CF/NCFOM Revision Guide
Captain Fantastic & No Country For Old Men Film Specification Areas:
- Film Form
- Meaning & response
- Contexts
- Spectatorship
- Ideology
Spectatorship:
Stuart Hall: (1932-2014)
- Devised encoding/decoding theory in 1973
- Argued 3 ways of 'decoding' a filmic text (Preferred, Negotiated & Oppositional). Another 4th way (Aberrant)
Preferred (or dominant):
- Spectator derives meaning from film that filmmaker intended; spectators = relatively passive
Negotiated:
- Spectator negotiates film's messages, accepting some whilst disagreeing with others
Oppositional:
- Spectator understands film's message but rejects them
Aberrant:
- Spectator derives unintentional or atypical messages from a film that do not correlate with others' views
'A preferred reading of a media text is one in which the spectator takes up the intended meaning, finding it relatively easy to align with the messages & attitudes of those who have created the text. An oppositional reading is one that rejects this intended response. Most often a preferred response will be associated with pleasure, if only the pleasure of reassurance that comes from the comfortable and familiar' (Nelmes)
Spectator vs Audience:
Spectator Response:
Response draws in the whole of the self, including:
- Social Self: makes meaning in ways not very different from others with a similar ideological formation
- Cultural Self: makes particular intertextual references (to other films, other kinds of images & sounds) based on the bank of material he or she possesses
- Private Self: carries memories of his/her own experiences & who may find personal significance in a film in ways very different from others in his/her community of interest
- Desiring Self: Brings conscious & unconscious energies & intensities to the film event that have little to do with the film's surface content
Active vs Passive Spectatorship:
Passive: filmgoers are a homogenous mass who responded identically to a film's narrative/messages
Active: each spectator is different, & will bring their own core values & ideological beliefs to a film, responding to the film's messages in varying ways
Post-Structuralism:
- Takes emphasis away from author (in this case, filmmakers or 'auteur) & posits notion that all meaning is derived by person consuming it. Therefore messages in film are shaped by consumer's own perspectives (which are shaped by a no. of demographic factors)
- 'A text (a book, a film, a painting) only comes into existence in the act of 'reading' it.. In this way the reader of the text is, in a way, simultaneously its creator' (Nelmes)
- 'We tend in practice to defer to the creator in making meaning. So although it is logically true to say that a work only comes into existence when we bring ourselves into it, the author is not dead - but 'immanent' in the encounter - and we are generally more than conscious of this' (Nelmes) [Immanent -> existing or operating within]
Character:
NCFOM:
Tropes/Codes/Conventions associated with the Western Genre (Late 1800's):
(Blue = in No Country For Old Men)
- Mexican Stand-Off -> use of closeups & extreme closeups
- Guns, waist shots
- Silenes -> Winds blowing (hyperreal) -> (no non-diegetic music in NCFOM)
- Cattle - Horses
- Desert setting
- Sheriffs
- Whisky
- Native Americans
- Criminality
- High Noon shoot-out duel / - Long cuts / - Slow paced editing / - Extreme close up/close up faces / - Saloon / - Trains & Carts / - Horse chases
Costumes:
- Bolo Tie
- Bounty Hunters
- Stetson Hats
Ending:
- Riding away into sunset disappearing -> moving + fulfil the American Dream -> suggests continuation
- Clint Eastwood/John Wayne/John Ford
Western & Ideology:
- 'the hero [...] never really wants to accept civilisation, as embodied by the woman (who brings with her from the east the notion of community, family and so on). Rather he is always desiring to be on the move in the Wild West. The cowboy, with his restless energy and rugged, dogged individualism, is in the Western the embodiment of American frontiersmanship, or at least the myth of that frontiersmanship.'
- 'the fact that the cowboy or gunman is always represented as being caught between the two values points to the ideological contradictions inherent in the myth of that frontiersmanship. The hero's actual ambivalence reveals the nation's own ambiguous attitude towards the west. Civilising the west meant giving up the freedom it represented, including of course the freedom of the individual, a high price for Americans to pay for national unity' (Susan Hayward, cinema studies: the key concepts)
- Typically this is why the hero never settles with 'the girl' at the end of the film
- The West had not yet been won, and the image of the gunslinger riding off into the haze of the desert represents these 'inherent contradictions'
- The myth of the cowboy can also be read in Freudian terms
In terms of spectatorship, one might look at NCFOM & consider how it subverts our expectations of the western genre
Additionally we might also consider the expectations of spectators when watching a Coen brothers' films
No Country For Old Men:
Cinematography
• Boots are a key motif throughout the film: there’s a whole scene where Moss goes to buy some new boots, and Chigurh (crucially for one plot reveal - see Spectatorship) doesn’t like getting blood on his.
• In one particular scene in the foreground, slightly out of focus, are the dead drug dealer’s boots. Here the boots seem symbolic of the old order, worn away by the exigencies of trying to live in such an unforgiving landscape and in the modern world. In the background, the desert stretches and these wide-angle long shots are repeated throughout the film: human characters dwarfed and insignificant-seeming to stress the harshness of the environment (an element familiar in many Westerns). Caught between human threat (symbolised by the corpse) and this punishing landscape is Moss, wearing the costume of a traditional Western hero.
Sequence 1 • Apart from the establishing shot, a high angle shot of the gas station with the horizon stretching ahead (a traditional shot from the ‘modern Western’), nearly all the shots are MCU and CU of the two men as they talk. Two exceptions are the CU of Chigurh’s candy wrapper where the camera lingers as it unfolds; and the coin, which cuts away before we’ve barely had a chance to see the outcome of the toss - reflecting how quickly the shopkeeper wants this encounter finished.
Sequence 2 • In the first of these three short scenes, Bell sits reading the paper and listening to the latest news about the case from his deputy. The MS shows he is relaxed. However, by the end the sense is that this could be interpreted as resignation from the evil world that surrounds him. The MLS of Bell, the border guard and the clothing store owner all frame these rooted characters as firmly established in their environments: the traditional diner (also where Bell meets Carla Jean), the border crossing and the store selling jeans and boots. As such, they seem solid and dependable, unruffled by the crazy new circumstances the modern world is throwing at them.
