02a - Wild Stawberries

The narrative analysis emphasized the contained reality of the movie experience. All events happen within frame: view pans and zooms; relative space blocked in close, drops, terminates or carries off the frame or horizon.

To connect the emotional/psychological narrative of a sequence, movies use the manipulation of relationships over time. In the example of Ingmar Bergman’s “Wild Strawberries”, the fundamental relationship is a kind of perpendicular triptych: the camera (narrative viewing eye + frame), the figure, and the background. At times the figure is the man, the clock, the pocketwatch, a second man, or empty. At times the background is close or distant, patterned or blackness. The background is identifiable as static/permanent and fixed, placing all movement in the realm of the camera’s relationship with the man.

changes- camera:character
datum/structure- background (camera:character move about the structure)

[more to come]



NARRATIVE ANALYSIS - Ingmar Bergman's "Wild Strawberries", selection of dream sequence

(START)

1. (01-21) CAMERA CHANGE – I intro

(00-01)figure wearing a dark suit and dark hat enters from right, only visible from the shoulders up, at street corner, in shadow and lost in the black background of a recessed corner structure in dark shadow; the figure walks across the frame, the camera pivots; (01-21)both camera and figure stop in line with heavy curb, which leads the bend in the street and sidewalk up and deep and end at perpendicular intersection, two dark openings in the upstage street wall appear at top left corner of the frame; the figure stops, a white circle with heavy black frame is directly above his head, sitting on the top of his hat (the figure has to this point been shown only from the shoulders up); (the round circle is faintly echoed by the arched entry with black rectangular door to the left) with a pause and slight bounce, figure rotates to scan away from street, then rotates with back to frame and continues in the direction of the line; camera remains still; figure moves off line and continues to the side of it, his entire body revealed the moment he steps up the curb onto the sidewalk (re: before entering the sidewalk, figure was only visible from the shoulders up) the path is gradually recognized as running to a point between a tall slender black rectangle in the back of the stage and the tall thin line of the black lampost; the figure continues along this path, hugging the line of the curb, which, with the lampost, bisects the frame; (the light is hard, the figure casts a strong shadow which fixes to his feet; as the figure walks upstage towards the black rectangle and black lampost line, the frame is revealed to be dived in half by two textures: the grid and lines of the sidewalk and perpendicular facade to the right of the curb line, and the solid polygonal surface blocks of the street and facing facades in the rear); he slows by the white circle above him and begins to pivot, looking up.

2. (21-26) CAMERA CHANGE – to II original path

(21-26) up close to the figure, from behind, at an oblique angle to perpendicular wall, the dark of the figure taking nearly half the frame, (camera perhaps on line of curb, figure off line); figure continues pivot, looking up, face in shadow, blending in with the dark hat; right side of frame window frame, left side lines of solid facade surface; camera free, laterally adjusts with figure, until figure steps backwards, allowing him to move to the left of the frame, center texture a perfect combination of both side textures;

3. (26-28) CAMERA CHANGE - to III clock focus

(26-28) camera at figure eye level, looking up, fixed; frame split: at right is the white circle with black frame clock (with two circles of eyeglasses sign beneath), and the left is a blank square with ornate line of mount connecting clock circle to wall square, casting shadow (cameras 2 and 3 may mirror on the x/y axis about the plane of the white circle clock).

4. (28-34) CAMERA CHANGE – to IIb get pocketwatch

(28-34) return to camera II, though slightly pulled back to reveal more figure (to thigh), more sidwalk pattern, and to reveal shadow on right wall, recognizable as that of the ornate connection line; figure reaches in to his coat pocket, without breaching his dark silhouette, and produces something in his hand; he tilts his head down to view it, casting the shadow of his hat down across his face.

5. (34-36) CAMERA CHANGE – to IV see pocketwatch

(34-36) camera fixed, by right shoulder, direction of previous path, fixed; frame composed of circular pocketwatch right of center mid frame, and circle created by shape of hand to the left of center mid frame, background of sidewalk texture; watch cover opens to reveal horizontal white circle of previous clock; underside of cover reflective.

