Deleuze’s Understanding of the World, Cinematic Notions of Framing, Shot, and Montage
INSTRUCTIONS:Write approximately 4 (double-spaced) pages for Section A and 5-6 pages for Section B, with a total of approximately 9-10 pages total text for your midterm. For Section A, divide your answer into two short essays, approximately 2 pages each. The two terms you choose do not need to be related. For Section B, answer two of the three essay questions, 2.5-3 pages each.Avoid repetitions where possible (i.e. do not write about the affection-image in Section A and Section B, or about both terms from the same Chapter in Section A). Use the prompts to best show what you have learned rather than to fill space. Direct quotes from the text are not necessary unless the specific wording of the citation helps you to make your argument, in which case please give the book and page number, no further citation apparatus required.-----A) TERMS QUESTION:Much of Deleuze's Cinema 1: the movement-image is spent developing a new taxonomy of cinematic signs and terms, based in part on his attempt to bring together the philosophies of Bergson and Peirce in relation to cinema. Describe your understanding of two of the following terms from his text. Show that you have a sense of what this term means to Deleuze, how he distinguishes it from others that may be related to it, and then describe how your understanding of this could be expressed in how you would film a shot or scene from an imaginary film.Terms:frame, out of field (hors champs), shot/plan, montage (organic, dialectical, quantitative, qualitative), free-indirect subjectivity, perception-image, sensory-motor schema, affection-image, any-space-whatever (espace quelconque), action-image SAS', action-image ASA', breath-encompasser & binomial/duel, relation-imageB) LONGER QUESTIONS:1. We have spent a great deal of time this semester discussing how Henri Bergson's theory of time influences Deleuze’s understanding of the world and cinema. In particular, he focuses on Bergson's critique of homogeneous clock-time as a spatialization of time, and his counter-notion of durée (duration). Articulate your understanding of this issue and what is at stake in it.2. Deleuze's conception of cinematic notions of framing, shot, and montage are sometimes different from how these notions have traditionally been described. Articulate your understanding of how this is the case for one or more of these terms. Then describe how this could influence something about a potential cinematic practice. For example, you could describe how you might film a particular scene of an imaginary film.3. Deleuze describes cinema and the world as having far more in common than many prior theorists. Much of this has to do with his critique of dualist models and binary distinctions in a more general way. Why do you think Deleuze works to deconstruct a binary conception of cinema (representation) and the world beyond it (reality) and why might this matter, for philosophy, cinema, or an understanding of the world beyond these?
Deleuze's Cinema
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Deleuze's Cinema
Section A
Sensory-motor schema
The achievement of Cinema books in visual and performing arts is undoubtedly significant. First, they offer a different way of understanding films. Cinema books postulate an alternative mechanism other than the usual work of art. According to Deleuze, films represent something. However, they can also create temporarities and own fluid movements. Deleuze further suggests that although the movements are associated with rhythm and duration, it is impossible to narrow them down to specific images. Alternatively stated, Deleuze contends that temporarity cannot be associated directly with a particular image shooting technique, a particular set of images, or a specific editing form.
In classical Holywood cinema, the narrative or rationality of the script dictates how time proceeds. This temporarity, according to Deleuze, depends on the sensory-motor schema. The concept means that linear causality or the flow of actions in the narrative determines all movements in the film (Deleuze, 1986). Thus, the current actions determine how characters behave or act. One may ask what happens during a flashback. However, drawing from the concept of temporarity, it can be argued that disruptions can occur to project unique circumstances such as a flashback. Such development involves integrating the present, past, and future to create temporal continuity (Marrati, 2005). Therefore, besides the narrative, temporal continuity also depends on other aspects such as the framing, continuous juxtapositions, and reasonableness of progressions.
Notably, sensory-motor schema determines how time and the image relate. Ordinarily, one would be expected to interpret the logical progressions in a film in isolation. However, that is not the case in Deleuze's perspective of sensory-motor schema. To him, the focus on the experience of the specific image follows the logical progression of the images. Deleuze's postulation of the sensory-motor schema considers six basic movement images. Indeed, the six steps are the simplest way to understand the concept. However, various aspects must be taken into account for this argument to hold. For instance, all six steps must be taken to be taking place concurrently. The six steps should also not happen in a pre-determined order.
