Understanding Focalization in Film: A Medium for Storytelling and Manipulation, Lecture notes of Voice

Download Understanding Focalization in Film: A Medium for Storytelling and Manipulation and more Lecture notes Voice in PDF only on Docsity! Media en Cultuur BA-eindwerkstuk, blok 4, 2016-2017 Yvonne van Beers, 5561655, y.j.f.vanbeers@students.uu.nl Begeleidend docent: dr. Chiel Kattenbelt Woorden: 7689 Inlever datum: 23-06-2017 Is she guilty after all, but we just did not notice? A study on how focalization in the film CLOSET LAND colors the information provided to the viewer of the film 1 Contents Abstract ...................................................................................................................................... 2 Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 2 Method ....................................................................................................................................... 6 Theory ........................................................................................................................................ 8 Table 1. Focalization of events in film ................................................................................. 13 Analysis .................................................................................................................................... 14 Discussion of the close readings ........................................................................................... 14 Ideology and theme .............................................................................................................. 19 Discussion ................................................................................................................................ 22 Bibliography ............................................................................................................................. 25 Attachment 1 - Close reading of three scenes of the film Closet Land ................................ 27 Scene 1, 0:00:00 – 0:05:00 ................................................................................................ 27 Scene 2, 0:39:35 – 0:50:50 ................................................................................................ 29 Scene 3, 1:17:45 – 1:25:55 ................................................................................................ 33 4 completely rely on the information about these events that we get from the characters. In the entire film there are only two characters, one of them is a female children’s book writer who wrote the story ‘Closet Land’, and the other one is a male interrogator. The interrogator tries to make the woman confess a crime she says she did not commit. He claims that the woman is a political activist who is planning to overthrow the government, and that the story ‘Closet Land’ has a lot of subliminal messages to influence the children who read the story. The woman claims that ‘Closet Land’ is just a children’s story about a child who is locked in a closet by her mother, and then starts to fantasizes that the clothes in the closet are her imaginary friends. The viewer later learns that the story ‘Closet Land’ is based on the real life of the woman. The woman was, in her mother’s closet, abused when she was a child, and she mentally escaped from the abuse by imagining that the clothes in the closet were living creatures which whom she would go on adventures with. The information the viewer gets about the time, the events prior to the interrogation, and ‘Closet Land’, is provided by either the interrogator or the woman. The information is mediated through a perspective, a character is providing the viewer information which is colored and/or incomplete, which makes it interesting to analyze focalization in the film and how focalization shapes the viewer’s experience of the film. Tatjana Jesch and Malte Stein say in their article “Perspectivization and Focalization: Two Concepts-One Meaning? An Attempt at Conceptual Differentiation” that for further research on focalization it could be better to speak of levels of focalization, depending on how strong a focalizer affects the information providing to the viewer.7 In CLOSET LAND, the interrogation situation and the blindfolding of one character might make one focalizer stronger than the other. This thesis will be in line with what Jesch and Stein describe in their article, and therefore focus on the strength of the focalizers in the film. The main aim of this thesis is to answer the following question: How does focalization in the film CLOSET LAND shape the viewer’s experience of the film? In order to answer this main question, the question is divided into three different questions, as a way to answer the main question step by step. These three questions are: What is focalization and how is it used in film? How does focalization relate to the range and depth of story information in film? How does the theme of the film affect the way the focalizers provide information to the viewer of the film? In this thesis, I will first do a literature review to get a better understanding of the concept of focalization in relation to information providing in film, and to form a model for the analysis 7 Tatjana Jesch and Malte Stein, “Perspectivization and Focalization: Two Concepts-One Meaning? An Attempt at Conceptual Differentiation,” in Point of View, Perspective, and Focalization: Modeling Mediation in Narrative, ed. Peter Hühn et al. (Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co, 2009 ), 76. 