6. (36-53) CAMERA CHANGE – to II pocket & recover

(36-47) return to first II position, figure shown waist up, left center; figure continues gaze at watch, deposits watch in different pocket (originally retrieved with right, now deposited with left, enabling right hand to:), and returns gaze up (connection to clock); his white right hand rises across his face to remove his hat; hat moves back with his head, off and sweeps over his shoulder, across his face, and down off frame; figure pauses, gaze fixed upwards at clock; hands transfer hat, fiddle with hat briefly at waist/edge of frame; right hand raises to cover and wipe his face; figure begins to move to center of frame; at center (47-53) camera pivots (loose) following the figure (kept center frame) towards wall; figure stops in the full shadow figure of the clock; frame divided with window frame now the left, heavy facade lines to the right; figure leans against wall.

7. (53-55) CAMERA CHANGE - to V (see III) clock again

(53-55) camera at view of figure, up right, fixed (similar to III, mirrored along path; more zoom in V); bottom right quadrant of frame taken by clock, cropped; clock in silhouette against white sky; angle of clock in relation to mount and wall

8. (55-1:00) CAMERA CHANGE – to VI (see III) zoom in

(55-1:00) camera at location of III, eye level of figure, focused on figure head in center frame, zoom; figure remains in shadow, white hand slowly dropping from his face (raised off camera presumably); background the heavy lines of the masonry facade (no window frame), and figural shadow of clock; zoom from waist to chest, head at top of frame (most white, black figure body, gray background split dark and light); zoom also lowers heavy black line down frame; figure now parallel with facade frame plane.

9. (1:00-1:30) CAMERA CHANGE – to VII elevation march

(1:00-1:04) new camera perpendicular to sidwalk path, showing elevation of street front; scene rotated 90cw; full figure shown 1/5 size of frame, relates to building scale (double stories), to bays of facades, beginning in a section of heavy lines; figure begins to move, (1:04-1:11) camera moves on track with figure, keeping figure left of center; passes window, narrow heavy line, blank, boarded window with horizontal at head and waist height (passes behind thin black lamp post with bulbous lamp head at top, hitting just below the bottom of second floor windows), blank, and across the dark black recessed entry (1:11-1:22)(camera briefly centers moving figure when he crosses into the black area, then holds back and freezes to let the figure travel slightly left again; foreshadows the figures forthcoming pause), pausing in the left half of the dark opening; long pause; figure rotates and looks at the path he came; leans and begins walk back in the direction came, (1:22-1:28)camera moves dollies right with figure moving in to center of frame; passes out of black, blank, boards (and behind the lamppost), blank line, window, line, heavy dark entry (under clock, now seen only as black line of frame perpendicular to camera), (1:28-1:30) camera freezes, figure obscured by long shadows cast by unseen objects across street off camera (trees), brief glimpse by more lines and blank, into darkness (original black pocket at start of scene).

10. (1:30-1:37) CAMERA CHANGE – to VIII black

(1:30-1:35) camera fixed; black canvas; figure enters from left, shoulders up, head at top of frame; side profile of bright white head; white head figure moves to center of frame; stops, pauses in profile facing to the right of the frame (looking back from where he originally entered the scene); figure head slowly turns to face the camera; (1:35-1:37) camera slight zoom in on the face.

11. (1:37-1:39) CAMERA CHANGE – to IX bad street

(1:37-1:39) new camera, fixed view; new view of new scene, where lines of curb, windows, surface of sidwalk and street, carry from bottom right to top left of frame; perspectival view shows horizon line elevated (topographic change from the flatness of prior scene), implication of secondary space as distant facade shows bend in the street; top left frame of a distant and anonymous character with field of windows; surface on right of frame in shadow.

12. (1:39-1:42) CAMERA CHANGE – to VIII back to black

(1:39-1:42) return to camera VIII, still black background, figure’s white head slightly right of center, facing camera, gazes; slowly turns to the left; in profile, hair begins to blow back as figure moves towards left of frame.

13. (1:42-1:44) CAMERA CHANGE – to I (modified) old path new figure

(1:42-1:44) camera fixed, same location as where camera I ended, though slightly more forward, cropping the turn at the curb and facade; solid black figure (silhouette) positioned at previous path first destination.

14. (1:44-1:46) CAMERA CHANGE – to VIII leaving black

(1:44-1:46) return to camera VIII, still black background, figure’s white head taking right half of frame, moves slightly right, then moves left, back in the direction from which he just came (END)