Data Bases • Custom Term Papers • Free Term Papers • Free Research Papers • Free Essays • Free Book Reports • Plagiarism? Links • Top 100 Term Paper Sites • Top 25 Essay Sites • Top 50 Essay Sites • Search 97,000 Papers @ DirectEssays.com • Search 101,000 Papers @ ExampleEssays.com • Search 90,000 Papers @ MegaEssays.com Free Essays • Term Paper Sites • Chuck III's Free Essays • Free College Essays • TermPaperSites.com • My Term Papers • Get Free Essays • Essay World • Planet Papers	Search Lots of Essays Back to Subjects - Psychology Freud and Film Freud and Film Films are probably the closest medium we have to experiencing the inexplicable quality of the dream in our waking lives. Rich in symbol, metaphor, movement and mystery, films, like dreams, enable us to participate in another reality, and, through that participation, to be transformed. Films are like dreams and dreams interpret symbolism in ways science has not even fully discovered yet. The images and symbols within a film are unending and unaccountable. Even the creators of films themselves cannot be aware of the unconscious impact of them all. Imagine the impact of a movie that was full of imagery that only, in its unconscious capacity, complimented the narrative. The film, October, contains an overwhelming amount of rich imagery. Perhaps this is because it is forced to because of its lack of verbal communication. When we watch the soldier standing outside the door of what I assume to be the royal chambers in October and the shots within the scene show his hands fidgeting, we assume he is nervous and even become nervous ourselves. Why? This is the type of question which plagues me in retrospect of watching the film, October, since Psychology is my main interest of study at University. When we see the soldiers hands fidgeting we associate this with anxiousness or nervousness because we have done this or have seen someone else do the same when they were anxious or nervous. Some symbols may be applicable to only certain people or all people depending on individual or collective knowledge and experience. The point is this is much more effective then having the character say, “I am nervous”. The fact we feel slightly nervous ourselves is due to the fact that, through “wish fulfillment”, we identify with the film in an intimate way. The scope of symbols and their unconscious effect is not yet fully realized or defined, although there are dream dictionaries available today which attempt to help us do this. If science ever does discover the symbolism behind all the different images which may be used in film and how to use them it will revolutionize the industry and films will become much more deeply impactive and culturally embedded in our day to day lives then they are even today. If Sigmund Freud were alive today and studying film he would argue that mise-en-scene is the most important part of film because of its potential for communication through symbolism. Freud suggests that dreams are a process of “wish fulfillment”. Freud considred dreams to be a manifestation of the fulfillment of a wish. Taking into account the fact that our dreams often take the form of a story in which we are the protagonist, the totally egotistical nature of dreams, it would make sense for us, as an audience, to identify with the protagonist on screen when we are in a dream enduced state such as in the cinema. When one is in a sleep-like environment, such as the cinema, it is easy to see how through the unconscious process of “wish fulfillment” one can identify with the characters or lose oneself within a film. This is similar to what we do in our dreams. Through this process of feeling like one is within the story of the film, the imagery and its symbolism become even more powerful. If the wrong filmmaker has this knowledge and the power to manipulate a great number of certain symbols it could almost be dangerous. Take for instance advertising within films, which takes place in the industry regularly and did in an almost shameless way during the Hollywood studio era. Advertising could increase its effectiveness by never before seen percentages, having an extreme effect on consumer culture. In the work by Jean Louis Beaudry, Metapsychological Approaches to the Impression of Reality in Cinema, he strongly suggests films are like dreams in many ways. One might even say that films simulate dreams, particularly silent films. When we go to the theater we are in relative darkness and we sit in a relatively rested position. This mimics a sleep environment, which itself brings us back to our mothers arms through a process which Freud referred to as “temporal regression”. This process makes us more suggestive to imagery as a form of communication since we could not communicate verbally when we were young enough to have our first memories of being in our mothers arms. Also visual form is the most archaeic form of communication and brings us back to the very most basic communication which the human brain knows. Within our dreams verbal communication does not exist. We communicate and receive communication through thoughts, which manifest as images or symbols. These images represent mental perceptions in our unconscious which are automatically taken for perceptions of reality. So it is easy to see how imagery can be an effective communication tool in film. There are many images within film, which may influence how the film communicates with us in this way because we are in a highly suggestive sleep-like environment. Take perhaps the image of a bend or fork in a road or a bridge, these may indicate a decision one has to make or a choice one is facing, just as the image of a house may indicate a set of values or a belief system. In the film, Vertigo, imagery is only as important as it is in any other film but it is more apparent and easily discernable in this film as in most other Hitchcock films. When we are in a cinematic setting with it’s dim lighting, comfortable seating and focus on the screen we are more suggestive to imagery as a form of communication then normal because of a regression, subconsciously, to infant like communication and an egotistical mind set. Hitchcock, more then