5 of the film. Secondly, I will use the information and model which I obtained from the literature review, to conduct a film analysis of the film CLOSET LAND. For the analysis of the film CLOSET LAND I will do a close reading of three different scenes of the film. I will select three scenes in order to limit my research, and I will base my selection of the scenes on elements of the narrative which are useful in close readings, described by Barry Brummett in his book Techniques of Close Reading.8 The analysis section will consist of an attached schema in which the close readings of the scenes are described, and a discussion of the findings of the close readings. Finally, I will give a brief discussion of how focalization shapes the viewers experience in the film CLOSET LAND, and give some recommendations for further research. 8 Barry Brummett, Techniques of Close Reading (Los Angeles: SAGE Publications, Inc., 2010), 52-65. 6 Method This thesis consists of two different parts, a literature review and a film analysis. First, I will do a literature review to get a better understanding of information providing in film, and in particular the concept of focalization. I will review literature concerning the concept of focalization to discuss the concept, what it entails, and how it could be used for the analysis. The theory will then provide me instruments to form a model for the analysis of the film. Secondly, I will use the information and model which I obtained from the literature review, to conduct a film analysis of the film CLOSET LAND. In the analysis I will investigate how focalization relates to the range and depth of story information in the film. According to Celestino Deleyto, focalization in film can be studied by analyzing the relationship between different focalizers, external and internal, and other elements which could affect focalization, like camera position, movement, and lighting.9 For the analysis of the focalization I will do a close reading of three different scenes of the film. For the selection of the three different scenes from the film, I will look at narrative elements Barry Brummett describes in his book Techniques of Close Reading as useful elements in close readings: coherence and sequence, tension and resolution, and alignment and opposition.10 I will look at the construction of the plot, and pay attention to situations that create expectations, tensions or resolutions, and/or alignments or oppositions. In order to limit my research, I select three scenes based on these elements for the analysis. In the analysis section I will explain my selection for each scene in more detail. To describe focalization in the close readings of the three different scenes, I am only going to look at the cinematography and sound techniques used in the scenes. Besides those techniques I will pay attention to the characters of the story, their facial expressions, body language, how they speak and what they say and do. This is a selection of elements I will look at in order to limit the analysis. To describe the cinematography and sound techniques, I will use the book Film Art: An Introduction by David Bordwell and Kristen Thompson. They explain that cinematography contains three different elements: the photographic aspects of the shot, the framing of the shot, and the duration of the shot. While working with the photographic aspects of the shot, a filmmaker is able to select a range of tonalities, manipulate the speed of motion, and transform perspective. In the analysis of this thesis, I will only focus on the photographic aspects of the shot which are related to the perspective. As for the second element 9 Celestino Deleyto, “Focalisation in Film Narrative,” Atlantis 13 (1991): 175-176. 10 Brummett, 52-65. 9 focalized is also human, his or her subjectivity could also affect the focalizer. The last facet of Rimmon-Kenan, the ideological facet, is often referred to as the norms of the text, the general system of viewing the world. Most of the time the norms are presented through the narrator- focalizer.19 In the analysis I will describe the information providing to the viewer in terms of the three different facets of focalization by Rimmon-Kenan. I will also make a distinction between external and internal focalizers, based on what Celestino Deleyto describes in his article Focalisation in Film Narrative. He says that in film, there can be several focalizers, both internal and external, in one shot or scene. The position of the focalization can shift from external to internal, when first a character is focalized from an external point, but later we see a shot that show where the character is looking at. Deleyto also describes that subjectivity in film is most of the times expressed without the complete disappearance of an external focalizer.20 Julian Murphet describes focalization in the chapter “Point of View” of the book Narrative and Media as the projection of the story through a point of view of a character. This character directs the narrative discourse, and shapes the viewers thoughts and perceptions.21 In this film, there are however shots that do not clearly derive from a character. David Bordwell describes in Narration in the Fiction Film that the character providing information to the viewer can be an actual