Two more, effectively employed cases of off-screen space, complementary
perhaps to Noel Burch's classification of 6 segments.
1. In Bunuel's Viridiana, a bunch of officials walk forward staring
off-screen, ahead and upward amazed and stupefied. After holding the shot
for awhile, a sudden quick camera movement follows the direction on their
looks and reveals Don Jaime, hanged on a tree (after having committed
suicide).
2. In Kurosawa's Rashomon, after inciting "The Thief" and "The Husband" to
fight each other, "The Woman" appears on-screen in a close shot, watching
the fight, which takes place off-screen. Through her head movements and
facial expressions, the viewers is invited to imagine the fight.
Both case are analysed in detail, with story-boards, as instances of
employing the tension between on-screen and off-screen space as expressive
elements, in my book "Cinematic Expression" (not available in English)
Haim
----- Original Message -----
From: Warren Buckland
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: Monday, January 02, 2012 1:02 PM
Subject: [FILM-PHILOSOPHY] off-screen space
Someone already mentioned Noel Burch’s seminal study of off-screen space
(in his book Theory of Film Practice). Burch divides it into 6 segments –
the four spaces beyond each frame line, the space hidden within the frame
(this is the space Jose mentions when referring to Jaws), plus the space
behind the camera, which as far as I'm aware hasn’t been mentioned in this
discussion yet.
Also, it is important to point out that all films of course have off
screen space; the key is to identify films where it is employed effectively
or in an unusual manner. For example, a character may exit off screen right
but return (without a cut) to on screen space from off screen left. Either
they have walked behind the camera (therefore drawing attention to the
camera or the space in front of the image) or they have somehow moved from
right to left while hidden in the frame. In all cases, our expectations
about where characters are and what they are doing while off screen is
challenged. Both art cinema directors and directors like Spielberg
creatively manipulate off screen space in this way.
Jose also mentioned Youssef Ishaghpour's 90 page study of space and
narrative in Touch of Evil. I haven't read it, but I have read Stephen
Heath's ,er, 90 page study of space and narrative in Touch of Evil
(published in Screen in the 1970s). Has anyone read both?
Warren Buckland
Reader in Film Studies
Oxford Brookes University
Date: Sun, 1 Jan 2012 18:39:06 +0000
From: jose manuel Martins <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: Off-space
Hi all
By definition, the *natural* abode of the *supernatural* is off-screen
space: as the most obvious tour-de-force on its thorough invisibility,
*The
Blair Witch Project *(mostly the ending). Terror is enhanced through the
collusion of *Our* innermost off-screen space and *the Other’s*
innermost
off-screen space, turning two ‘*exteriors*’ into one and the same
*interior*:
thence, our helplessness.
*Jaws* is another perfect candidate: the Ocean conspicuouslly offers a
sort
of an *off-screen on screen* dimension; and the tension between deep
waters
horror (the Other’s space) coming onto the beach nearby (Our space) is
yet
another variation on the interior/exterior or nearby/away scheme.
As a (90 pages long) theoretical tour-de-force on *Touch of Evil* ’s
spacial and narrative structuring in terms of the *on and off
screen*quintessential
*noir* interplay:
Youssef ISHAGHPOUR
*Orson Welles cinéaste. **Une caméra visible* (Orson Welles the film
director: a visible camera)
[Éditions de la Différence, "Essais" coll., 2001. Vol.1: 600 pp., ISBN:
2-72911-32-58. Vol. 2: 300 pp., ISBN: 2-72911-32-66. Vol. 3: 300 pp.,
ISBN:
2-72911- 32-74],
*Vol.III, pp. 377-470*
**
As for comedy - ‘noir’ comedy -, *C’est arrivé près de chez vous* (
Dir.: Rémy Belvaux, André Bonzel, Benoît Poelvoorde - Belgium, 1992 ):
once again the (this time) unsettling comical effect being produced
through
our participation (as ethically responsible implied voyeurs) in the film’s
ostensive off-screen space, ocuppied by its direct addressees: the
camera
and the apparently detached team that goes along documenting the
atrocities
of a small criminal and big lunatic, who boasts to them looking at us.
José Martins
Dep. of Philosophy
University of Évora - Portugal
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