Mise-en-Scène
Costume
• Nearly all the characters wear area-specific costume - denims, checked shirts with ‘yoked’ pockets, stetsons - that root them to their location, and also establish them as traditional Western characters: the Cowboy, the Sheriff, the Bounty-Hunter. By contrast, Chigurh’s costume is very dark blue (not quite the black of the traditional Western villain) with straight lines. This and his almost comical haircut establish him as a character who has no place or time - he also stands out against the brown and beige colour scheme of the film’s locations.
Sequence 1 • The loops of wire hanging behind the shopkeeper symbolise the danger in this conversation. They represent visually every action Chigurh’s takes verbally: set a trap, a noose that will tighten around his victim given a chance. The coin is a recurring symbol of destiny or fate, the only set of rules that Chigurh seems to follow. He always asks his possible victim to call heads or tails after he has tossed the coin, reducing the feeling that they have any real agency - death is coming, regardless of the outcome of this encounter.
Sequence 2 • The costumes of the characters are linked to their jobs and suggest they are dependable, trustworthy people following rules. Moss has slipped out of this world. His cowboy-style attire from earlier in the film has been torn and shredded by gunfire (symbolising his loss of control), and now he wears a hospital gown that connotes vulnerability. In the clothing store we see he is nonetheless still wearing his boots, showing there is a core element within him that remains undefeated.
Editing:
Editing Sequence 1 • Other than the establishing shot and the CU of the wrapper and coin, every shot is structured around shot-reverse-shot as we see the deadly conversation bounce back and forth between Chigurh and the shopkeeper. Whenever the dialogue takes a particularly threatening turn, the shots move closer to each man’s face. This draws us closer to the exchange - provoking a feeling of intense discomfort given the danger we can feel.
Sequence 2 • The juxtaposition of these three scenes show Bell’s disbelief at the evils of the modern world (“Who are these people?”), but they also assert that there are still those who believe in traditional values: the honour of fighting for your country, the honesty of good quality boots. The fact the border guard and shopkeeper help Moss suggests these values can be restored, even if Bell has all but given up on them.
Sound:
Sequence 1 • This is the only scene with any non-diegetic sound and the only music that appears in the film other than in the end credits. This adds even more intensity to the scene. The dialogue between the two men creates almost unbearable tension. Chigurh’s words menacingly blend ambiguity (“Is that what you are asking me? If there’s something wrong with anything?”) with outright threat (“What’s the most you’ve ever lost on a coin toss?”). The shopkeepers are innocent and reasonable throughout: “Just passin’ the time. If you won’t accept that, I don’t know what else to do for you.”. Though he is obviously terrified, his words don’t betray his fear and this makes the scene even more tense because it is so understated. • Chigurh’s words also link to the theme of destiny: “This coin has travelled from 1958… it’s been travelling 22 years to get here.”. His lines also suggest that he is inhuman, a personification of fate, who lacks any agency of his own: “Call it. I can’t call it for you.”.
Sequence 2 • The dialogue between Bell and his deputy tells two stories: the development in the search for Moss/Chigurh, and the horrific report from the news. Both allow Bell to show his despair at the modern world. They also link to the idea that the traditions of the West are being eroded by the amorality of the contemporary world: “They tortured them first. Who knows why… Maybe the TV was broken.”. The grudging respect of the border guard and the unruffled acceptance of the clothing store owner reflect a more hopeful attitude, that not all the old ‘codes’ of the West have been destroyed.
Representations:
Age
• The film’s title is almost embodied by Bell. He has been ground down by the evils he has witnessed, indicated in his opening monologue. In this, his final case before retirement, there is a sense that he is trying to find meaning or some kind of closure. But when he goes to visit Ellis, his grandad’s old deputy, he shows that despite his age and considerable experience, he feels “overmatched”. “I always felt, as I grew older, God would come into my life somehow.” This represents older people not as the wise characters or mentors we often see in film, but rather as people as confused by events as those younger. Interestingly, Carla Jean, though far younger, has a similarly resigned attitude to the evils of the world - when Chigurh visits her after her mother’s funeral, she seems almost too exhousted to show the appropriate level of fear.
Gender
• The film seems almost like an ‘elegy’ for a particular type of American masculinity that has been mythologised by the Western genre. Bell, particularly, is the embodiment of traditional decency: law-abiding, faithful and loving to his wife, doing his best to hunt down the ‘bad guys’ and bring them to a justice he believes in. His opening monologue about how his ancestors didn’t even carry a gun show us that - even in the violent and depraved modern world - he is a man who shies from violence. Wells, though a bounty hunter working for one of the villains also displays these qualities. Moss also shows remarkable moral character. He does steal the money, but this seems like an impulsive rather than greedy decision. Afterwards, he puts himself in danger by returning to give water to the dying Mexican, by going on the run to draw the danger away from his family, and he even resists the advances of the woman at the motel. All of these suggest he has a moral ‘code’ that he must follow. By the end, however, the consequences of his actions result in his (and his wife’s) death. The message seems to be that, admirable though these values may be, the amorality of the modern world will soon overwhelm them.
Aesthetics:
- Cinematographer, Roger Deakins, was inspired by both traditional Westerns, and by trying to capture how ‘the West’ is changing. The opening shots feature no humans, it could easily be the dawn of time. Then we begin to see signs of humans: fences, a wind turbine. Deakins lit and exposed the film differently for the desert and urban scenes. For the scenes in the desert there is a ‘burnt’ colour palette of blanched out beiges and browns - creating a sense that in this brightly-lit landscape there is nowhere to hide. The urban scenes are more garish and often lit with fluorescent tubes to accentuate the artificiality.
• One sequence reflects the theme of the rapid change: he returns to the site of the drug deal to give water to the dying Mexican, and is spotted by the villains and pursued. As the jeep begins chasing him, it is night; but as he splashes into the river to escape, dawn arrives… and shortly after, as he binds his wounds, it is bright morning. This emphasises the theme of rapid change that the characters struggle against.