character present in the story-world, or an invisible witness who is present in the story-world but not visible for the characters in the story-world. The camera lens can represent the eyes of a character or the invisible witness. The information providing from a character has to match or represent the eyes of the character, while the invisible witness could use more possible camera positions and angles to present information to the viewer. The witness is able to provide the viewer overall information of an event by showing the event from the outside.22 In the analysis of focalization, I will include Bordwell’s idea of the invisible witness as a possible focalizer in the story, in addition to the focalizers who are actual characters in the story-world. According to Richard Barsam and Dave Monahan, filmmakers use the camera to influence the viewers interpretation of the film’s meaning. The camera is a mediator between the staged story-world and the viewers eyes. The mediating always involves selection and 19 Rimmon-Kenan, 79-84. 20 Deleyto, 167-171. 21 Julian Murphet, “Point of View,” in Narrative and Media, ed. Helen Fulton et al. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 89. 22 David Bordwell, Narration in the Fiction Film (Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1985), 9-12. 10 manipulation of what will be in a shot and what not.23 Focalization depends on more aspects than just the visual perspective the camera establishes. Focalizers have certain thoughts, beliefs, and knowledge about events that affect the way they experience those events. In this thesis I will consider focalization to be the flow of knowledge a viewer experiences when watching a film, where the story-information provided to the viewer is restricted by a character or invisible witness. In the discussion of the findings of the close readings, I will describe how focalization affects the viewer’s experience of the film. Bordwell and Thompson describe in their book Film Art: an Introduction that the depth of knowledge the viewer has of a story changes during the development of the plot.24 Bal describes in Narratology: Introduction to the Theory of Narrative that the focalizer in a scene determines whether the viewer receives information less complete, just as complete or incomplete, or more complete than the character(s) within the story-world.25 Edward Branigan says in his book Narrative Comprehension and Film that when the viewer knows more than a particular character or the characters in a story, feelings of suspense or anticipation are created. When the viewer knows the same as the character(s), mystery is created and feelings of curiosity are aroused. When the viewer know less than the character(s), an event can cause a shock and feelings of surprise are created.26 How the story information is provided to the viewer can be described in terms of focalization, because the information is provided through a specific perspective, or focalizer. The focalizer is able to delay or withhold story information, or repeat story events, to provoke feelings of suspense, surprise, anticipation, and/or curiosity.27 In the discussion of the findings of the close readings, I will describe which feelings are provoked in the scenes, by evaluating the knowledge the viewer has at a specific time compared to the knowledge of a particular character or the characters in the film at that same time.28 The information provided to the viewer by the focalizer does not necessarily have to be reliable. Branigan says that a character is a subject with personality traits and a degree of subjectivity, and could therefore possibly be an unreliable information provider.29 A character 23 Richard Barsam and Dave Monahan, Looking at Movies: An Introduction to Film 3d ed. (New York, London: W.W. Norton & Company, 2010), 46-47. 24 Bordwell and Thompson, Film Art: an Introduction 8th ed., 88. 25 Bal, 160-161. 26 Branigan, 75. 27 Bordwell, Narration in the Fiction Film, 54-55. 28 Branigan, 75. 29 Branigan, 101. 11 in the story can be unreliable because of his limited knowledge, personal involvement, or a questionable value-scheme.30 An invisible witness, even though he does not take part in the event, does not always have to be completely objective. As said before, filmmakers use the camera to influence the viewers interpretation of the film’s meaning.31 Sometimes a filmmaker might reflect upon an event happening in the story-world through the invisible witness to influence or affect the viewers focus. An invisible witness has to rely on external cues, and does not know what a character actually experiences, and therefore his statements about an experience are always speculative.32 I will therefore also consider the invisible witness as a possible unreliable focalizer in the story. It is difficult to decide whether a focalizer is reliable or not, but if signs of unreliability are present, there is a higher chance that the focalizer is not completely reliable.33 The question of reliability will be included in the analysis of focalization, next to Rimmon-Kenan’s facets of focalization and Bordwell’s idea of the invisible witness as a focalizer, and will be addressed in the discussion of the findings of the close readings of the three scenes. The film CLOSET LAND is about political torture, and it depicts a dramatic representation of an interrogation situation. The interrogator in the film uses mental and physical