Aesthetics:
Philosophical approach to art concerned with value of works and how they're experienced.
Aesthetic cognitive = value of a work lies in its ability to help us understand, order and illuminate everyday experience.
Other approaches = value = enjoyment, pleasure, or emotional stimulation
How can a film be effective, affective or thoughtful
Inquiring into the nature of the cinematic experience
Anti-cinema (informal):
Any form of cinema that defies cinematic conventions (see: postmodernism)
Eg. Ozu, Ida.
ARG:
Alternate reality games
Interactive networked narrative that uses the real world as a platform and employs transmedia storytelling
Has specific terminology - puppet master, the curtain, rabbit hole, tinag (this is not a game)
Real life as medium
Platformless narrative (not bound to a medium)
Collaborative storytelling
Cognitivism (Cognitive Film Theory):
Psychological processes involved in acquisition, organisation and use of knowledge
Viewers' response to film form devices though rational and conscious interpretation
Challenged uy non-cognitive responses to film as well as questions of aesthetics
Distanced from film analysis that aim to uncover underlying codes, meanings, deep structures, etc. - semiotics, structuralism, ideological criticism, and psychoanalytic film theory.
Cybertext:
"A machine for the production of variety of expression" (Aarseth 1997, p. 3).
Focus on form, not content
"Cybertext is a perspective I use to describe and explore the communication strategies of dynamic texts" (Aarseth 1997, p. 5).
"The mechanical organization of the text by positing the intricacies of the medium as an integral part of the literary exhange" (Aarseth 1997, p. 1)
Empirical:
Based on, concerned with, or verifiable by observation or experience rather than theory or pure logic.
Ergodic:
Aarseth: cybertext
Requires nontrivial effort to navigate
not medium specific; concerned with mechanisms of form
Text-as-game (not text v game)
Film-as-game (film v game)
"Mechanical organisation of the text by positing the intricacies of the medium as an integral part of the literary exchange" (Aarseth 1997, p. 1)
FMV:
Full motion video
Video game narration techniquew that rely on rec-recorded video to display action
Games that are primarily presented through FMVs referred to as full-motion video games or interactive films
Interactive film:
A video game or interactive media that has the characteristics of cinematic film
In video game industry, refers to a movie game
In film industry, refers to interactive cinema
Inclusive of FMVs, but mostly refers to choice-based narratives
Heavy rain - discourse around interactive film or video game? Does it matter?
Interactive video:
Digital video with clickable 'hotspots' which perform an action when touched
Might trigger info, jump to a new video, change the story line
Neoformalism:
A method of film criticism that moves away from the interpretive theory and towards a more empirical analysis of film, developed by David Bordwell.
Film narrative and stylistic form
Activity of the viewer in making sense of films
Meaning in any film emerges through a combination of devices (form, style, content)
Perception, emotion and cognition on viewers' part are central in the functioning of a films formal qualities.
Postmodernism (film):
Subvert the mainstream conventions of narrative structure and characterisation
Test the audience's suspension of belief
Such films typically break down cultueral divide between high and low art
Does not abide by traditional narrative expression
Three key characteristics: homage and pastiche, meta-reference/self-reflexivity, bridging of gap between low and high brow artistic styles
Often concerned with liminality
Segmentation:
A process of dividing a film into its sequences in order to analyse its form.
Signiconic:
Coined by Mark Danielewski
Sign + icon
"Rather than engage those textual faculties of the mind remediating the pictorial or those visual faculties remediating language, the signiconic simultaneously engages both in order to lessen the significance of both and therefore achieve a third perception" (Daniewski, nd.)
Taxonomy:
Scheme of classification, especially a hierarchical classification, in which things are organised into groups or types; empirical/objective classification and filtration of observable characteristics.
Textual Analysis:
Breaking a film down into its formal elements: narrative and style.
In some: goal to expose underlying meaning - groundwork for symptomatic readings.
Alternative approach - neoformalist.
Detailed breakdown or close reading.
Segmentation as a tool.
Transmedia storytelling
Telling a story or experience across multiple platforms and formats using digital technologies
Various delivery channels