• The sound design (by Skip Lievsay) is almost as significant as the cinematography. A very good example is the scene in the hotel, as Moss awaits his assassin’s inevitable arrival. The groan of a floorboard, the steady beep of the transponder and the ringing phone all build the tension to an excruciating level. The film is also sparse in terms of dialogue, especially for the Coen Brothers, who are well-known for lyrical and verbose characters like in The Hudsucker Proxy (1994) and The Big Lebowski (1998). This is especially true of Moss, who spends much of the film (when he isn’t being chased) in silent reflection - yet we only hear the final words of his inner monologue: “... Yeah” or “...Okay, then.”. This continues the use of ellipses that litter the film’s narrative.
Historical:
- The writer-directors, and Cormac McCarthy, have said that the narrative reflects the ‘changing West’. Westerns were incredibly popular in the first half of the 20th century and were amongst the first genres Hollywood produced. One reason for this was because there were still genuine cowboys starring in travelling shows. It was relatively easy to use these performers to provide spectacular stunts in early cinema. During the mid-part of the century, the Western took on a moral dimension, with stars like Gary Cooper and John Wayne representing a kind of American decency that Sheriff Bell in No Country For Old Men is mourning. His conversation with Ellis, however, reminds him (and us) that this landscape has always been intrinsically violent, and that he is being nostalgic about an imagined past that never actually existed.
Political:
- Violence in films has always been a controversial issue. Every decade has its own moral panic about the way violence is depicted, and its effects on viewers and wider audiences. The films of Sam Peckinpah, mostly Westerns set in the same environment as No Country... , were particularly demonised for the glamorisation of violent spectacle. The Wild Bunch (Sam Peckinpah, 1969) set the template for concerns about the ‘aesthetics of violence’ that continued through 1980s and 90s action cinema. Unusually for such a brutal film, No Country… is quite minimal in depicting violence. Though we explicitly see Chigurh’s killings in the first half of the film, in the second half most of the killings happen off-screen: Wells’ death is out of frame, the murder of the chicken truck driver is suggested, and the murder of Carla Jean is hinted at so subtly that many viewers have debated whether it even takes place. Throughout, the Coens don’t indulge the violent action, and even big set pieces like the confrontation in and near the hotel evoke fear and suspense rather than excitement. Instead, they often focus on the aftermath of violence, including - frustratingly for some viewers - the demise of Moss
Spectatorship:
- The film encourages the audience to be engaged and active in interpreting the narrative. The absence of non-diegetic soundtrack makes us far more sensitive to the sound design of each scene and upsets our expectations. The Coen brothers said they wanted to remove the ‘safety net’ of incidental music that tells us when to feel scared, relieved etc. Without a score to guide our emotion, the spectator becomes more attuned to the subtleties of the cinematography and performances in order to interpret the action. Even in narrative terms, the film is full of ellipses that require the spectator to ‘fill in the gaps’, the most notable being death of Moss, which would have traditionally been the climax of the story. (The use of ellipsis is also referenced by Wells when he says “...in the elevator, I counted the floors. There’s one missing.”)
• Genre can often provide a frame of interpretation for the spectator, but in No Country… the conventions of the Western are consistently challenged, surprising the audience. The landscape, mise-en-scène and character types are immediately familiar. But Chigurh is different, seeming to belong to an entirely different genre (perhaps horror?). Instead of the typical revolver or rifle that Bell and Moss carry, the assassin uses a ‘captive bolt pistol’ (reducing his victims to ‘cattle’) and even his gun looks odd.
• Westerns conventionally reach their narrative and moral climax in the duel: a direct confrontation between the forces of good and evil, where good usually triumphs and closure is achieved. In No Country… the duel between Moss and Chigurh happens halfway through the film - and is inconclusive. This upsets the expectations of the audience - what will happen now? To further avoid the satisfying closure of the duel, our hero (Moss) confronts the Mexican villains off-screen, and is killed. Who is now the hero? Our attentions switch to Bell and we expect him to confront Chigurh when he returns to the hotel room. But there is no confrontation - instead Bell sits, confused and defeated, unaware that his prey stands just feet away. The silhouetted figure in his stetson is in mourning, perhaps for the stable moral paradigm the Western once offered.
• Not only does the film challenge the spectator to make meaning, but how we interpret the world is a core theme in itself. The characters and audience are given visual and sonic clues to decipher exactly what is happening. These function on three levels: denotation, connotation and ‘occult’ symbolism. As hunter and hunted swap roles, there are numerous POV shots of tracks left behind. These denote what we haven’t seen explicitly - blood trails of a wounded dog, or of Moss/Chigurh after their gunfight, or scrapes in a crawlspace where the money bag has been moved. Then there are connotations: the unstated threat of the coin toss, Chigurh cleaning chicken feathers from the back of the truck, and checking the soles of his boots after visiting Carla Jean - all building on our knowledge of this character’s evil to infer violence.
• The final level of symbolism is ambiguous, opaque and ‘occult’. There are patterns and symbols throughout that seem to have some meaning, but which are left to the spectator to interpret. The scuff marks on the floor as Chigurh strangles the cop are lingered on by the camera as if there is some significance to their pattern. There are numerous examples of ‘twinning’ throughout: the numerous shots of characters removing or putting on boots; the buying of a shirt from a random passer-by; the way both Chigurh and Bell sit in Moss’ trailer, both sipping milk, both reflected in the television in a repeated shot.
• The film also ends on a monologue of ‘occult’ symbolism, as Bell describes a dream about him and his father. The imagery is resonant with what we’ve just seen with the Western genre: a man and boy, on horseback, venturing into darkness. Is this symbolic of Bell’s journey towards his own death? (Echoing what Ellis says earlier: “You can’t stop what’s coming”) Or of Bell’s despair at the darkness of modern crime, where the memory of his father is all he can cling on to? The film ends mysteriously, provoking the audience to debate their own interpretations.
Captain Fantastic:
Cinematography
• Opening shots, extreme long shots of long duration to establish and romanticise the grandeur of the natural world
• Framing of Ben in the rear view mirror in close up is repeated throughout the film establishing that he is in some ways isolated even from his family.
• Contrast between wide shot of open landscape as Steve the bus recedes and the big close up of Ben ‘alone’ clearly expressing distress for the first time in the narrative.
