Buckland-Warren-Puzzle-Films-Complex-Storytelling-Contemporary-Cinema

114 Chris DzialoIn this version, the reader assumes that the complicated plot regarding Orleanand Laroche takes a number of years to unfold, and includes times from1993, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, and even 1999 and perhaps 2000 – if we assumethat we move past the “now” of 1998 by the end of the film.Further sources of confusion (besides Hurricane Andrew occurringduring the “wrong” year) 7 are the flashbacks of Orlean in New York. Is shewriting her New Yorker articles, in approximately 1995? Or is she workingon her book, a year or two or three later? Do we always come back to thesame scene, or do we see her writing at different points in time? This becomesa question of temporal “frequency” for Gérard Genette (1980). Perhapswe are seeing several singulative actions one time each (“narrating n timeswhat happened n times” [Genette 1980, p. 114]), or seeing one singulativeaction repeated several times over (“narrating n times what happened once”[p. 115]). Alternately, is each scene of Orlean typing actually a case of theiterative (“narrating one time [or rather: at one time] what happened ntimes” [p. 116]), in effect “standing in” for all such typical instances? Variouscombinations of all three, at different times (i.e., narrating three times whathappened twice? Narrating three times what happened ten times?) We’renever quite sure, in the script at least.Brian Henderson (1999), examining a sequence from How Green WasMy Valley (1941), marvels at how the voiceover narration and onscreenaction “almost imperceptibly” shift, when Huw meets Bronwen, from theiterative to the singulative. Henderson remarks that “most interesting,theoretically, is how and why such a slippage is possible in cinematiciterative” (Henderson 1999, p. 66). He concludes that although it mightappear cinema only traffics in the singulative (owing to its indexicality),the complexity of cinema as a system helps fulfill Metz’s dictum that “thefact to be understood is that films are understood, including the cinematiciterative” (Henderson 1999, p. 67). He adds, however, that:Nevertheless, the singulative tendency of recorded sounds and images canhave a backlash effect on iterative constructions. How Green Was My Valleygoes from the iterative to the singulative by virtue of a tense change in thevoiceover. A much more frequent figure is a scene that begins in the iterative,by virtue of a title or a voiceover, then becomes singulative, as thoughreverting to the singulative in the absence of continued linguistic definitionto the contrary. (p. 67)Thus, Henderson locates in the voiceover and title-cards a certain power,an ability to confer a sense of the iterative on what might seem to be singulativein nature. Screenplays, based on written language, do not suffer