Storytelling in Film and Television
eBook - PDF

Storytelling in Film and Television

  1. 413 pages
  2. English
  3. PDF
  4. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - PDF

Storytelling in Film and Television

About this book

Derided as simple, dismissed as inferior to film, famously characterized as a vast wasteland, television nonetheless exerts an undeniable, apparently inescapable power in our culture. The secret of television's success may well lie in the remarkable narrative complexities underlying its seeming simplicity, complexities Kristin Thompson unmasks in this engaging analysis of the narrative workings of television and film.

After first looking at the narrative techniques the two media share, Thompson focuses on the specific challenges that series television presents and the tactics writers have devised to meet them--tactics that sustain interest and maintain sense across multiple plots and subplots and in spite of frequent interruptions as well as weeklong and seasonal breaks. Beyond adapting the techniques of film, Thompson argues, television has wrought its own changes in traditional narrative form. Drawing on classics of film and television, as well as recent and current series like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The Sopranos, and The Simpsons, she shows how adaptations, sequels, series, and sagas have altered long-standing notions of closure and single authorship. And in a comparison of David Lynch's Blue Velvet and Twin Peaks, she asks whether there can be an "art television" comparable to the more familiar "art cinema."

Information

Publisher
Harvard University Press
Year
2003
Print ISBN
9780674010871
9780674010635
eBook ISBN
9780674260658
Topic
Media & Performing Arts
Subtopic
Film & Video
dangling 
causes 
prepare 
us 
for 
a 
change 
of 
time 
and 
space, 
how 
motifs 
create
echoes 
and 
parallels, 
how 
goals 
are 
formulated, 
recast, 
thwarted, 
or
achieved—and, 
most 
basically, 
to 
see 
how 
classical 
ªlms 
achieve 
their 
ªne-
grained, 
scene-to-scene 
comprehensibility. 
One 
further 
aim 
of 
analyzing 
the
ªlms 
in 
chronological 
order 
is 
to 
facilitate 
video 
viewings 
of 
each 
with 
these
analyses 
in 
hand.
I 
will 
also 
use 
each 
ªlm 
to 
formulate 
an 
additional 
generalization 
that 
can
be 
applied 
to 
contemporary 
classical 
cinema—a 
“ªnal 
lesson.” 
Some 
of 
these
will 
address 
issues 
of 
how 
storytelling 
in 
the 
New 
Hollywood 
might 
be 
im-
proved. 
There 
is 
a 
widespread 
perception 
that 
Hollywood 
ªlmmaking 
en-
tered 
a 
period 
of 
doldrums 
during 
the 
mid- 
to 
late 
1990s, 
with 
formulaic
narratives 
predominating. 
Yet 
there 
is 
also 
evidence 
that 
this 
slump 
has 
been 
a
passing 
phase 
in 
a 
generally 
stable 
system. 
I 
will 
develop 
this 
theme 
further 
in
the 
ªnal 
chapter.
MODERN 
CLASSICISM
49

Table of contents

  1. Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright
  4. Dedication
  5. Contents
  6. Preface
  7. Chapter 1. Modern Classicism
  8. Chapter 2. Tootsie
  9. Chapter 3. Back to the Future
  10. Chapter 4. The Silence of the Lambs
  11. Chapter 5. Groundhog Day
  12. Chapter 6. Desperately Seeking Susan
  13. Chapter 7. Amadeus
  14. Chapter 8. The Hunt for Red October
  15. Chapter 9. Parenthood
  16. Chapter 10. Alien
  17. Chapter 11. Hannah and Her Sisters
  18. Chapter 12. Hopes and Fears for Hollywood
  19. Appendix A. Large-Scale Portions of Classical Films
  20. Appendix B. Bombs, or What Makes Bad Films Bad?
  21. Notes
  22. Index

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Yes, you can access Storytelling in Film and Television by Kristin Thompson,Kristin Thompson in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Media & Performing Arts & Film & Video. We have over 1.5 million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.