Mise-en-Scène
• Hair as symbolic – Ben shaves his beard and Bo, his head, to mark lifestyle changes and transitions in identity
• Costumes of the family suggest they are out of touch with the modern world. This can be most clearly seen in the funeral scene as their brightly coloured clothes contrast with the other mourners and defy traditions. Jack refers to Ben as, “some hippy in a clown outfit”. This sense of being from a different time is reinforced by Ben’s ‘Jesse Jackson 88’ t-shirt in a later scene.
• Lighting in the basketball court scene where Bo and Rellian discuss Ben is very harsh and contrasts with the naturalistic lighting in most of the film. The blackness created here lends gravity to their difficult conversation about whether Ben is “dangerous” or not.
Editing
• The film is bookended with scenes highlighting the rite of passage narrative and foregrounding Bo becoming a man, “the boy is dead and in his place is a man.”
• Matt Ross was keen to avoid conspicuous editing as he stated, “The thing I’ve always hoped for is to lose myself in the movie and then only afterwards say ‘Wow that was a oner. They never cut.’ I don’t want to notice that when I’m watching. I want to feel the intention of it.” Captain fantastic adheres to the principles of continuity editing, almost without exception, to this end.
• Ben’s hallucinations of Leslie break from the editing techniques used in the rest of the film as they are intended to be other-worldly. In these brief scenes there is a visual softness, choral religious music and lighting effects that see her appear, fade away and re-appear.
Sound
• Diegetic music used to symbolise Rellian’s rebellion and assertion of individuality as he uses confrontational drumming to challenge Ben’s acoustic guitar music.
• Playing bagpipe music on the bus suggests they are an army going into battle. This is anchored by Ben saying, “so they know we are coming.”
• The train sounds used when Bo looks through his university acceptance letters suggest impending conflict and provoke a sense of anxiety in the spectator.
Representations
• Rellian and his desire to be like the rest of society, “why can’t we celebrate Christmas like the rest of the world?” This can also be seen in the video game scene when he embraces playing while his siblings do not.
• Parenting – the film explores different approaches to parenting and challenges all of them. Ultimately the children decide how they want to be raised and choose their father despite him asserting, “I’ll ruin your lives.” Key events to explore include Vespyr’s fall and discussions about Leslie’s death over dinner.
• Gender equality – the children all perform the same tasks and are taught the same skills so roles are not gendered throughout the film. The film’s closing scene suggests that greater integration into mainstream society may change this however as Zaja is feminised through costume and styling for the first time in the narrative.
Aesthetics
• Matt Ross says he was influenced by Simen Johan and this can be seen particularly in the way he shoots the natural world in the film capturing its splendor and majesty.
• The film is immersive and the visual style encourages the spectator to feel they are present, taking part. Matt Ross, “I wanted to shoot handheld because… I felt a more classical or formal manifestation of photography would put you at an arm’s length. I wanted to be in the scene, not watch the scene.”
• Matt Ross on influences, “The only thing that I was conscious of was that I wanted to create something that was psychically hopeful. I think Pixar does this very well. Their movies are emotional without being empty. They’re sentimental but they earn it.”
Political
• Owen Gleiberman in Variety, “We’re living at a moment, after all, when Donald Trump is on the right, Bernie Sanders is on the left, and Hillary Clinton is at the center — but the supporters of Trump and Sanders have more in common, in many ways, than either faction has with the supporters of Clinton. The left and the right in America are now selling different versions of anti-establishment fervor, and “Captain Fantastic” doesn’t just reflect those two poles; it fuses them. It taps the topsy-turvy sympathies that now rule the political-cultural zeitgeist.” Ben and Jack both represent different ideological viewpoints but in some ways both dislike the perception that, as Ben says, “‘the powerful control the lives of the powerless’.”
Institutional
• The film got made due to Matt Ross seeking funding from the producer Lynette Howell Taylor at the Sundance film festival and its success and subsequent wider release was due to word-of-mouth and positive reviews. In these ways it is typical of the independent film world. It was also released in a year of very successful independent films and this may have helped this film gain momentum.
Spectator & Ideology:
• Although the film does not completely encourage identification with Ben it does at key moments of grief e.g. his ‘hallucinations’ of his deceased wife are shot using close up point of view shots encouraging identification.
• The film represents two very different approaches to life, Ben’s and Jack’s, and invites the spectator to consider the pros and cons of each. Therefore the spectator’s own experiences and ideologies will have a profound impact on the view they leave the film with. Matt Ross, “I didn’t want to vilify anyone. No one in this film is the villain. When I met Frank Langella, I told him [his character] is antagonistic towards Viggo’s character but that he is not the antagonist. That would have been boring. [His attitude to the kids’ upbringing] comes from love. His love is different but just as legitimate.”
• Audience expectations play a significant role in creating a spectator’s response and this film being an art-house film and festival success may have created an expectation that its politics will be clearly liberal and left-leaning. The more balanced approach to ideology within the storytelling may therefore provide an interesting challenge to some audience expectations.
• Critique of contemporary American society. One of the film’s taglines is, ‘Americans are over medicated and under educated’ and when the children enter mainstream society they comment on the obesity of those around them, “everyone is so fat”, “are they sick?”
• Self-improvement - importance of diversity in education as the children study academic subjects like literature, politics and quantum physics but creativity, survival skills and physical fitness are valued highly too. A methodical, structured life is encouraged with rotas and timings emphasised.
• Anti-authority messages throughout including the scene where the children pretend to be a Christian cult to disconcert the police officer. Recurring quotes in the film are, ‘power to the people’ and ‘stick it to The Man’.
- Film Form
- Meaning & response
- Contexts
- Spectatorship
- Ideology
Spectatorship:
Stuart Hall: (1932-2014)
- Devised encoding/decoding theory in 1973
- Argued 3 ways of 'decoding' a filmic text (Preferred, Negotiated & Oppositional). Another 4th way (Aberrant)
Preferred (or dominant):
- Spectator derives meaning from film that filmmaker intended; spectators = relatively passive
Negotiated:
- Spectator negotiates film's messages, accepting some whilst disagreeing with others
Oppositional:
- Spectator understands film's message but rejects them
Aberrant:
- Spectator derives unintentional or atypical messages from a film that do not correlate with others' views
'A preferred reading of a media text is one in which the spectator takes up the intended meaning, finding it relatively easy to align with the messages & attitudes of those who have created the text. An oppositional reading is one that rejects this intended response. Most often a preferred response will be associated with pleasure, if only the pleasure of reassurance that comes from the comfortable and familiar' (Nelmes)
Spectator vs Audience:
- Film studies distinguishes between the
response of social groups, collectives of people – an audience – and the
response of the individual – a spectator.
