Date: Fri, 14 Jul 95 10:51:50 EDT
From: ma-AT-dsd.camb.inmet.com (Malgosia Askanas)
Subject: _Short Cuts_ -- random start


I have no idea how to talk about montage, so I'll make up words where
I feel I need them, and then learn better terms from others.  I very much 
urge everybody else to do likewise.  

Three initial observations.  

The credit-sequence of _Short Cuts_ uses the med-fly spraying motif 
to establish an overarching link between the disparate threads.  
The spraying image plays the role of an establishing shot, but differently: 
it is not _we_ who are permitted to see the spatial relationship beween
the threads.  Instead, we are shown an image of _others_ who
presumably see the relationship, and see it from sort of military
perspective.  The link thus stops being purely spatial, and becomes
charged with a military energy.  Also, the threads are linked through
the _sky_, rather than the earth, and a very instrumentalized sky, at
that; a panopticon.  

Altman is always flirting with what, right now, I'll call chain-link montage,
whose grandest example is Bunuel's "Phantom of Liberty".  In this kind
of montage, a marginal character of the current episode (or shot) is s 
permitted to "distract" the film and become the focus of the next episode 
or shot.  I don't think this type of montage corresponds to anything
discussed in C1.

A very powerful totality-releasing effect is produced when two
completely separate threads are brought into contact through, say,
a meeting of two charaters.  The effect is always powerful, but it
does not always belong to the realm of Deleuze's "organic unity";
this very much depends on who meets whom and under what circumstances.
I think the power of the effect comes from the fact that it creates
a new perception of the purposefulness of the film itself, as an
artifact.  I think this might be an interesting area for discussion 
vis-a-vis Deleuze.


- malgosia 


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