton Kaes, used by permission.