Film’s Multimodal Capacity to Assert, Describe and Depict

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Film’s multimodal capacity to assert, describe and depict 1. Introduction 1.1 Overview It is the intention of this paper to illustrate how film’s multi-modal affordances allow some capacity to assert as well as depict. If the language of cinema is acknowledged then the issue becomes one of enquiring into the differing nature of description and assertion within film and the novel. Therefore, the paper will argue the case for the centrality of text and sound within cinema. In the analysis, examples will be drawn from a range of sources to contrast the inferential requirements of portrayals in each medium. There is a focus on two film adaptations in particular, Apocalypse Now and Trainspotting. The former, according to Stam (2005) would more intertextual in adaptation than faithful to Conrad’s novel. It uses a range of strategies to convey the text’s themes in an alternate context which illustrate the choices the director makes in order to balance the depiction and assertion of the narrative. The second adaptation employs highly visual depictions of mental processes which challenge the notion that viewers can only infer mental activity. First though, I will outline the terms under which film is referenced in this discussion. 1.2 Film Beja (1979: 20) issues a reminder that film is both a medium and an artefact. The medium of film is the celluloid or plastic roll onto which the images are recorded. The first movies were produced without sound and even the first talking pictures required that vision and sound be recorded separately. Purists may still prefer to make movies on analogue film stock but today digital recording allows sound and images to be seamlessly integrated. Nevertheless, this split between sound and vision is etched into film’s history. This has important consequences for the analysis of film as an artefact. It is this

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