the average director, realizes this and takes advantage of it by using imagery to convey his message in a much more effective way. Color is the most important part of Vertigo. At the beginning we are subjected to a barrage of colors in swirls and designs which foreshadow the importance of color in the film to follow. Throughout the film flashes of color are used to indicate anger and confusion. The color of Vertigo may be analyzed to reveal themes, which are associated with different color. A stop light analogy can be used here with red indicating Scottie’s reluctance to have a relationship with a woman, green his full speed fall for Madeleine and yellow his cautious, mediocre relationship with Midge. It is safe to say that nobody orchestrates colors anymore quite like Hitchcock did. What is most recognizable about Vertigo is the color green. For the color green is associated with Scotties vertigo and, particularly, it’s underlying cause: the dizzying fear of falling, and of falling deliriously in love. Madeleine’s dress is green which she appears so statuesque in, in the blood red restaurant. Madeleine’s car is green. The waters of San Francisco bay are given a blue-green tinge. And Scottie’s sweater is changed to blue-green after he takes a dive for Madeleine, in more ways then one. It is also interesting to recognize that when the two green cars pass in a circle and confuse Scottie this is foreshadowing to Madeleine’s alter personality, Judy. These all tie in to the fact that Scottie sees green whenever his vertigo surfaces. The color green seems to suggest, everywhere it appears, Scottie’s naïve, unusual and confused obsession with Madeleine which parallels the unusual feeling and confusion which is caused by his vertigo. The opposite of green is red. Red is used in many ways as well in Vertigo. The color of the restaurant where Scottie’s obsession with Madeleine is born is blood red. The color red seems to indicate Scotties reluctance to get involved with women. Scottie’s front door is red which serves as a big stop sign to women. The color of Madeleine’s robe after she plunges into the bay is red. And finally the color of the pendant necklace, which makes Scottie so angry with Judy, is red. Red seems to be Scottie’s theme before Madeleine and vertigo as red indicates his reluctance toward women which describes Scottie up to this point in his life. The color yellow also surfaces in Vertigo through Midge. Her studio is bright which is an indication of her sunny personality. Yellow often indicates caution, but in this case it indicates a slow progression or mediocrity of Scottie’s love for Midge. The color purple also makes an appearance in the film by seeming to be associated with Judy. However, when Scottie and Judy kiss the camera makes a dizzying pan and the color shifts to green which foreshadows Scottie’s discovery of Judy’s alter personality of Madeleine. The camera circles around the both of them, and as it does so, images of San Juan Batista emerge from behind them, as if to indicate that the past has caught up with the present, and later will engulf them to a powerfully emotional and tragic end. When Scottie sees Judy on the street for the first time the viewer has been set up to share Scottie’s cognitive dissonance, that is she looks like but doesn’t look like Madeleine. The curious sensations which occur during the last half of the film during Madeleine’s rebirth might rest in Vertigo’s careful manipulation of cognitive dissonance as we compare Madeleine with all her variations: Judy from Kansas; Midge; Midge in her self portrait of Carlotta; Carlotta in her painting and Carlotta in Scottie’s dream. Scottie, an established symbol of the normal, all-American male, represents the normal man who cracks under the pressure of his placement within an extraordinary set of circumstances. Many key sequences, for example, are mysteriously shrouded in cloud, or a dreamlike green light that permeates the psyche of the viewer, leading to a feeling of claustrophobia. As an audience, we are drawn into Scottie's narrow view of the world, conceiving our vision of a 1950s San Francisco through Scottie's eyes. As such, we accept that there is very little traffic, and virtually no people cluttering the city streets in Scottie's reality. In fact, the only connections that Scottie, and the audience, find with the outside world are through Midge. The intense, specific color saturation that permeates each location and the rapid dismissal of lighthearted banter in place of cooler, more monotonous speech all enhance the closed-off mise-en-scene that frames Scottie's world. There are, of course, other forms of imagery within Vertigo than color. The painting for instance. When Madeleine first appears in the blood red restaurant in her green dress she pauses in artistic form which is later reciprocated by the painting of Carlotta and Midge’s likening of herself in her own version of the same painting. It is also interesting to note that Madeleine often appears in a doorway, which indicates there is something behind her or in her past. This makes her a mystery to Scottie and therefore to us. The lack of what is shown about Scottie’s rescue from the rooftop at the beginning of the film is a powerful manipulation of imagery in itself. The effect of this, metaphorically, leaves him suspended, throughout the film, over a great abyss. Hitchcock chooses to end the picture almost abruptly at the bell tower scene. It is the same exact spot where earlier on, Scottie first witnesses the “suicidal” fall of Elster’s real wife. The same exact scene where Scottie relives his guilt of being unable to prevent a death due to his vertigo. Scottie’s vertigo is channeled into his confusion, his guilt, his hurt and his ultimate love for a woman from which there is no turning back from. As he reaches the top, he is ultimately faced with his own strong belief of upholding the law, and his equally passionate feelings for a woman who has deceived him and yet, now offer the only real hope of redemption and his only compromised opportunity for a perfect love. And as he contemplates his decision for either justice or love, he is cruelly robbed of that