Assessing graduate screen production outputs in nineteen ...

The artistic “How” is often presented as subservient to the “What” of the filmicnarrative if only because the “What” of the production comes first with the script. Butthis relationship is not so straightforward. The opposite may be the case as thevision of the production may well be in place before the “What” of the production.The complexity that we label Art may well be the primary force behind all the Topicrelated scholarship.4.6.4 The Gestalt Synthesis of Form and ContentThe initial and final “vision” represented by the production falls into place when allthe production components are in place, namely: Topic, Media and Art. The triangle1-2-3 in Figure 4.18 schematically represents the conceptual work that goes intodeciding: “How to combine Topic, Media and Art together to represent the Topicthrough the medium of screen?”BOTH (WHAT & HOW)1.2 TOPIC MEDIA ART 3Figure 4.18 The “What + How” scholarship triangle schemeThe following criteria question deals with this primary gestalt characteristic of screenproduction.GESTALTQ11THE BEST ELEMENT OF THIS PRODUCTION IS:What: its content 1How the content is presented 1Both: what it has to say and how it says it 2Neither what it has to say nor how it says it 0The component scale is mostly self evident. The “What” and “How” are each giventhe value of 1. The conceptual work required to create the unity of all threecomponents (topic media and art) is proportionally larger than unifying just two.Accordingly this gestalt element is accorded the higher criteria value of two (2).Assessing graduate screen production outputs in nineteen Australian film schools53