I've coined a term: Visual Poetry. It was the only way I could explain what I feel is the only way to make a movie. Films are primarily visual, and the clever use of images within the photographed frame is the very reason I got into this business to begin with.
Example: The famous "match cut" in Lawrence of Arabia. Lawrence holds up the match and blows it out, the picture cuts instantly to the pre-dawn desert even before the match has gone out and the sound of O'Toole's breath carries over as well. Then, slowly, as the music builds, the sun breaks over the vast, sterile landscape, and we are there.
Another example: Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Truffaut hears the famous five note tune through an earphone ("Ecouté! Ecouté!") and begins to play the notes on an electronic piano keyboard. He plays it at least twice and just when his finger is going to play it over again, the image cuts straight to Barry's xylophone and he continues the transition by tapping out the same five note theme.
I'll give another Spielberg example, then let that director's work drop: Jaws. Mayor Vaughn unequivocally tells Chief Brody that the beaches will be open tomorrow morning for the 4th of July, then sits down in his car and drives off. Everyone misses this, except for me – as he sits down, a "One Way" street sign can be seen behind him. In other words, Mayor Vaughn's thinking is purely one way, which leads to disastrous consequences.
There are many, many other fine examples and it really boggles my mind at the number of people who really don't think that's what movies are all about. So many, especially younger people who shun classic films as so much primitive rubbish, think a great screenplay is a character walking around making unrealistic and snide comments while carrying a Sunny Delight jug.
But it's more than that, our minds think in images, not words. We can think about words but our brains are animal, so they think in images. Motion pictures are, first and foremost, motion PICTURES. Not knowing what has come before, what great images have been conjured up by great directors in the past, is utterly foreign to me. How does one even desire to come all the way to Los Angeles to be a screenwriter/filmmaker/procrastinator when one doesn't "get it," doesn't revel in these great images?? How can a dream, based solely on the idea of writing just words and not images for the screen, get somebody to drop everything and move here? It's like setting out on a literary career without knowing the classics.
Another example, and please bear with me on this one, you might learn something: Howards End. Margaret Schlegel (Emma Thompson) approaches Henry Wilcox (Anthony Hopkins) in the hospital. Ruth, Henry's wife, is dying so Margaret, her friend, leans over and takes Henry's hand sympathetically. The shot holds for a bit as their hands are clasped, then cuts directly to the nurse taking Ruth's hand and placing it on a notepad, where she begins to write the legacy that will leave her childhood home, Howards End, to Margaret. This one shot encompasses the crux of the film – through a series of events, Margaret will eventually become Henry's second wife and will ultimately inherit Howards End.
There are simpler examples. In The Lion in Winter, two of the boys are plotting with the young king of France to take over the throne from their older brother, Richard the Lionheart. No great cinematic tricks in this scene, since the film is directly derived from the stage play, but if you look in the foreground you will see the entire bottom of the Cinemascope frame lined with chess pieces the two boys had been playing with before the scene began. This lends a subconscious image in our minds – they are playing a game, and a dangerous one at that.
All right, one more, and this one is ancient: Murnau's Faust, 1926. Faust is standing outside Gretchen's open bedroom window and, after they've gazed longingly at each other for awhile (silent movies, pshaw!) she gets frightened at his intentions and tries to close the two window panes. He pushes on them with his hands, she pushes back. The scene is lit only from the inside of her room so Faust and his hands are almost in silhouette. She eventually cannot withstand his strength (isn't that always the case) and gives in. He pushes the windows open and she leans defeated against the wall, almost as if he's already taken her virginity.
So there you have it. Visual Poetry. Perhaps I should ™ that term.
Hmmmmm…