abuse against the woman as a way to break her down, and make her confess crimes she did not commit.34 In the article “The worst scars are in the mind: psychological torture”, Hernán Reyes says that unpredictability and uncontrollability are two factors which come into play in interrogation situations. These two factors increase the stress experienced in a specific situation. While the interrogator wants to increase the unpredictability and uncontrollability, the victim seeks to predict behavior and try to gain control over a situation, in order to experience less stress.35 The theme of the film relates to the construction of the plot, in that the plot implies or presents story information according to the theme of political torture. The theme of the film affects the information providing to the viewer, and therefore helps to shape the viewers experience of the film. In the discussion of the findings of the close readings, I will relate the theme of the film to the information providing in the scenes, and how the theme of the film and focalization used in the scenes are related to each other. 30 Rimmon-Kenan, 57. 31 Barsam and Monahan, 46-47. 32 Branigan, 102. 33 Rimmon-Kenan, 103. 34 Radha Bharadwaj, Closet Land, directed by Radha Bharadwaj (USA: Universal Studios, 1991), DVD. 35 Hernán Reyes, “The worst scars are in the mind: psychological torture,” International Review of the Red Cross 89:867 (2007): 614. 14 Analysis In this section I am going to analyze focalization in three different scenes of the film CLOSET LAND. In an attached schema, I will divide each scene into different parts and describe what is going on in every part, describe the cinematography and sound techniques, and, with the use of table 1 of this thesis, also describe the different focalizers in the parts. According to Robert Stam the psychological facet of focalization often expresses a more overall meaning of a scene or sequence.37 Therefore, the perceptual focalization will be described for every part of the scene, while the psychological facet will be described more generally. The ideological facet will be separately discussed in the end of the analysis. The results of the close readings of the scenes will be discussed in the section below. Firstly, I will use the findings of the close readings to describe the information providing to the viewer in the three scenes. I will describe how the focalizers in the each scene affect the viewer’s understanding of the story, whether the focalizer is reliable or not, and how the focalization in the scene affects the viewer based on Branigan’s distinction of the viewer knowing more, the same, or less than the character(s) within the story-world.38 Secondly, I will describe the ideological facet of focalization, as described by Rimmon-Kenan, in relation to the theme of the film, and I will describe how ideology and the theme affect the viewers experience of the film. Discussion of the close readings The first scene I analyzed is the openings scene of the film from start till 0:05:00, in which the victim is blindfolded and taken into a room. More than half of the scene the viewer sees a black screen and only gets story information through conversations and other sounds. After that we get to see two characters in a room, who are not talking to each other.39 I selected this scene because it is the opening scene. This particular scene creates expectations about the story or upcoming events, and it starts to build up tension. In the beginning of the film the viewer is immediately drawn into the story, because the action starts right away. The voices we hear in the beginning of the scene give us indications about the characters and the space in which the characters are. We hear three different voices, one distorted man’s voice, a woman’s voice, and a more friendly man’s voice. The voices all sound echoing, which give the viewer an indication that the characters are probably in a 37 Stam et al., 91. 38 Branigan, 75. 39 Radha Bharadwaj, Closet Land. 15 spacious room with high ceilings. Through the conversation between the two men and the woman, the viewer finds out that the woman has limited knowledge about what is going on, which is based on what the woman is saying. Through what is said the viewer is also able to figure out that the woman is arrested. It is not explained to the viewer why the woman is arrested, which puts the viewer on the same level of knowledge as the woman, because she also claims to not know why she is arrested. In the beginning of the scene the viewer is perceptually focalized through the woman’s perspective, which we realize on the moment the blindfold is removed. This puts the viewer also in terms of seeing what is going on the on the same level as the woman. The first thing we get to see is a medium close-up of a man standing in a room, who then walks back into the room. This shot is in selective focus, which resembles how the human eye focusses on objects. It is another clue that we look through the eyes of the woman. The viewer gets to sees what the woman is seeing, and only gets to know what the woman knows about the situation, and because of that we become psychologically focalized through the woman’s perspective. The woman in the scene is involved in the story and a character with a degree of subjectivity. It is possible that the woman is not a reliable information provider, and she is lying to the interrogator.40 