Experimental Film requires a different kind of spectatorship.

Experimental films are different from mainstream films, in the way that they are designed to challenge mainstream cinema. They do not have a plot or characters are characterised by being a mix of different images and sounds that don't really fit together or make sense to form a cohesive story. This requires spectators to change their conventional cinema expectations in order to watch an experimental film, as you need to look deeper into the film to understand what it is trying to convey. Experimental films are not films that you can watch passively and enjoy a narrative as they require constant analysis on the audiences.

Luis Bunuels "Un Chien Andalou" is a famous experimental film from the 1920's, the film has an avant garde theme which requires the audience to look at the film in a different way that they would with mainstream cinema. This can be seen in the opening scene where we see the director, Luis, sharpening a razor. We then see the a cloud in the sky cutting across the moon. This symbolises when the woman gets her eye cut by the razor in the next cut. This does not represent anything and holds no meaning with reinforces the theme of challenging mainstream cinema. The purpose of this scene was to provoke a response in the audience, as in the 1920s this kind of scene was very violent and was not usually seen. "Un Chien Andalou" relies on the audience response to create a desired response, without their response the film has no purpose showing that

How far can it be argued that your chosen fillm prodices a realistic representtion of the people and places they focus on?

The film City Of God is based on the real life experiences of people that live in Rio De Jeneiro. The reality of Rio is that over 7 million people live in farelas and inhabitants have a really low life expectancy ,they are not expected to live past their teen years thanks to the lifestyle that people have there. Violence is a norm there, in the documentary "Favela Rising" it was said that whilst the kids who didn't live in the farelas were going to sleep in cribs listening to bed time stories, the kids who lived in the ferelas go to sleep wherever they can find whilst listening to gun shot and peoples screaming. Violence is obviously one of the main themes of City Of God, but it is not just fiction - it is the reality for people who live in the farelas. The people in the documentary also mentioned how the experiences that they had as a child have affected them for the rest of their lives, they cannot remove the violent memories from their minds and will be with them for the rest of their lives. This gives the impression that they are trapped and will be forever haunted by their life in the farelas, which is implied in the film using visual binary opposition which symbolises the the lack of escape - in the ending scene where rocket is surrounded by the police and the gang, the camera pans around to show that he has no means of escape. Sound also shows how the people feel trapped, they are always preoccupied with the thought that time is passing and they are not going anywhere else which is shown in the ticking sound showing the negative passing time.

Storyboard §wag

Genre of film- Documentary/Urban story film
Target audience- john and the examiners in wales/16+ middle class m+f who have some base knowledge regarding Urban Story themes as the film is going to be based on elements of La Haine
How long- 2-4 minutes.
Key Stylistic Elements- Montage - urban story themes e.g representing minorities - one character throughout the whole film as it would support a key theme of loneliness.
new wave one.

only music playing when jallen is in motion.

based on señor duck
time frame 12;00 - woken up late
mr jallen in the mirror doing hair, booze bottle on the shelf
Time frame
Zoom into face. when it gets to a close up
 flash to a drug  - 0.5 seconds.
cuts to back of head.
shows you walking from the back.
shots of jallo walking
shot behind bars, trapped in addictions
goes and sits on the bench so music stops.
Longshot, close up of jallen on the bench with frequent flashbacks to the druggy alcohol things
maybe colour when he gets up
smiley man now because of lovely thinking on the bench
crossing over a bridge to new ways

Discuss Some Of The Ways In Which Film Or Video Work You Have Studied For This Topic Requires Different Kinds Of Spectatorship From That Which Spectators Bring To Their Mainstream Film Going?

Spectators will have different experiences when viewing mainstream films in comparison to experimental films due to the fact that they are both constructed in very different ways. Mainstream films are mainstream for a reason, they are easy to understand and allow the viewer to watch it passively without giving it much thought. Their main purpose is entertainment and they have a very wide audience as there is generally nothing to figure out from mainstream films, they are usually quite obvious and are a very easy watch with a simple storyline which lots of people can relate to. They are not usually very controversial so they are just quite simple in terms of themes and contexts. This is a really big contrast to experimental films, they are not as popular as mainstream films and definitely do not engage a wide audience as it requires the spectator to think a lot, they cannot simply passively sit and watch it and enjoy it. These films sometimes do not have any storyline or narrative, they are generally very surreal and have a lot of random clips put in together - the spectator needs to be an active viewer. An example of an experimental film is Un Chien Andalou, made in 1927 by Luis Bunuel. Upon viewing this film without being aware of the directors intentions, to me personally it was not enjoyable because I found it hard to understand. The film is very much a collection of random clips that have no meaning and do not fit together and I found that throughout the film I was constantly trying to find a hidden meaning behind everything or do some sort of analysis which I obviously found very difficult. This is how it differs from a mainstream film, I could not sit back and watch it happily following a storyline, i was constantly confused. It required me to view the film in a different way in order to get to grips with the different surreal, random style. Whilst doing deeper research into the film I found that the directors were very interested in Freuds psychological concept of the unconscious mind and they wanted to depict this in a film. Their aim of the film was to show something that had no meaning, which is a very experimental technique.  When brainstorming ideas for the film they would write down ideas but would not think about them for more than 3 seconds to ensure that no rational thought was incorporated into the film otherwise it would wreck the idea of trying to portray the unconscious mind. This is why I, as a spectator, personally found it hard to view at first until I understand that I had to watch the film in a different way as I would do a mainstream film. "Un Chien Andalou" challenges mainstream films, the film aimed to subvert conventional expectations to explore experiences or observations that cannot be visualised. The directors made it a point to "refuse any image that could have any rational meaning." which is a direct contrast to mainstream films where they generally try to create images that people can relate to and that relate to a story so that the audience can watch the film passively and still be entertained. If experimental films were released into the cinema for example, they would not appeal to a wide audience as people would not know how to respond to the images they were being seen as they would not make sense of them due to the fact they would need to change the way they view films, which is why the films require a different type of spectatorship than mainstream films.