• Spectatorship
is concerned primarily with the way the individual is positioned between
projector and screen in a darkened space
•The
audience ceases to exist for the individual spectator for the duration of the
film
•Although
the spectator is singular, a figure alone before the screen, spectatorship
tries to generalise about how all spectators behave
- “Even though theories of spectatorship
isolate the self, this self is an abstract concept, rather than a self with
individuality and differences from other spectators. In other words, interest
is not in observing and explaining the response of actual people but rather in
the attempt to generalise about a ‘state of being’ common to all people when
they position themselves before a screen and watch a film.” (Jill Nelmes)Spectator Response:
Response draws in the whole of the self, including:
- Social Self: makes meaning in ways not very different from others with a similar ideological formation
- Cultural Self: makes particular intertextual references (to other films, other kinds of images & sounds) based on the bank of material he or she possesses
- Private Self: carries memories of his/her own experiences & who may find personal significance in a film in ways very different from others in his/her community of interest
- Desiring Self: Brings conscious & unconscious energies & intensities to the film event that have little to do with the film's surface content
Active vs Passive Spectatorship:
Passive: filmgoers are a homogenous mass who responded identically to a film's narrative/messages
Active: each spectator is different, & will bring their own core values & ideological beliefs to a film, responding to the film's messages in varying ways
Post-Structuralism:
- Takes emphasis away from author (in this case, filmmakers or 'auteur) & posits notion that all meaning is derived by person consuming it. Therefore messages in film are shaped by consumer's own perspectives (which are shaped by a no. of demographic factors)
- 'A text (a book, a film, a painting) only comes into existence in the act of 'reading' it.. In this way the reader of the text is, in a way, simultaneously its creator' (Nelmes)
- 'We tend in practice to defer to the creator in making meaning. So although it is logically true to say that a work only comes into existence when we bring ourselves into it, the author is not dead - but 'immanent' in the encounter - and we are generally more than conscious of this' (Nelmes) [Immanent -> existing or operating within]
Character:
'Active' spectators will also work with character in developing a response to a text -> 3 facets to this
1. We must enter into an act of recognition. We take a fictional construct & translate them into something (somebody) credible. Familiarity with the star persona/image may provide us with additional insights & expectations
2. We then become aligned with a particular character. We see and feel parts of the story through this fictional person. Though we align with them (through, for example, cinematographic choices, mies-en-scene etc), it is not necessarily the case that we identify with them (in a serial killer film, for example)
3. Finally we show allegiance, and in doing so we make evaluations about the appeal of the characters to us.
...So, what kinds of appeals does a particular character have on us? What kinds of memories or fantasies are triggered? Is the appeal of a cowboy (for example) different for the white, middle-class British spectator from the white, working class American male?
NCFOM:
Tropes/Codes/Conventions associated with the Western Genre (Late 1800's):
(Blue = in No Country For Old Men)
- Mexican Stand-Off -> use of closeups & extreme closeups
- Guns, waist shots
- Silenes -> Winds blowing (hyperreal) -> (no non-diegetic music in NCFOM)
- Cattle - Horses
- Desert setting
- Sheriffs
- Whisky
- Native Americans
- Criminality
- High Noon shoot-out duel / - Long cuts / - Slow paced editing / - Extreme close up/close up faces / - Saloon / - Trains & Carts / - Horse chases
Costumes:
- Bolo Tie
- Bounty Hunters
- Stetson Hats
Ending:
- Riding away into sunset disappearing -> moving + fulfil the American Dream -> suggests continuation
- Clint Eastwood/John Wayne/John Ford
Western & Ideology:
- 'the hero [...] never really wants to accept civilisation, as embodied by the woman (who brings with her from the east the notion of community, family and so on). Rather he is always desiring to be on the move in the Wild West. The cowboy, with his restless energy and rugged, dogged individualism, is in the Western the embodiment of American frontiersmanship, or at least the myth of that frontiersmanship.'
- 'the fact that the cowboy or gunman is always represented as being caught between the two values points to the ideological contradictions inherent in the myth of that frontiersmanship. The hero's actual ambivalence reveals the nation's own ambiguous attitude towards the west. Civilising the west meant giving up the freedom it represented, including of course the freedom of the individual, a high price for Americans to pay for national unity' (Susan Hayward, cinema studies: the key concepts)
- Typically this is why the hero never settles with 'the girl' at the end of the film
- The West had not yet been won, and the image of the gunslinger riding off into the haze of the desert represents these 'inherent contradictions'
- The myth of the cowboy can also be read in Freudian terms
In terms of spectatorship, one might look at NCFOM & consider how it subverts our expectations of the western genre
Additionally we might also consider the expectations of spectators when watching a Coen brothers' films
No Country For Old Men:
Cinematography
• Boots are a key motif throughout the film: there’s a whole scene where Moss goes to buy some new boots, and Chigurh (crucially for one plot reveal - see Spectatorship) doesn’t like getting blood on his.
• In one particular scene in the foreground, slightly out of focus, are the dead drug dealer’s boots. Here the boots seem symbolic of the old order, worn away by the exigencies of trying to live in such an unforgiving landscape and in the modern world. In the background, the desert stretches and these wide-angle long shots are repeated throughout the film: human characters dwarfed and insignificant-seeming to stress the harshness of the environment (an element familiar in many Westerns). Caught between human threat (symbolised by the corpse) and this punishing landscape is Moss, wearing the costume of a traditional Western hero.
Sequence 1 • Apart from the establishing shot, a high angle shot of the gas station with the horizon stretching ahead (a traditional shot from the ‘modern Western’), nearly all the shots are MCU and CU of the two men as they talk. Two exceptions are the CU of Chigurh’s candy wrapper where the camera lingers as it unfolds; and the coin, which cuts away before we’ve barely had a chance to see the outcome of the toss - reflecting how quickly the shopkeeper wants this encounter finished.