However, the woman is not the only focalizer in this scene, the viewer also gets perceptual information about the story-world through the invisible witness. When the woman is the perceptual focalizer, we see POV shot from the her perspective, which show us limited information about the story-world. When the invisible witness is the perceptual focalizer, we get to see the action through medium or long shots and from an outside position, and get a more overall view of the situation. The perceptual information through the invisible witness does not provide the viewer different or opposed information to what the woman gives us, which makes the woman seem like a reliable information provider. In terms of knowledge the viewer probably knows almost the same as the woman, which arouses feelings of curiosity and suspense about what is going on and what will happen next.41 Mieke Bal describes in Narratology: Introduction to the Theory of Narrative, that a character who focalizes the first and/or last scene is seen as the hero(ine) of the story.42 The woman is the strongest focalizer in the first scene of the film, both perceptually and psychologically, which puts the viewer in a position that we give her the most attention and feel the most empathy for her throughout the film, we view her as the ‘heroine’ of the story. 40 Rimmon-Kenan, 57. 41 Branigan, 75. 42 Mieke Bal, 148. 16 The second scene is the scene from 0:39:30 till 0:50:50 in which the victim, the woman, is blindfolded and introduced to a new interrogator and another victim. The viewer sees that the interrogator is deceiving the woman by pretending to be a new interrogator and another victim, while the woman is blindfolded and therefore not able to see what is going on.43 I selected this scene because in this scene the viewer gets to know more than the victim in the story. In this particular scene the story develops in a different direction than expected before, which makes what will happen next more unpredictable. Throughout the scene tension is build and expectations are created about what will happen next. In this scene the woman is blindfolded and therefore the viewer is mostly perceptually focalized through the interrogator and the invisible witness. These perceptual focalizers provide the viewer information about the story, but also strengthen to build the psychological focalization in the scene through the woman’s perspective. The viewer gets to see what is going on through tracking, panning, and tilting shots following the interrogator, and with close-up shots and medium close-ups of the woman’s face. The tracking, panning, and tilting shots put emphasis on what the interrogator is doing, and ensure that the viewer’s attention is focused on the interrogator’s actions. Close-up shots and medium close-ups provide the viewer visual information about the woman’s inner state. The moment when, for example, the interrogator pretends to be a new interrogator and other prisoner, medium shots of the interrogator are constantly alternated with close-up shots of the woman’s face. The viewer is able to read the discomfort on the woman’s face, while in the shots of the interrogator we are not able to do this. This heightens the psychological focalization, mainly the emotional aspect, through the woman’s perspective. The perceptual focalization in the scene through the invisible witness is sometimes limited out of out of rhetorical considerations, to increase the surprise effect when the person hits the woman. For example, in the beginning of the scene the viewer the viewer does not see who is entering the room, and is put on the same observing level as the woman who is blindfolded. The viewer gets to see a tracking shot of the feet of the person, but we are at this point not yet able to see who the person is that walks in. This increases the surprise effect when the viewer actually gets to see that the old interrogator is also the new interrogator.44 Just as the blindfolded woman, the viewer gets some information about the person who walks in before we get to see the person. We hear the same heavy footsteps as in the beginning of the 43 Radha Bharadwaj, Closet Land. 44 Branigan, 75. 19 before. It would seem unlikely or ‘one step too far’ that the interrogator would lie about being the abuser as a final method to make the woman confess, even though the interrogator deceived the woman before, and that the woman would falsely believe it. It would be more likely to believe that the woman simply repressed the memory about the abuse, instead of her lying about him being the abuser in order to deceive the man or gain control over the situation. Childhood abuse could be repressed or ‘forgotten’ for a certain amount of time, and at a later time be recalled.48 More information which could affirm that she repressed it, can be found in the woman’s monologue of the scene. The woman says that her mother was not able to notice the abuse, just as she did not notice that her neighbors disappeared, and maybe also not that the interrogator was her abuser. However, the viewer will never know for sure who is telling the truth, and it remains a matter of personal consideration to believe that the interrogator is the abuser or not. Ideology and theme The film CLOSET LAND shows a political interrogation, in which the interrogator uses physical and psychological torture against the prisoner in order to make her confess. Rimmon-Kenan describes