How Useful Has A Particular Critical Approach Been In Gaining A Deeper Understanding And Appreciation Of Your Chosen Film?

Fight Club is a polysemic text, so you can look at it in many different ways and interpret quite a few meanings from it. For example, you could see the film representing a crisis of masculinity or you could apply Freudians theory of psychoanalysis to the text. If you did that you would see Tyler as being the ID. He is the selfish part of the personality. He is irrational and emotional, and can almost be described as a baby as they are selfish and only think about their own needs. The ID is constantly interrupting the ego and is trying to take control, as the ego is based on reality. It tries to meet the ID's needs of selfish wants and desires but incorporates the real word into everything. It basically tries to balance the personality and please everyone. The ego does have some control of the ID, but not total control. Sometimes the ID can take over. This is depicted in the scene where Jack is talking to Marla, and Tyler keeps calling up from down in the basement. Jack is trying to get back into reality, and also when on the phone to the police discussing the details of his apartment explosion, Tyler runs upstairs and tells Jack what to say. At first jack resists, but then repeats what Tyler says. This is a representation of the ID influencing the ego in the way that the ID is trying to steer the ego away from reality, and the ego loses control eventually and the ID has full control of what jack (the ego) is saying. This could also imply that Jack and Tyler are the same person, as the ID and ego are aspects of the personality in one individual.

'Experimental Film requires a different kind of spectatorship.' Has this been your experience?

'Experimental Film requires a different kind of spectatorship.' Has this been your experience? [35]

Experimental films are full of strange mixtures of images, situations, words and expressions that may not tell a cohesive story but, in the end, don't have to in order to achieve an emotional goal. This type of film therefore requires the spectator to shift their conventional cinematic expectations to accommodate more radical narrative techniques, themes and meaning construction. 

Un Chien Andalou, the infamous 1929 surrealist short film from Luis Bunuel and Salvador Dali, attests to this. I found this film quite hard to follow seeing as it was random and nothing in the film really added up. This is how I knew that it would have some kind of surrealism in it. This theory was then confirmed by a scene very close to the introduction, where there is a shot of Luis Brunel looking up at the moon as a cloud was coming towards it, the moon was a full moon so was circular like an eyeball. There was then an extreme close up of a womans face, and he has a sharp knife in his hand. He holds it next to her eye and then the moon shot it shown again, with the cloud going over the moon. This was symbolic as it implied what was going to happen next, the cloud represented the knife and the moon represented the eyeball as in the next shot Luis was shown cutting the womans eye. As I don't really enjoy abstract film too much because I find it hard to make sense of them, scenes where there is symbolism helps me understand the film more so I enjoyed this aspect. 
A scene like this where it showed something that had a shock factor was uncommon for this time, which for me implied that the whole film was trying to go against any mainstream ideas of film. 

Chris Marker became known internationally for the short film La Jetée (1962). It tells of a post-nuclear war experiment in time travel by using a series of filmed photographs developed as a photomontage of varying pace, with limited narration and sound effects. Now add your personal response and discussion of spectatorship issues

Maya Deren’s Meshes of the Afternoon (1943) is a work that maintains all of the mystery, tranquility, unpredictability, and personal attachment that is ever present within the world of dreams. Now add your personal response and discussion of spectatorship issues 

Reflective Analysis

Our video was intended to have similar conventions to other films studied in the Urban Stories genre. The films we studied were ChungKing Express, La Haine, City Of God and Princesses. We chose Chungking Express as our main inspiration especially regarding the films. We focused on a common aspect of Urban Story films and that is the idea that relationships are unsustainable, they cannot begin or end because there is always a form of conflict, something that stops it being established and/or lasting. In our film the conflict was the phone of the male character, it stopped the people from actually being able to carry out the hug that was seen as a vision. You can tell it's a vision as it zooms out from the male characters eye after cutting to where they aren't hugging. In retrospect, we may have used too many effects which may have left it looking a little too edited and perhaps cheap, which although it's common for urban story films to look like they were done on a low budget (as they usually are) they do not have many over the top effects such as the over use of smudge motion.