Certain areas of the set are, of course, off limits (because showing them would reveal that this is a set and not a living room), leading to some rather preposterous and predictable blocking of scenes.Ī notable example is the family dining room table where no one sits with their back to the camera, thus leaving one entire length of the table unoccupied. Sitcoms tend to be one- or three-camera affairs with fairly stock approaches to filming. In television (at least until the new “golden age of television” emerged in the early 2000s), the camera tends to restrict itself to certain clichéd shots and conventions. Hand in Water by TheDigital Artist ( Pixabay License / Pixabay) Thus, the director and the director of photography (and perhaps others as well) enter into the business of acting alongside or in counterpoint with the actor. No longer is it simply the actor that provides movement or emphasis, but rather the camera has the ability to move in its own right, to emphasize (through panning, close-ups, edits, etc.) moments independently of what the actor does. The camera, however, allows for a split subjectivity to enter into the acting. We often laud actors, like Meryl Streep or Orson Welles, who are able to act in tandem with the camera-not exactly “playing” to the camera in an ingratiating manner but rather creating a gently tense counterpoint with the camera’s gaze, knowing what to reveal and when to reveal it, knowing what to obscure and how to obscure it. The latter two media, however, have an element missing from typical theater: the camera. This directorial input is true of theater, television, and film. And yet, in Léon Morin, Priest(1961), director Jean-Pierre Melville was able to exploit Belmondo’s preternatural reticence toward an unexpected end, creating a figure of moral and religious calm that somehow fit Belmondo perfectly and yet was never to be seen on screen by him in the same way again. Jean-Paul Belmondo carried a kind of quiet assurance and aloof mystique to nearly all of his roles he didn’t so much disappear into the roles as he brought out similarities between his own persona and the characters he embodied. Some directors are reputed to take a heavier hand than others. The director leads the actor toward certain insights, certain behaviors, the emphasis on certain traits of the character portrayed. Of course, we realize that an actor’s portrayal is not entirely of her own creation (although we often forget or ignore this realization). We criticize them when they seem to obtrude in a manner detrimental to the narrative. We praise them when they disappear into those roles in engaging and fascinating ways. Whether on stage, in television, or on the silver screen, we look to the actors to portray the roles. Who acts in films? In one sense, this is a silly question.
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