that what is acceptable or normal behavior in the story-world of the film, or the ideological facet of focalization, is often expressed through a narrator. The ideology of this narrator-focalizer is usually seen as the authoritative ideology of the text, and the ideologies of the characters within the story-world are evaluated from the narrator’s ideology. In the film CLOSET LAND there is never a narrator who expresses the authoritative norms of the text, and therefore the characters themselves represent their ideology which is not evaluated by a higher authority. A character may represent his ideology through his way of seeing the world or his behavior, or actually discussing his ideology.49 The interrogator justifies the physical and psychological torture techniques he uses against the woman in the interrogation, because in his eyes the woman is a dissident, a person who opposes official policy. The woman, on the other hand, claims that she does not know what the interrogator is talking about, and that she is not a political person and just a children’s book writer. In her eyes she is innocent, and the interrogation and torture is unjustified. As the plot enfolds, the torture used in the interrogation increasingly gets worse. In the beginning the interrogator only claims that the woman is lying, but slowly he starts to assault the woman 48 Fred W. Seymour, “Memory and Childhood abuse: The Psychological Evidence,” Waikato Law Review 4 (1996): 155-166. 49 Rimmon-Kenan, 81-82. 20 physically, and gradually the psychological abuse gets worse and worse. According to Hernán Reyes, an interrogator wants to increase the unpredictability and uncontrollability, while a victim seeks to predict behavior and try to gain control over a situation, in order to experience less stress.50 In the film, the woman is blindfolded several times by the interrogator. This blindfolding is a technique from the interrogator to control what the woman gets to see at a specific time, and what not. In this situation the woman is unable to predict behavior and gain control over the situation, which increases the stress she experiences. The woman explained that at the times when she was abused as a child, she shut her eyes really hard in order to escape to ‘Closet Land’ and mentally leave the real world. After some time the viewer gets to see that the woman is able to escape to ´Closet Land´ in her mind, to shut away the pain and stress she is put through in the interrogation. Through flashbacks of the abuse and ‘Closet Land’, the viewer gets to see what the woman is thinking about and what she is feeling, and is therefore invited to feel empathy for the woman. We are emotionally focalized through the woman, which might also affect us in a way that we experience the same stress as the woman experiences. Besides that, the viewer gets more visual information than the woman about what the interrogator is doing to the woman to make her confess, which increases the suspense experienced by the viewer. The viewer is able to anticipate what might happen next, but because we do not always get to see everything the interrogator does and because the interrogator remains really unpredictable, the expectations we might create do not necessarily to come true. The viewer also has to consider whether they find the torture used against the woman justified. This consideration depends on the viewer’s own ideology about political torture, but also on the reliability of both characters. The woman seems to be a reliable person, she claims to be innocent and she does not show or tell at any moment anything which raises suspicion that she might in fact be guilty. The interrogator seems to be more unreliable. He claims that the woman is guilty, but in fact he does not know whether she is actually guilty and does not provide any evidence to prove her guilt. He constantly lies to the woman, and uses physical and psychological torture techniques to make the woman confess. Despite the viewer’s own ideology about political torture, throughout the film we get information in a way to believe that the woman is innocent. For some viewers, the idea that the woman is innocent might put them in a position that they find the physical and psychological torture used against the woman unjustified, while in general they are not against political torture. However, the only evidence 50 Reyes, 614. 21 that the woman is innocent is provided by the woman herself, leaving the question whether the woman is actually guilty or not open for interpretation. 24 providing to the viewers, if gender roles were turned around? If in the film CLOSET LAND the woman was the interrogator and the man the victim, would the physical abuse be different, probably less sexually degrading, or the psychological abuse be even worse? 25 Bibliography Bal, Mieke. Narratology: Introduction to the Theory of Narrative, 2nd edition. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1997. Barsam, Richard, and Dave Monahan. Looking at Movies: An Introduction to Film, 3rd edition. New York, London: W.W. Norton & Company, 2010. Benoit, James. “Working Through the Ambiguities of Focalization with the Films of Edward Yang.” PhD diss., McGill University, 2005. Accessed March 16, 2017, http://digitool.library.mcgill.ca/webclient/StreamGate?folder_id=0&dvs=1489834842 127~887&usePid1=true&usePid2=true. Bordwell, David. Narration in the Fiction Film. Madison: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1985. Bordwell, David, and Kristin Thompson. Film Art: an Introduction, 8th edition. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2010. Branigan, Edward. Narrative Comprehension and Film. London, New York: Routledge, 1992. Brummett, Barry. Techniques of Close Reading. Los Angeles: SAGE Publications, 2010. Coëgnarts, Maarten and Peter Kravanja. “A Study in Cinematic Subjectivity - Metaphors of Perception in Film.” Metaphor and the Social World 4:2 (2014): 149–173. Accessed March 14, 2017. doi: 10.1075/msw.4.2.01coe. Deleyto, Celestino. “Focalisation in Film Narrative.” Atlantis 13 (1991): 159-177. Huisman, Rosemary. “Narrative Concepts.” In Narrative and Media, edited by Helen Fulton Rosemary Huisman, Julian Murphet, and Anne Dunn, 11-27. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. 26 Jesch, Tatjana, and Malte Stein. “Perspectivization and Focalization: Two Concepts-One Meaning? An Attempt at Conceptual Differentiation.” In Point of View, Perspective, and Focalization: Modeling Mediation in Narrative, edited by Peter Hühn, Wolf Schmid, Jörg Schönert, 59-77. Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co, 2009. Meister, Jan Christoph. “Narratology.” In The Living Handbook of Narratology. Accessed March 10, 2017. http://www.lhn.uni-hamburg.de/article/narratology. Monaco, James. How to Read a Film: The World of Movies, Media, and Multimedia. New York, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. Murphet, Julian. “Point of View.” In Narrative and Media, edited by Helen Fulton, Rosemary Huisman, Julian Murphet, and Anne Dunn, 86-95. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. Reyes, Hernán. “The worst scars are in the mind: psychological torture.” International Review of the Red Cross 89:867 (2007): 591-617. Rimmon-Kenan, Shlomith. Narrative Fiction: Contemporary Poetics, 2nd edition. London, New York: Taylor and Francis e-Library, 2005. Seymour, Fred W. “Memory and Childhood abuse: The Psychological Evidence.” Waikato Law Review 4 (1996): 155-166. Stam, Robert, Robert Burgoyne, and Sandy Flitterman-Lewis. “Focalisation and Filtration.” In New Vocabularies in Film Semiotics: Structuralism, Post-Structuralism and Beyond. London, New York: Routledge, 1992. Film Bharadwaj, Radha. Closet Land. Directed by Radha Bharadwaj. USA: Universal Studios, 1991. DVD. 29 Scene 2, 0:39:35 – 0:50:50 Time What is going on? Cinematography and sound Perceptual focalization Psychological focalization 0:39:35 – 0:40:45 Interrogator blindfolds the woman. He says she is going to be interrogated by someone else. He also says ‘they’ are watching him too. Cinematography: Medium close-up shot of woman being blindfolded by interrogator. Perspective on eye-level woman, the interrogator is not entirely framed in the shot. Then a close up of the hands of the interrogator. Then a zoom-out shot of the woman, and long-shots of the woman sitting in the room. Sound: Diegetic: interrogator whispers in ear of woman, door opening/closing. Nondiegetic: music. External position We see the event from the outside, as if we are an invisible witness of the event. Complete overview of situation. External position Invisible witness of the story. The knowledge is restricted, just as the woman we do not know what’s going on and what’s will happen next. High degree of objectivity. 0:40:20 – 0:40:45 Door opens and someone walks in. Cinematography: Tracking shot of someone walking, we only see feet, alternated with medium close-up shots of the woman. Sound: Diegetic: door opening/closing and the same heavy footsteps as in the beginning of the film. Nondiegetic: music becomes ‘darker’. External position We see the event from the outside, as if we are an invisible witness of the event. Limited observer, out of rhetorical consideration. Internal position The viewer does not know what’s going on, just as the woman. We do not know who walks in and what will happen next. 0:40:45 – 0:41:28 Someone hits the woman. We then see it is the same interrogator as before. He speaks with a different voice. The interrogator then reads a part of the children’s book from the woman. Cinematography: Low angle shot woman, zoom-in interrogator. Medium close-ups of the woman. Then a tracking shot interrogator, alternated with high angle medium shot of woman. Sound: Diegetic: hitting sound, footsteps. The interrogator’s speaks with a different voice, lower pitch, which voice the woman recognizes from before, and he continues the interrogation. External position We see the event from the outside, as if we are an invisible witness of the event. First limited observer, out of rhetorical consideration, then we get a complete overview of the situation. First: Internal position The knowledge of the situation is restricted and we do not know more than the woman. Then: External position We suddenly know what’s going on, and become externally focalized for a moment. 30 0:41:28 – 0:41:56 The interrogator runs towards the woman, he wants to know who the Friendly Rooster is, she says he is just a character, but he does not believe her. Cinematography: Zoom-in and low angle shot interrogator, high angle shot woman. Shot- reverse-shot. Sound: Diegetic: hitting, running interrogator more aggressive tone of speech, music. External position We see the event from the outside, as if we are an invisible witness of the event, and get a complete overview of situation. The knowledge of the situation is unrestricted, and high degree of objectivity. 