For instance, one cannot purport that a perception image follows an action image or affection image. This is due to the immediacy of affection images which co-occur with perception images. Besides, perception images envelop all the other five images. Deleuze contends that the images cannot be thought of separately. In his view, they overlap and relate with one another. Therefore, even if one attempts to perceive a single perception of an image separately, the multiple images occur concurrently. Towards this end, it can be argued that sensory-motor schema results in this phenomenon. Through it, the interval gap of the images is eliminated, providing a link between the action and the relation (Marrati, 2005). In other words, the sensory-motor schema mediates between the initially perceived images and the appropriate action by using the human mind to combine all the images.
Thus, Deleuze postulates that the sensory-motor link is the unification of movement and the interval when evaluating images in films. Looking at the concept differently, it introduces wholeness. The concept of "the whole" implies that the images cannot be separated into parts. On the whole, time and space are considered. In this case, time refers to the moments that make sense. They could be minutes, hours, days, months, or years. Therefore, understanding sensory-motor schema or link involves appreciating that events in a film are not interpreted linearly but as a coil or pile. This means that all the events are interrelated and occur concurrently.
Perception-Image
Perception-image is one of the six images in film temporarity. According to Deleuze, it is also an image. While looking at the images through the interval gap perspective, a perception image is the incoming side. In other words, it is the sensory aspect of the interval gap since it involves the initial perception. If one uses the example of a living cell to understand perception image, one can relate it to the cell membrane. This is because the cell membrane facilitates the absorption of anything into the cell. Similarly, the cell membrane facilitates the absorption of all the other images. Indeed, without perception image, one cannot understand the other images. Thus, perception image facilitates initial action and relation with the other images. Towards this end, there is a need to understand what action and relation entail. Notably, they are both parts of perception. Without them, one cannot perceive anything. Indeed, it is through perception image that one can perceive all the other images. Now, Deleuze considers perception image relative to the interval gap (Deleuze, 1986). This means that perception impacts the sense and action through which viewers relate to the greater world. In other words, perception images can also be perceived as moving images and be related to other concepts such as intention, attention, and sensory-motor schema.
Deleuze's description of perception images and subsequent use of examples helps one appreciate that the primary role of perception images is representative. They help us see things from a particular point of view. Although perception images may not point someone to an identifiable perspective, they induce a sense of view. The objectivity or lack of it on the point of view largely depends on the viewer. Deleuze's view of perception images collates with Ronald Bogue, who suggests that images are inherently perceptual. In his view, images appear to have been taken from a perspective-inducing camera. This means that the camera creates a perception related to the existing frame to draw a specific meaning from the images. Therefore, in film, no image can be said to be entirely subjective or objective.
One tends to draw meaning from the image. This agrees with Deleuze, arguing that perception cannot be tied to the image but to the perceiver (Deleuze, 1986). In this light, according to Deleuze, one can interpret perception images to mean self-conscious attempts to impose a perception. However, care must be taken to avoid assuming that the image must be objective or subjective. Based on this argument, it is accurate to postulate the Deleuze's contention of perception image aligns with Pasolini and Bakhtin's theoretical view (Marrati, 2005). According to them, a perception image draws its status from the independence it draws from the camera. Thus, perception is literally on the thing or image and not the perceiver.
This means that a producer can use an image to create a universal perception that more than two people can confirm. I agree with Deleuze that breaking down perception images in a film is problematic and challenging. In my view, isolating each of the six images is impossible since they are all tied to the perceived image. However, as Deleuze suggests, there are instances in films where perception images can be identified without necessarily isolating them from the rest. For example, in The Man with a Movie Camera, a 1929 movie, Deleuze notes that one can determine when the movement of images was stopped, edited, reserved, and so on to create a perception. I agree with him that in that case, one can single out the images as perception images. I also agree with his intention to show them as part of perception messages. However, overall, I hold that it is difficult to isolate images and purport that they are simply perceived images.
Section B
Question 1: We have spent a great deal of time this semester discussing how Hen...