Sequence 2 • In the first of these three short scenes, Bell sits reading the paper and listening to the latest news about the case from his deputy. The MS shows he is relaxed. However, by the end the sense is that this could be interpreted as resignation from the evil world that surrounds him. The MLS of Bell, the border guard and the clothing store owner all frame these rooted characters as firmly established in their environments: the traditional diner (also where Bell meets Carla Jean), the border crossing and the store selling jeans and boots. As such, they seem solid and dependable, unruffled by the crazy new circumstances the modern world is throwing at them.
Mise-en-Scène
Costume
• Nearly all the characters wear area-specific costume - denims, checked shirts with ‘yoked’ pockets, stetsons - that root them to their location, and also establish them as traditional Western characters: the Cowboy, the Sheriff, the Bounty-Hunter. By contrast, Chigurh’s costume is very dark blue (not quite the black of the traditional Western villain) with straight lines. This and his almost comical haircut establish him as a character who has no place or time - he also stands out against the brown and beige colour scheme of the film’s locations.
Sequence 1 • The loops of wire hanging behind the shopkeeper symbolise the danger in this conversation. They represent visually every action Chigurh’s takes verbally: set a trap, a noose that will tighten around his victim given a chance. The coin is a recurring symbol of destiny or fate, the only set of rules that Chigurh seems to follow. He always asks his possible victim to call heads or tails after he has tossed the coin, reducing the feeling that they have any real agency - death is coming, regardless of the outcome of this encounter.
Sequence 2 • The costumes of the characters are linked to their jobs and suggest they are dependable, trustworthy people following rules. Moss has slipped out of this world. His cowboy-style attire from earlier in the film has been torn and shredded by gunfire (symbolising his loss of control), and now he wears a hospital gown that connotes vulnerability. In the clothing store we see he is nonetheless still wearing his boots, showing there is a core element within him that remains undefeated.
Editing:
Editing Sequence 1 • Other than the establishing shot and the CU of the wrapper and coin, every shot is structured around shot-reverse-shot as we see the deadly conversation bounce back and forth between Chigurh and the shopkeeper. Whenever the dialogue takes a particularly threatening turn, the shots move closer to each man’s face. This draws us closer to the exchange - provoking a feeling of intense discomfort given the danger we can feel.
Sequence 2 • The juxtaposition of these three scenes show Bell’s disbelief at the evils of the modern world (“Who are these people?”), but they also assert that there are still those who believe in traditional values: the honour of fighting for your country, the honesty of good quality boots. The fact the border guard and shopkeeper help Moss suggests these values can be restored, even if Bell has all but given up on them.
Sound:
Sequence 1 • This is the only scene with any non-diegetic sound and the only music that appears in the film other than in the end credits. This adds even more intensity to the scene. The dialogue between the two men creates almost unbearable tension. Chigurh’s words menacingly blend ambiguity (“Is that what you are asking me? If there’s something wrong with anything?”) with outright threat (“What’s the most you’ve ever lost on a coin toss?”). The shopkeepers are innocent and reasonable throughout: “Just passin’ the time. If you won’t accept that, I don’t know what else to do for you.”. Though he is obviously terrified, his words don’t betray his fear and this makes the scene even more tense because it is so understated. • Chigurh’s words also link to the theme of destiny: “This coin has travelled from 1958… it’s been travelling 22 years to get here.”. His lines also suggest that he is inhuman, a personification of fate, who lacks any agency of his own: “Call it. I can’t call it for you.”.
Sequence 2 • The dialogue between Bell and his deputy tells two stories: the development in the search for Moss/Chigurh, and the horrific report from the news. Both allow Bell to show his despair at the modern world. They also link to the idea that the traditions of the West are being eroded by the amorality of the contemporary world: “They tortured them first. Who knows why… Maybe the TV was broken.”. The grudging respect of the border guard and the unruffled acceptance of the clothing store owner reflect a more hopeful attitude, that not all the old ‘codes’ of the West have been destroyed.
Representations:
Age
• The film’s title is almost embodied by Bell. He has been ground down by the evils he has witnessed, indicated in his opening monologue. In this, his final case before retirement, there is a sense that he is trying to find meaning or some kind of closure. But when he goes to visit Ellis, his grandad’s old deputy, he shows that despite his age and considerable experience, he feels “overmatched”. “I always felt, as I grew older, God would come into my life somehow.” This represents older people not as the wise characters or mentors we often see in film, but rather as people as confused by events as those younger. Interestingly, Carla Jean, though far younger, has a similarly resigned attitude to the evils of the world - when Chigurh visits her after her mother’s funeral, she seems almost too exhousted to show the appropriate level of fear.
Gender
• The film seems almost like an ‘elegy’ for a particular type of American masculinity that has been mythologised by the Western genre. Bell, particularly, is the embodiment of traditional decency: law-abiding, faithful and loving to his wife, doing his best to hunt down the ‘bad guys’ and bring them to a justice he believes in. His opening monologue about how his ancestors didn’t even carry a gun show us that - even in the violent and depraved modern world - he is a man who shies from violence. Wells, though a bounty hunter working for one of the villains also displays these qualities. Moss also shows remarkable moral character. He does steal the money, but this seems like an impulsive rather than greedy decision. Afterwards, he puts himself in danger by returning to give water to the dying Mexican, by going on the run to draw the danger away from his family, and he even resists the advances of the woman at the motel. All of these suggest he has a moral ‘code’ that he must follow. By the end, however, the consequences of his actions result in his (and his wife’s) death. The message seems to be that, admirable though these values may be, the amorality of the modern world will soon overwhelm them.
Aesthetics:
- Cinematographer, Roger Deakins, was inspired by both traditional Westerns, and by trying to capture how ‘the West’ is changing. The opening shots feature no humans, it could easily be the dawn of time. Then we begin to see signs of humans: fences, a wind turbine. Deakins lit and exposed the film differently for the desert and urban scenes. For the scenes in the desert there is a ‘burnt’ colour palette of blanched out beiges and browns - creating a sense that in this brightly-lit landscape there is nowhere to hide. The urban scenes are more garish and often lit with fluorescent tubes to accentuate the artificiality.
