I wouldn't agree with the expressive/neutral distinction offered in one of
the posts, because, for example, expressing the power of a character by
filming them from below can also be considered a convention, since the same
thing could be expressed in a different way. The form/content distinction
doesn't work either. A convention is simply an either form- or
content-related (or both) aspect or element of a film which has over time
come, by unspoken "consensus", and is generally held to mean something more
or less specific. A cliché however, unlike the term convention which is
neutral in a value sense, has a strong negative connotation, as a convention
which is perceived as having been used too much. So a convention can at some
point come to be seen as a cliché and in order for something to be a cliché,
it must first be a convention. In other words, every cliché is a convention,
but not every convention is a cliché. (Or, as they always told us in school:
Every communist is a partisan, but not every partisan is a communist. I hope
I got this right.) It seems to me though, that only those conventions which
have an expressive function can come to be seen as clichés, since, as
somebody has already pointed out, putting credits at the beginning or the
end of the film can never become a cliché. Of course, it's a matter of
context, so something which was a purely inexpressive convention at a
certain time can become a cliché later, as with the iris in silent film and
later in commercials, but that's because it has in the meantime acquired an
expressive function.
Anja
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