If film is to have a language, it is a language made up of rules like these. Such constraints, we contend, are analogous to relations of discourse coherence that are widely recognized in the linguistic domain. As we show, both have the effect, in different ways, of limiting the way that viewpoint (or camera position) can shift through space from shot to shot over the course of a film sequence. One such rule is already well-known sometimes called the "180° Rule," we term it the X-Constraint to this we add a previously unrecorded rule, the T-Constraint.
We articulate it for a pair of conventions that govern spatial relations between viewpoints. In this paper, we develop and defend a new version of the semantic view. How is this possible? The semantic view of film holds that film coherence is achieved in part through a kind of film language, a set of conventions which govern the relationships between shots. Though each shot is disconnected from the next, combinations of shots still convey coherent stories that take place in continuous space and time. Films are made up of individual shots strung together in sequences over time. An Oscilloscope Laboratories release.This paper examines the interplay of semantics and pragmatics within the domain of film. MPAA Rating: unrated, violence, adult situationsĬast: Emily Baldoni, Maury Sterling, Elizabeth Gracen, Hugo Armstrong, Alex Manugian, Lauren MaherĬredits: Written and directed by James Ward Byrkit. The one thing “Coherence” needs most is that word that gives it its title. Baldoni makes her interesting enough for us to identify with her.īut its 87 minutes feel like more of a writing/plotting exercise than a finished, polished film. As curious as the men at the party might be, Em is the one proactive one, playing her cards close to her vest as she does. And when.īyrkit keeps a lot of the mystery off camera and tells the story, more or less, from Em’s point of view. Characters sit and try to reason out the motives for this or that action for the other versions of themselves.Īnd the viewer tries to keep track of who is doing what to whom, and where. “Coherence” provides the cast with one puzzle and the audience with another. How long before the Yahtzee dice come out to introduce true “randomness” to their reasoning? When does the violence start? And is there more wine? Can they undo something their alternate selves have done? Can they mix and match party guests, alternative versions of each other, with the other house? On a dark, confusing night, with only glow sticks (blue for one house, red for the other) and a passing comet to illuminate the gloomy suburban street, how can they avoid that? “If there’s another version of me, I want to meet him!”īeth (Elizabeth Gracen), wife of Hugh, references “that movie, ‘Sliding Doors,'” as they speculate on how they might tamper with or choose among the alternate realities they seem to be confronting. Writer-director James Ward Byrkit concocts a Mobius loop of illogical temporal logic as the people in the first house - ballerina Em (Emily Baldoni), home owner Hugh (Hugo Armstrong), actor Mike (Nicholas Brendon) and the others - puzzle over what is happening, the clues each version of themselves leaves the other, and what to do about it.
Who do they see? Themselves, or versions of themselves, gathered for this same dinner party, coping with the increasingly odd evening in many of the same ways. That’s the excuse for one character to recite weird bits of comet lore.Īnd that’s when the eight see one house still has light, way up the street. The comet? That’s the sci-fi plot device that makes the power go out and cell phones shatter. Set us up for the usual interpersonal melodramas - this character used to date that one, these two slept together and didn’t tell - and then toss in the comet. In spite of being shot in 2015 this film seems to have almost a nostalgic vibe reminiscent of the early 2000s / 2010s - a timeless. Round up eight friends for a dinner party. In this mind-bending sci-fi thriller, 8 friends at a dinner party start experiencing strange and mysterious events on the night a comet is passing close to Earth. “Coherence” is an indie thriller of modestly cerebral ambitions, a Theatre of the Absurd piece with “Twilight Zone” touches.