1. Montage
Lovingly made by:
Dan Black, Matthew Brown, Victoria Guerrero, as well as
Evan Harms

2. History
• Montage – French "putting together"
• Story as a whole / symbolic meaning
“To determine the nature of montage is to
solve the specific problem of cinema.”

3. Montage
• The process or technique of selecting,
editing, and piecing together separate
sections of film or video to form a
continuous whole.
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JU9Uwhjlog8

4. Differences
• American – Unity through opposition
• Soviet – Opposite ideas making new
• French – Movement
• German – Light and color

5. Sergei Eisenstein
• One of the first important narrative filmmakers
• Pioneer in the use of montage
• Linkage of shots to evoke emotions
• Methods of Montage:
• 1. Metric
• 2. Rhythmic
• 3. Tonal
• 4. Overtonal
• 5. Intellectual

6. Metric Montage
• Time length of shots
• Combination of shots = Absolute Length
• Example:
• Paint in painting
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D
ig3HDSH9CE

7. Rhythmic Montage
• Rate of action in comparison to music
• Changing shots in time with musical beat
• Acceleration of action compared to music
• Fast action : Slow music
Example:
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b2uLNioV
W-M

8. Tonal Montage
• Tone of shot matches tone of music
• Dark shot will have dark music
• Loud action has loud music
• Example:
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jSTWy25h
RiI

9. Overtonal/Associational
• Combination of all previous (Metric,
Tonal, Rythmic)
• Abstract + Complicated effect
• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a
miVgxYQ3q8

10. Eisenstein’s
Features of Film
• Primo - Photo-fragments of nature
• This is the distorted fragment of nature
(Only a part of nature is seen)
• Secundo - The combination of the
fragments of nature, which thus creates
a scene (also known as a montage)

11. Eisenstein’s Dialectic Approach to
Film Form
• Philosophical
• Projection of opposing views in film can abstractly
create a process of thinking
• Artistic
• The same projection which concretely creates
and gives form to film makes the film.
• Combination of abstract and concrete projection
creates conflict
• Fundamental concept of approach to film form.

12. Art
• “Art is Always Conflict”
• According to:
• It’s social mission
• It’s nature
• It’s methodology

13. To Social Mission
• Art’s task is to bring contradictions (conflict) of what is, to
the audience’s mind.

14. To Nature
• In conflict with nature due to the natural existence and
creative tendency.
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDOvMb6pSlo

15. To Methodology
• The methods of filmmaking bring
about two counterpoints;
• Visual and Audio-Visual

16. The Counterpoints
• Visual Counterpoints
• Through visual aspects it helps to create
conflict graphically, on planes, spatially, and
through lights.
• http://www.youtube.com/watchv=6P2iUJuc
bk4
• Audio-Visual Conflicts
• Through sound it helps to create conflict
through volumes and in tempo.
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqRHjYl9
55s

17. Battleship Potemkin

18. Battleship Potemkin, 1925
• Made by Sergei Eisenstein
• Celebrates 1905 Revolution against
Tsarism in Russia
• Sailors rebellion
• Captain orders them shot
• Gained support

19. Battleship Potemkin
• Created to inspire comrades towards
Bolshevism
• Test theory of montage
• Emotional Response
• Characterization simplified

20. Odessa Steps
• Massacre of Civilians on the Odessa Steps
• Many films have paid homage to scene
• Fictional
• Rhythmic Montage
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D
LEE2UL_N7Q

21. More on Battleship Potemkin
• Critically acclaimed worldwide
• Eisenstein focused on structural issues
• Camera angles
• Crowd movements
• Montage
• Brought under fire from Soviet film community
• Forced to issue public articles of self-criticisms,
commitments to reform his cinematic visions to
conform to socialist realism’s doctrines