The Classical Narrative System

Following the 1927 Wall street crash America entered a period of recession which continued into the 1930’s.

With the advent of sound the cost of producing movies rose and so studios needed more money to make films. Investors, keen to see a return on their money, wanted films that would please audiences. This meant that films being made became generic. It was safer and more efficient for them to make a crime film or a western to a specific formula that would guarantee a good audience reaction than it was to experiment with story or format. Investors also wanted to ensure that audiences wouldn’t be offended by what they saw in a story. This gave rise to the now cliched morals or “American Family Values”.

Issues such as drugs, racism, or abortion, would absolutely not be raised in a classical narrative.The goal of producers at the time was to create an illusion - to tell a seamless story that the audience would get involved in and so not think about how the movie was made. The economic problems of the time could be the cause for this escapism mentality. Audiences were eager to try and forget their problems and their financial situation.

They wouldn’t be interested in seeing a documentary on how bad things really were.What follows is an account of what a classical narrative is as defined through it’s iconography and technical requirements. It aims to look at why the particular codes were developed and standardised and to show why and how they work.The unification of the narrative structure could be said to have begun in 1932 when, following the introduction of sound, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences standardised screenplay format including the size (length) and structure.

Screenplays should now be of 120 pages in length and contain three acts. This meant that screenwriters now had a format to fit the formulas for their genre films onto. It wasn’t long before it developed to the point were character development and turning points in the story had designated pages by which they should have occurred and been resolved within the script. It was here, first, that the cinematic image became secondary to the requirements of a specific type of story.In any classical narrative a problem arises early on in the story which disrupts the peace of the fictional world. It is then up to the protagonist, usually a male hero figure, to resolve all of the problems necessary to return that world to order.

This could be said to be the definition of a classical narrative.The course of the narrative is focused on coming to terms with the disruption so that every problem raised by the disruption is addressed leading to a high level of closure. Typically, classical narrative stories are structured with a beginning, a middle and an end in mind. This strict linear sequence allows the events of the story to be driven by a cause and effect momentum.

Typically, events take place in a fictional world designed to be as realistic as possible. This illusion is meant to get the audience emotionally involved by being familiar, and therefore relateable to them. In many cases to accomplish this the town or city scape can be entirely fictional and not have a counterpart in the real world. Bedford Falls in It’s A Wonderful life (1946 Frank Capra USA) is a good example of this. Bedford Falls acts as a typical middle class American town that the audience can feel for as George Baily (James Steward) tries to protect it from the greed of the banker Potter (Lionel Barrymore).

This verisimilitude applies to the physical space and the time of the setting to make it appear as realistic as possible. This “realism” is essential in making the cause and effect sequence of events from disruption to conclusion seem logical to an audience.In a classic narrative the events of the story are character driven with the story arc following the development of the central character - the hero. The hero is the one facing the problem and as he over comes and resolves this problem the story progresses with him. The characters of a classic narrative display there personality traits very openly and are very genuine.

Characters are always relateable by the audience - the little sister, the guy who doesn’t get the girl, the strange neighbour. This is important in creating the fictional realism and getting the audience emotionally involved with the characters.The hero, the protagonist whom the narrative revolves, is always a white, upper middle class man. His iconography can vary from genre to genre. John Wayne can be identified as the hero from his white hat and colt 45 in numerous films such as Red River (1948 Howard Hawks USA) while Humphry Bogart prefers sporting a trench coat such as in Casablanca (1942 Michael Curtiz USA).

Women never play a key role in a classical narrative. Rather than be the subject of the story they are objects in it, a part of the scenery used to add to the illusion and propel the narrative. Their roles typically involve either being wholesome, married with children and an active member of society, or being bitter, untrustworthy and sexually active. They serve the protagonist emotionally through being looked by him at or serving him. Their iconography reflects this - the wholesome servant can be seen in a gingham dress such as Dorothy (Judy Garland) in The Wizard Of Oz (1939 Victor Flemming USA) who wants to get back to Uncle Joe, while Bette Davis in The Letter (1940 William Wyler USA) is dressed in a tightly fitted, classic cut dress as she commits adultery and murder.