• One sequence reflects the theme of the rapid change: he returns to the site of the drug deal to give water to the dying Mexican, and is spotted by the villains and pursued. As the jeep begins chasing him, it is night; but as he splashes into the river to escape, dawn arrives… and shortly after, as he binds his wounds, it is bright morning. This emphasises the theme of rapid change that the characters struggle against.
• The sound design (by Skip Lievsay) is almost as significant as the cinematography. A very good example is the scene in the hotel, as Moss awaits his assassin’s inevitable arrival. The groan of a floorboard, the steady beep of the transponder and the ringing phone all build the tension to an excruciating level. The film is also sparse in terms of dialogue, especially for the Coen Brothers, who are well-known for lyrical and verbose characters like in The Hudsucker Proxy (1994) and The Big Lebowski (1998). This is especially true of Moss, who spends much of the film (when he isn’t being chased) in silent reflection - yet we only hear the final words of his inner monologue: “... Yeah” or “...Okay, then.”. This continues the use of ellipses that litter the film’s narrative.
Historical:
- The writer-directors, and Cormac McCarthy, have said that the narrative reflects the ‘changing West’. Westerns were incredibly popular in the first half of the 20th century and were amongst the first genres Hollywood produced. One reason for this was because there were still genuine cowboys starring in travelling shows. It was relatively easy to use these performers to provide spectacular stunts in early cinema. During the mid-part of the century, the Western took on a moral dimension, with stars like Gary Cooper and John Wayne representing a kind of American decency that Sheriff Bell in No Country For Old Men is mourning. His conversation with Ellis, however, reminds him (and us) that this landscape has always been intrinsically violent, and that he is being nostalgic about an imagined past that never actually existed.
Political:
- Violence in films has always been a controversial issue. Every decade has its own moral panic about the way violence is depicted, and its effects on viewers and wider audiences. The films of Sam Peckinpah, mostly Westerns set in the same environment as No Country... , were particularly demonised for the glamorisation of violent spectacle. The Wild Bunch (Sam Peckinpah, 1969) set the template for concerns about the ‘aesthetics of violence’ that continued through 1980s and 90s action cinema. Unusually for such a brutal film, No Country… is quite minimal in depicting violence. Though we explicitly see Chigurh’s killings in the first half of the film, in the second half most of the killings happen off-screen: Wells’ death is out of frame, the murder of the chicken truck driver is suggested, and the murder of Carla Jean is hinted at so subtly that many viewers have debated whether it even takes place. Throughout, the Coens don’t indulge the violent action, and even big set pieces like the confrontation in and near the hotel evoke fear and suspense rather than excitement. Instead, they often focus on the aftermath of violence, including - frustratingly for some viewers - the demise of Moss
Spectatorship:
- The film encourages the audience to be engaged and active in interpreting the narrative. The absence of non-diegetic soundtrack makes us far more sensitive to the sound design of each scene and upsets our expectations. The Coen brothers said they wanted to remove the ‘safety net’ of incidental music that tells us when to feel scared, relieved etc. Without a score to guide our emotion, the spectator becomes more attuned to the subtleties of the cinematography and performances in order to interpret the action. Even in narrative terms, the film is full of ellipses that require the spectator to ‘fill in the gaps’, the most notable being death of Moss, which would have traditionally been the climax of the story. (The use of ellipsis is also referenced by Wells when he says “...in the elevator, I counted the floors. There’s one missing.”)
• Genre can often provide a frame of interpretation for the spectator, but in No Country… the conventions of the Western are consistently challenged, surprising the audience. The landscape, mise-en-scène and character types are immediately familiar. But Chigurh is different, seeming to belong to an entirely different genre (perhaps horror?). Instead of the typical revolver or rifle that Bell and Moss carry, the assassin uses a ‘captive bolt pistol’ (reducing his victims to ‘cattle’) and even his gun looks odd.
• Westerns conventionally reach their narrative and moral climax in the duel: a direct confrontation between the forces of good and evil, where good usually triumphs and closure is achieved. In No Country… the duel between Moss and Chigurh happens halfway through the film - and is inconclusive. This upsets the expectations of the audience - what will happen now? To further avoid the satisfying closure of the duel, our hero (Moss) confronts the Mexican villains off-screen, and is killed. Who is now the hero? Our attentions switch to Bell and we expect him to confront Chigurh when he returns to the hotel room. But there is no confrontation - instead Bell sits, confused and defeated, unaware that his prey stands just feet away. The silhouetted figure in his stetson is in mourning, perhaps for the stable moral paradigm the Western once offered.
• Not only does the film challenge the spectator to make meaning, but how we interpret the world is a core theme in itself. The characters and audience are given visual and sonic clues to decipher exactly what is happening. These function on three levels: denotation, connotation and ‘occult’ symbolism. As hunter and hunted swap roles, there are numerous POV shots of tracks left behind. These denote what we haven’t seen explicitly - blood trails of a wounded dog, or of Moss/Chigurh after their gunfight, or scrapes in a crawlspace where the money bag has been moved. Then there are connotations: the unstated threat of the coin toss, Chigurh cleaning chicken feathers from the back of the truck, and checking the soles of his boots after visiting Carla Jean - all building on our knowledge of this character’s evil to infer violence.
• The final level of symbolism is ambiguous, opaque and ‘occult’. There are patterns and symbols throughout that seem to have some meaning, but which are left to the spectator to interpret. The scuff marks on the floor as Chigurh strangles the cop are lingered on by the camera as if there is some significance to their pattern. There are numerous examples of ‘twinning’ throughout: the numerous shots of characters removing or putting on boots; the buying of a shirt from a random passer-by; the way both Chigurh and Bell sit in Moss’ trailer, both sipping milk, both reflected in the television in a repeated shot.
• The film also ends on a monologue of ‘occult’ symbolism, as Bell describes a dream about him and his father. The imagery is resonant with what we’ve just seen with the Western genre: a man and boy, on horseback, venturing into darkness. Is this symbolic of Bell’s journey towards his own death? (Echoing what Ellis says earlier: “You can’t stop what’s coming”) Or of Bell’s despair at the darkness of modern crime, where the memory of his father is all he can cling on to? The film ends mysteriously, provoking the audience to debate their own interpretations.