0:41:56 – 0:43:27 The interrogator takes a tomato and garlic. He then puts the tomato and garlic in his mouth, and ‘kisses’ the woman. Then the interrogator throws up. Cinematography: Extreme close up. Tilting shot interrogator, then low angle shot interrogator and high angle shot woman. Panning shot interrogator. Then medium close-up shot interrogator and woman, from the side. Then shot on eye-level of interrogator, selective focus: woman in sharp focus. Sound: Diegetic: eating, vomiting sounds. The interrogator talks to the woman, blaming her that he did not want him to come, with a passive-aggressive tone. First: Internal position Limited to what the interrogator sees. Then: External position we see the event from the outside, as if we are an invisible witness of the event, and get a complete overview of the situation. External position Invisible witness of the story. The knowledge is unrestricted, and a high degree of objectivity. Through what we see as an invisible witness of the story, we become more emotionally 0:43:27 – 0:44:35 The interrogator runs away. Then he comes back and pretends to be two persons at the same time, the new interrogator and another prisoner/victim. Cinematography: Tracking shots of interrogator, alternated with medium close-ups of the woman. Shots in dark and in light, corresponding to the different voices of the interrogator, alternated with close-ups of the woman. Sound: Diegetic: running, screaming, hitting. Interrogator speaks with two different voices, lower pitch voice which represents the other interrogator, and higher pitch which represents the other victim. The woman still says she is innocent. External position We see the event from the outside, as if we are an invisible witness of the event, and get a complete overview of the situation. attached to the woman. She doesn’t know what is going on, we also do not exactly know what is going on even though we do see what is happening. We get optically closer 0:44:35 – 0:46:42 The interrogator runs towards the woman and holds a stick against her neck. Then he runs towards a sound machine and turns it on. The interrogator then describes to the woman Cinematography: Zoom-in on interrogator, tilting down at sound machine, panning shot interrogator, and shots alternated with close-up woman. From 45:36, longer takes. Zoom-in on interrogator, alternated with close-up woman, shot-reverse-shot. Sound: to the woman then the Interrogator. We constantly see close-ups of her face, while at first we see the interrogator from a distance. 31 what he is doing to the other prisoner/victim, complemented with sounds. Diegetic: footsteps, running. The interrogator says to the woman, in her ear: “there is plenty more to come”. The interrogator then turns on a sound machine, and mimics ‘barbecuing’ the other victim with sounds of metal and the so called ‘other victim’ screaming in fear, begging the interrogator to not do anything to him. We ‘see’ the woman’s discomfort through her facial expressions. 0:46:42 – 0:47:30 The woman screams. Then she hears a whistle. Then the interrogator stands up and pretends to leave the room. Cinematography: Close-up woman. Camera moves, Steadicam shot. Ends with a low angle shot of the woman. Sound: Diegetic: woman screams, off-screen whistle. Internal position Limited to what the woman sees and hears. Internal position We become emotionally focalized through the woman’s perspective. 0:47:30 – 0:48:25 The interrogator pretends to be the ‘other victim’ again. He is on the floor and moves towards the woman. The woman seems to really think there is another victim. Cinematography: Tracking shot of interrogator on the floor, low-angle shot woman. Tracking shot interrogator, alternated with zoom-in woman. The shots of the woman do not seem to be POV shots of the interrogator, the angle is different. Sound: Diegetic: crawling sounds The interrogator speaks with the higher pitched ‘prisoner/victim voice. Conversation woman and the so called ‘other victim’. Based on his rhythm of speech he sounds out of breath. External position We see the event from the outside, as if we are an invisible witness of the event, and get a complete overview of the situation Even though we see what is going on, we know the woman doesn’t. She seems to believe that there is another prisoner/victim. 0:48:25 – 0:49:35 The woman and the ‘other victim’ talk to each other. The woman then talks about the imaginary world she can escape to. Cinematography/editing: Long-shot woman and interrogator, long take. Perspective on eye-level interrogator, low-angle shot woman. Associative inserts of the cat with green wings, and a door closing. Eye-line-match, but woman is blindfolded. Sound: Diegetic: conversation woman and ‘other victim’. The ‘other victim’ asks about things the woman could think of when she is interrogated, in order to ‘escape’ the pain. He sounds more soft and friendly, his timbre shifts. First: external position We see the event from the outside, as if we are an invisible witness of the event, and get a complete overview of the situation Then: internal position Limited to what the woman sees and hears, we supposedly see what the woman thinks about. Just as the woman we do not exactly know what is going on, why she is in this situation, and what will happen next. The associative inserts give us some insides in the woman’s mind.