This iconography became very important to the standardisation of the classical narrative structure because it was during this time that producers and investors used the “star system” to promote films. The star system was when actors would go under a contract to work exclusively for a particular studio and as such that studio would benefit from that actors celebrity. They would also associate a particular actor with a particular genre like John Wayne and Westerns. Casablanca is the best example of how this worked as audiences went to see it for Bogart and Bergman’s on screen romance because of their rumoured off scene one. It was this that led to the use of iconography over symbolism as it was important for studios to promote an image that audiences could immediately relate to. The coat and hat, for example, makes the character more identifiable “oh that’s Humphry Bogart he’s the hero”.

In many cases there was also a spectator character who is not necessarily the central hero. The role of the spectator character is to relate to the audience as someone who watches the film and works through the linear narrative with you, such as the reporter Thompson (William Alland) in Citizen Kane (1941 Orson Welles USA) who works throughout the film in an attempt to find out what the resolution, Rosebud, is.Also adding to the unification of the narrative structure was that investors demanded to see that their money was being spent efficiently. This led to a very structured approach to movie making in Hollywood that would maximise time, equipment, expertise and energy. This structure included script writing, editing, camera operations and lighting.

The classic basic lighting set-up is known as three point lighting. It consists of a key light - which should be the brightest light, a backlight - to show background detail and a fill light to add dept to the image. While making the actors appear best on film it also serves the illusion through directing the gaze of the audience. The viewers eye will always focus on what’s brightest in the frame - so the gaze of viewers can be directed with the placement of the key light.

Editing is assembling the individual shots to create an experience from different points of view. It’s principle purpose, however, is to move the story along to the resolution while maintaining the illusion of the narrative. This is done though ordering each of the individual shots to a strict linear time line. Doing this makes a sequence of events believable by an audience as they can see the disruption to the narrative followed by the effect of that disruption. It also serves it add to the illusion as it creates a realistic time line between individual shots allowing the audience to follow the story without questioning the sudden spatial change.There are several rules that help achieve this illusion.

If these rules are broken the audience will begin to question the illusion of the narrative. The first is the thirty degree rule. This rule states that to edit “invisibly” the camera set-up must have changed by at least thirty degrees otherwise it will appear that the image has simply shifted or jumped rather than changed. The second is the one hundred and eighty degree rule that states that if the camera set-up is changed by more than one hundred and eighty degrees it will appear to the audience as if everything has suddenly turned backwards.

Also of importance in maintaining the illusion are the size of each individual shot and how they are placed in the finished sequence. The idea behind this is to direct the gaze of the audience to important details and to establish the space within a scene or location. To do this a sequence will usually start with an establishing shot - a shot of the location were action will take place. This is followed by a closer shot to call the audiences attention to details and to characters. Then a long shot is put into the sequence to establish the space of the area were the action will take place. All of these rules, and more besides, can be seen in the crop dusting sequence in North by Northwest (1959 Alfred Hithcock USA).

The sequence opens with a wide aerial shot of a bus pulling up surrounded by an open field. Roger (Cary Grant) steps off the bus and as the bus leaves we see his surroundings and how isolated he is.This is followed by a series of closer shots that focuses on Roger and his watch. Giving us the impression that he’s waiting impatiently.

The longer shots, used to establish spatial relations are also point of view shots that help us relate to Roger’s isolation - we see that there’s no one around as he looks up the road. We can also see the 180 degree rule in play here. As Roger looks up and down the road the “line” isn’t crossed as we stay on the same side of the road. The sequence continues in this fashion of close shot followed by long shots to establish the space. The creation of this fictional space in the mind of the audience is very important to the climax of the sequence.

A plane chases Roger through the surrounding field which we’ve seen the size of and know were it is in relation to Roger and the road. The plane then crashes into an oil truck travelling on that road.These rules achieved their purpose of creating an enjoyable, escapist fiction with the 1930’s era being regarded as the “golden age of Hollywood”. In fact Gone With The Wind (1939 Victor Flemming USA) is the highest grossing film of all time. Taking inflation into account it has made more money than Titanic (1997 James Cameron USA) or Star Wars (1977 George Lucus USA) - both of which are generic films that follow the codes of a classical narrative structure to the letter.

There’s still a hero who goes through narrative in an effort to solve the enigma and bring about calm to the disruption creating a high level of resolution.