2. Language: They vary from the written text of the play in the film adaption. Variation from text is not uncommon in the performance of drama or in film adaptions so that isn’t surprising. Where and when they choose to change it though, is interesting.
3. Narrator: Vivian plays a huge double role, as narrator and as an actual character. She switches back and forth between the two, seemingly in one breath sometimes. The narrator-Vivian seems almost always composed and very intellectual. The exceptions were when she was throwing up, though not as completely as in the scene where Vivian is crying and hyperventilating with Sally and the popsicle.
4. Plot: The events and story unfold in an order that helps share both a feeling and a message. Especially in drama.
5. Set/setting: There is a lot of putting characters in settings which they don’t seem to belong, and having characters flip between settings, especially when Vivian is in memory mode.
6. Stage directions: They made choices of how to keep with the spirit of what is written in the stage directions, without actually doing it for the most part. On stage, this would be a very fluid performance as far as the set and the stage directions would go. In the movie there are transitions and different segments.
7. Actor: facial expressions and voice inflections. Emma Thompson did a remarkable job playing different versions of herself and especially making it clear that it is a different version of herself.
8.
Camera angle/framing/zoom/focus: Generally it is
used to put our attention where it should be. In this case it also subtly brought
our focus to other things, like hospital equipment, or the circumstance of the
scene. The slow zoom is often used for Vivian’s monologue. Camera angle is used
in conjunction with the sometimes unusual setting very effectively. There are
foreground and background shots when we are looking across something blurry or back
to something blurry that we need to pay attention to. 9. Music: They used part of Shostakovich’s String Quartet No. 15 in E-Flat Minor, but they didn’t use very much of it that I could tell. It was also much louder in comparison to the rest of the background sounds and music. The piano and strings piece by Arvo Part Spiegel im Spiegel, was also used fairly frequently and was a returning motif. Though I didn’t particularly notice very many other uses of music, they did have some other pieces they used, which is generally a good thing in a film, to not particularly notice the music.
10. Sound: when everything was relatively quiet, they deliberately had quiet background hospital sounds with no music. They also used sounds, louder than “normal,” to accentuate what was happening. This seemed to be for the purpose of creating a juxtaposition and to help us feel the uncomfortableness of the situation, or the wrongness of it. For example in the scene with the pelvic exam or where Vivian died.
The medium of film is very good because it's all very cohesive. All of the pieces are working together to create a larger whole. The analysis of the use of the camera along with the music, text, and setting could come together to resonate along themes of regret and choices, or on human truth vs. scholarship, John Donne, Wit, Conceit, even cancer and death. Maybe this whole story is just a facade and an elaborate metaphor, which since this is a play and NONE of it is real, is exactly right. The point of all this is "Not insuperable barriers, not semicolons, just a comma."
Working Thesis Statements
I'm having a difficult time figuring out how to include formal elements in my thesis.
1. Though the subject matter of Wit is cancer, it is not a commentary on cancer and death, rather it is an elaborate metaphor about the role of choices and consequences.
2. While Narrator Vivian is not really always composed, why does she always try to be composed? What is her motivation for telling this story? Who is she telling the story to? How does the setting and switching places in a scene help tell her story?
3. The music and background sounds of Wit helps us better understand Vivian's complex character and purpose.
I think writing about the medium of film vs. the print version of this play is a great idea. Your arguments could deal individually with camera work, music, and setting--things you don't get in just text. However, is that a different idea than the analysis of metaphors, or would you work it into the paper somehow? And what would be the point that you're trying to argue?
ReplyDeleteI think analyzing the camera work vs stage directions would be really interesting. You could go into why you think they chose certain angles for certain scenes and what effect it had, and then you could compare that with the stage directions. You have a ton of great ideas, I would just be careful about not trying to tackle too many ideas at once because you'd only be able to cover all of them a little or go in depth in a few.
ReplyDeleteFirstly, I love that you identified the pieces in the soundtrack. I feel a bit silly (as a classical music nerd) for not realizing that the music wasn't composed for the film. Good job!
ReplyDeleteSecondly, and on the topic of music, I like how you noted the silences. I think oftentimes silences in films are underrated for their cleverness and, frankly, taken for granted--even if the scene would be drastically different with a soundtrack. You were clearly paying really close attention. I definitely think this is a good observation that a compelling argument could be made from.