(Related article: Practical Application of the Atoms of Cinema, Part I)
We're going way beyond Screenwriting 101 this time. We're getting as basic as we can get. And we're taking the long road to get there.
There is something in scientific fields of study that can be called the “basic primary unit.” The basic primary unit (let's call it BPU for short) is the smallest element that the subject or field of study can be broken down to and still retain the qualities of that subject. These primary units are the building blocks from which everything in that field is composed.
Anyone who has taken a class in chemistry can tell you that chemistry's basic primary unit is a single atom. Everything is made up of atoms, and a single atom still retains the qualities of its chemical element. But if we try to break the atom down further, we get nothing but a mass of protons, neutrons, and electrons, and all of the atom's elemental qualities are lost.
In biology, the study of living things, the BPU is a single living cell. Every living creature is made up of one or more cells, and each cell carries out all the activities of life; such as metabolism, reproduction, growth, and death. However, if you try to break a cell down further, you are left with only bits and pieces that cannot carry on the functions of life on their own.
It seems nearly every legitimate field of study has its own BPU. But the question that struck me one day – does cinema have this? Is it possible to break cinema down to a single crucial element that makes up its whole? Then, if it does, can we as writers use this knowledge to better understand and practice our craft?
Now I know what some people are already thinking: “We're talking about art here, not science. Ooh-la-dee-dah ART! It defies the kind of structured analysis applied to sciences.” Well then, you would be wrong. Abasic primary unit can be identified in the arts just as clearly as in the sciences.
For example, literature. Being a written medium, literature has a basic primary unit of a single written word. An author is able to express meaning with a single word, and through their cumulative collection, builds higher and more complex levels of meaning. However, the author cannot express meaning with any unit smaller than a single word, such as a broken syllable or a single letter. The BPU of music is, of course, a single musical note. In photography, the most basic unit is a single photon of light. It is through the creative manipulation of where and how photons expose a frame of film that the photographer makes his or her art.
The BPU is easy to see in artistic mediums such as literature or photography. But what about cinema? Cinema is complex, an amalgam of nearly all arts; one of images, sounds, words--both read in type and spoken aloud--movement, time and space. Any approach that favors word over image, or image over sound, or any one element over another would be incomplete since it ignores the total sensory experience that is cinema. Thus, stating that the basic primary unit of cinema is a single image would be false. So would be a single action, or a single line of dialogue, or a word on the script's page. An entire script/film can naturally be broken down into individual scenes, but what of the materials that compose those scenes? Just like the cellular structure of the human body, the existence of cinema is made up of a complex structure which is itself made up of even smaller and equally complex structures.
To figure this all out, we need to take a step back and get even more basic. Cinema is an art. Let's define what an “art” is. Art is the communication of ideas (whether those ideas be concrete or abstract, intellectual or emotional) by a creator to an audience through a creative medium. At its simplest level, all art is communication. Without some manner of communication between two parties -- the artist who originates the idea and fixes it into a creative medium, and the audience who receives and comprehends the idea -- a work cannot be art.
If concept is a hard to follow, pretend I grabbed a camera and took a snapshot of the chair I am currently sitting in. Now I could show this snapshot to you, but it would not be art. Why? Because I had no intention to communicate anything with that photograph. The only thing stated by the photograph is “here is a chair.” On the other hand, if I creatively manipulated the elements within the photograph to express some secondary meaning other than the simple statement that this chair exists, then the photograph would be art.
So, we have established that art is communication. Okay, that means cinema is a form of communication. But, what is it that cinema communicates? (Let's get simpler again.) What is the only thing transmitted through ANY process of communication?
The answer: Information. Communication transmits information.
Let's jump forward now, back into the craft of screenwriting: “The scene should always be moving forward” is the advice I give most often when it comes to writing effective scenes. “The story should always be moving forward” is the advice I give most often when it comes to an effective plot. I cannot count how many times I have told a writer that no piece of dialogue should ever be in a scene without good reason. Every line should have a purpose. It should do something to move the scene towards its goal. Likewise, in the larger structure, every scene should accomplish something to move the story towards its ultimate goal and resolution.
Years ago, I was engaged in an in depth analysis of Joel & Ethan Coen's Fargo. The one thing that stood out about the film was its elegant efficiency. Nothing in the Coens' scenes went to waste. Not only did every line of dialogue have a purpose, but there was not a single action, or a single visual image, that did not do something to move the story forward.
How are these two points connected? Cinema is an art that communicates information. A good script such as Fargo is effective because everything in it moves the story forward. The real reason Fargo is an excellent film is because every element works to tell us (tells the audience) a piece of NEW INFORMATION. Every thing seen or heard in that film worked to communicate new information and thus move the story forward.
Thus, we have found what makes up the atoms of cinema, the elemental building block, its most basic primary unit. The smallest element of cinema is the COMMUNICATION OF A SINGLE PIECE OF NEW INFORMATION. This is true whether the information is communicated visually, verbally, or acoustically. It is solely through the communication of singular pieces of information that the audience comprehends the cinematic experience. The viewer begins the film with a blank slate. From there on, the viewer's story experience is made up completely by the ongoing accumulation of individual pieces of information. These are the building blocks by which filmmakers build effective scenes, and which the scenes, taken together in a larger super-structure, create an effective and satisfying narrative whole. All atoms on the same subject connect to become molecules of story elements, story elements combine to create structures, and the structures make up the whole of the entire narrative. Every bit of your script; every line, every action, every image; should be a building block which, bit by bit, chunk by chunk, adds important information that moves the story forward.
With this as our starting point, we as writers can begin to understand a lot about just how stories can manipulate the audience's minds by giving – and withholding – atoms of information. In a future post, I will explore the practical application of this idea and how it can be used to create better, more effective scenes.