decision as Judy accidentally plunges towards her own demise. In the end, Scottie is cured of his romantic illusions and at the same time, of his vertigo. But it’s a cure that leaves him staring into the great abyss. A nun represents God, and if the ending is abrupt, the resolvement of Judy’s involvement in the murder of the actual “Madeline” is to symbolize the cliched notion that criminals may escape the hands of the law, but not from the hand of God. Her apparent accidental fall may be even more symbolic in the sense that she is re-enacting what she was asked to do by Elster, to pretend to fall to her death to mask the death and murder of his actual wife. The terrific irony here again is she is not acting, but really doing it this time. Falling to her own death, which is as real as Elster’s wife death was. With that, the film concludes with the everlasting image of Scottie standing at the bell tower, looking down on the lifeless body of his de-mystified obsession, a woman who never existed for him. A woman who was manufactured for the purpose of a diabolical crime, and a woman who was in turn, re-manufactured by the very same man she was supposed to deceive. Hitchcock also captures Scottie's emotional and mental state through the motif of falling. the fact that Scottie is seen to drive down the hills of San Francisco and its surrounding regions and never up, in addition to the emotional vortex that Scottie and Madeleine/Judy are uncontrollably pulled into, all add to the constuction of a world from which the death of Judy seems inevitable There are some films, however which do not follow Jean Louis Beaudry’s principles of dreams and film. One specific genre stands out in this way and that is the art film. The art film brings deviations from the norm into the foreground and highlights gaps and problems. This creates a feeling of realism and distances the audience from the effects of classical cinema. That is, classical cinema as I have described earlier has the almost hypnotic ability, created by the cinematic setting, “wish fulfillment” and “temporal regression”, to put the audience in a dream like state which makes the use of imagery multiply more effective. Art film calls attention to this process and as a result negates the effect. David Bordwell describes the art cinema as: The art cinema is less concerned with action then reaction; it is a cinema of psychological effects in search of their causes. Art film calls attention to imagery and cinematic devices which lessens the effect of these on the viewer, but the auteurs of such films do this purposely so they may convey there unique message in a different way. Ingmar Bergman’s film, Persona, brings attention to the fictional nature of film through the boy at the beginning who starts to read a book then looks up to a woman’s face and touches the screen it is projected on. Bergman also calls attention to the fact that the audience is watching a film and the actions are not real through the images of the mechanics of a projector at the beginning and the end of the film. Ingmar Bergman uses all sorts of devices to distance us from the story he tells in Persona. But we are still drawn in, mystified and then horrified at this tale of emotional possession told as if it were a dream. The narrative proceeds so calmly and the mood seems so tranquil that it is hard for us to recognize that we are watching what amounts to a vampire taking her victim. He primes us from the beginning to pay attention to his pictures by starting with an abstract assemblage of shots that includes scenes of film passing through a projector. We are reminded that what we are watching is not reality, but an artist's reconstruction of it. But this does nothing to lessen the cumulative power of the art. In Persona, Bergman looks at artists' inherent exploitation, and creates a masterpiece in the process. It might seem awkward to tell a story so tightly focused on two characters, one of whom doesn't speak. But Bergman uses these silences as expertly as he uses the bright sunlight of his location to gradually expose how the actress takes over the nurse's spirit. As the nurse chatters on about her fiance and the boyfriends of past summers, the actress watches and listens with a seemingly sympathetic expression. Using tight close-ups of the two faces, the director shows us the gradual merging of the two personalities, and the disappearance of the younger woman's being into the triumphant persona of her patient. Films are the closest we come to experiencing dreams in our waking lives and just like dreams films are rich in symbolism and mystery. Symbolism within films communicates messages much more effectively then we are usually even aware. The effectiveness of symbolism in film is specifically enhanced by the almost hypnotic way the cinema effects the human psyche. This is done through a process of “wish fulfillment” and “temporal regression” as described by Sigmund Freud to explain dreams. This phenomenon is particularly apparent in silent films such as October since verbal communication does not often take place in the dream world. However, the effectiveness of imagery is shown in many talking films as well. A particularly good example of this is Hitchcock’s, Vertigo. Hitchcock shows a conscious awareness of this process and uses it to create a powerfully communicative film. Some films, however, do not use this process and deliberately negate it by calling attention to the apparatus of film and distancing the audience from the story. These films choose to convey their message in other ways and creating distance helps them do this. An example of an effective art film which uses this technique is Ingmar Bergman’s, Persona. As film evolves and multimedia and entertainment move into areas of virtual reality, video games and internet the principles of imagery and it’s symbolism combined with the manipulation of the conscious and unconscious state, whether intentional or not, will remain the most effective, important and mysterious communication tool society posesses. Bibliography: Word Count: 3052
Copyright © 1998-2008 College Term Papers, INC All Rights Reserved. DMCA Notifications and Requests