**Welcome to Production**
            Morgan McGuire & Shawn Rosenheim

Films are about stories and emotions. However, as Mamet discusses in
_On Directing Film_, you can't film emotions or stories. You can only
film actors, sets, and props. But if you film them well, then the
stories and emotions you seek will emerge in the minds of the
audience.

The differences between actor and character, set and setting, etc. are
important. We use actors and sets, which exist in the real world, to
create the characters and settings, which exist only in the minds of
the audience members. In production, we aspire to the abstract but we
must achieve it through the concrete.  Never lose sight of the material
basis of art.

You're perhaps accustomed to analyzing the impact and genius of works
studied in Comparative Literature and English courses at a high level,
interpreting and decoding the masterpieces. In fact, we selected you
for this course in part because of your success at doing so in the
past.

We're now extending your reach to the production (synthesis)
elements--what objective, practical, and challenging details created
the impact of a film? What changes when we adjust the lights, camera,
framing, blocking, and editing?  For the moment, limit your instinct
to interpret and praise. Begin with how the artifact of the film is
assembled. What is literally on the screen?  How was it created?  What
production constraints drove the aesthetic choices?  How does the
reality of the film and its creation differ from what it purports to
be?  By the end of the semester you'll be back to interpretation, but
able to support it with strong arguments rooted in technique and
process.

We're going to push you to be specific and concrete in your work and
self evaluations. No-one ever has a good "eye" for technical elements
of their own film in the Cold Open assignment. Everyone fails to catch
to even the most gross distinctions between their technique and those
employed in professional productions. That's good, because if someone
received an A+ on the first assignment, then they'd have little to
learn in the course.

Use your self evaluations, screening, and a personal film journal to
start teasing apart the production elements of everything that you see
on screen. For example, the following link is to a film theory guide
to critique:

   http://www2.kumagaku.ac.jp/teacher/dminor/howToCritiqueAMovie.pdf
   
**Do not** follow that process for this course. Cinematography is not
the primary concern of film theorists. Instead, apply production
critique standards:
   
   http://www.cheatsheet.com/entertainment/7-important-areas-to-consider-to-view-a-film-critically.html/
      
which are just an extension of studio art critique standards:
      
   http://www.wikihow.com/Critique-Artwork
        
We anticipate a marked improvement in specificity between the self
(pre-)evaluations, the discussion after the screening first, and the
discussion in the first class. Williams students are quick
learners. We're looking forward to that improvement and to the trend
continuing all semester. The readings will provide many of the
synthesis and analysis tools you need that we can't cover directly in
the limited time of class sessions.


<!-- Markdeep: --><style class="fallback">body{visibility:hidden;white-space:pre;font-family:monospace}</style><script src="https://casual-effects.com/markdeep/latest/markdeep.min.js"></script><script>window.alreadyProcessedMarkdeep||(document.body.style.visibility="visible")</script>