Towards a poetics of the cinematographic frame

In delineating a poetics of the cinematographic frame, this essay presents a typology of framing styles, and demonstrates ways in which filmmakers use the frame as an expressive resource—and ways in which the frame uses them. The examples discussed are modernist in orientation, and each has a particular association with a city—its history, architecture, and cultural character. Although it is common practice to refer to various—especially, modernist—framing situations as instances of deframing, the essay also enquires into the problematic nature of this term, suggesting alternative visual and cinematographic contexts more amenable to the deconstructive implications of this term. As the boundaries between cinema and the other arts continue to converge and relations between frame, image, and screen become more complex, this essay offers a reassessment of some first principles of film language, especially the aesthetic integrity of the cinematographic frame.