Captain Fantastic:
Cinematography
• Opening shots, extreme long shots of long duration to establish and romanticise the grandeur of the natural world
• Framing of Ben in the rear view mirror in close up is repeated throughout the film establishing that he is in some ways isolated even from his family.
• Contrast between wide shot of open landscape as Steve the bus recedes and the big close up of Ben ‘alone’ clearly expressing distress for the first time in the narrative.
Mise-en-Scène
• Hair as symbolic – Ben shaves his beard and Bo, his head, to mark lifestyle changes and transitions in identity
• Costumes of the family suggest they are out of touch with the modern world. This can be most clearly seen in the funeral scene as their brightly coloured clothes contrast with the other mourners and defy traditions. Jack refers to Ben as, “some hippy in a clown outfit”. This sense of being from a different time is reinforced by Ben’s ‘Jesse Jackson 88’ t-shirt in a later scene.
• Lighting in the basketball court scene where Bo and Rellian discuss Ben is very harsh and contrasts with the naturalistic lighting in most of the film. The blackness created here lends gravity to their difficult conversation about whether Ben is “dangerous” or not.
Editing
• The film is bookended with scenes highlighting the rite of passage narrative and foregrounding Bo becoming a man, “the boy is dead and in his place is a man.”
• Matt Ross was keen to avoid conspicuous editing as he stated, “The thing I’ve always hoped for is to lose myself in the movie and then only afterwards say ‘Wow that was a oner. They never cut.’ I don’t want to notice that when I’m watching. I want to feel the intention of it.” Captain fantastic adheres to the principles of continuity editing, almost without exception, to this end.
• Ben’s hallucinations of Leslie break from the editing techniques used in the rest of the film as they are intended to be other-worldly. In these brief scenes there is a visual softness, choral religious music and lighting effects that see her appear, fade away and re-appear.
Sound
• Diegetic music used to symbolise Rellian’s rebellion and assertion of individuality as he uses confrontational drumming to challenge Ben’s acoustic guitar music.
• Playing bagpipe music on the bus suggests they are an army going into battle. This is anchored by Ben saying, “so they know we are coming.”
• The train sounds used when Bo looks through his university acceptance letters suggest impending conflict and provoke a sense of anxiety in the spectator.
Representations
• Rellian and his desire to be like the rest of society, “why can’t we celebrate Christmas like the rest of the world?” This can also be seen in the video game scene when he embraces playing while his siblings do not.
• Parenting – the film explores different approaches to parenting and challenges all of them. Ultimately the children decide how they want to be raised and choose their father despite him asserting, “I’ll ruin your lives.” Key events to explore include Vespyr’s fall and discussions about Leslie’s death over dinner.
• Gender equality – the children all perform the same tasks and are taught the same skills so roles are not gendered throughout the film. The film’s closing scene suggests that greater integration into mainstream society may change this however as Zaja is feminised through costume and styling for the first time in the narrative.
Aesthetics
• Matt Ross says he was influenced by Simen Johan and this can be seen particularly in the way he shoots the natural world in the film capturing its splendor and majesty.
• The film is immersive and the visual style encourages the spectator to feel they are present, taking part. Matt Ross, “I wanted to shoot handheld because… I felt a more classical or formal manifestation of photography would put you at an arm’s length. I wanted to be in the scene, not watch the scene.”
• Matt Ross on influences, “The only thing that I was conscious of was that I wanted to create something that was psychically hopeful. I think Pixar does this very well. Their movies are emotional without being empty. They’re sentimental but they earn it.”
Political
• Owen Gleiberman in Variety, “We’re living at a moment, after all, when Donald Trump is on the right, Bernie Sanders is on the left, and Hillary Clinton is at the center — but the supporters of Trump and Sanders have more in common, in many ways, than either faction has with the supporters of Clinton. The left and the right in America are now selling different versions of anti-establishment fervor, and “Captain Fantastic” doesn’t just reflect those two poles; it fuses them. It taps the topsy-turvy sympathies that now rule the political-cultural zeitgeist.” Ben and Jack both represent different ideological viewpoints but in some ways both dislike the perception that, as Ben says, “‘the powerful control the lives of the powerless’.”
Institutional
• The film got made due to Matt Ross seeking funding from the producer Lynette Howell Taylor at the Sundance film festival and its success and subsequent wider release was due to word-of-mouth and positive reviews. In these ways it is typical of the independent film world. It was also released in a year of very successful independent films and this may have helped this film gain momentum.
Spectator & Ideology:
• Although the film does not completely encourage identification with Ben it does at key moments of grief e.g. his ‘hallucinations’ of his deceased wife are shot using close up point of view shots encouraging identification.
• The film represents two very different approaches to life, Ben’s and Jack’s, and invites the spectator to consider the pros and cons of each. Therefore the spectator’s own experiences and ideologies will have a profound impact on the view they leave the film with. Matt Ross, “I didn’t want to vilify anyone. No one in this film is the villain. When I met Frank Langella, I told him [his character] is antagonistic towards Viggo’s character but that he is not the antagonist. That would have been boring. [His attitude to the kids’ upbringing] comes from love. His love is different but just as legitimate.”
• Audience expectations play a significant role in creating a spectator’s response and this film being an art-house film and festival success may have created an expectation that its politics will be clearly liberal and left-leaning. The more balanced approach to ideology within the storytelling may therefore provide an interesting challenge to some audience expectations.
• Critique of contemporary American society. One of the film’s taglines is, ‘Americans are over medicated and under educated’ and when the children enter mainstream society they comment on the obesity of those around them, “everyone is so fat”, “are they sick?”
• Self-improvement - importance of diversity in education as the children study academic subjects like literature, politics and quantum physics but creativity, survival skills and physical fitness are valued highly too. A methodical, structured life is encouraged with rotas and timings emphasised.
• Anti-authority messages throughout including the scene where the children pretend to be a Christian cult to disconcert the police officer. Recurring quotes in the film are, ‘power to the people’ and ‘stick it to The Man’.
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