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Chapter 11. Mending endings

Power and closure in film plots
  • Gerda Dullaart
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Images in Use
This chapter is in the book Images in Use

Abstract

Closing images of films are used to maintain a status quo. Thus images of a happy ending ‘mend’ our critical experience of the world by washing audiences in the escapist glow of cinema light, hiding the chains with flowers. I Am Legend (2008) is an example of how a happy ending sanitises the cinema exit, neutralising subversive images before the audience leaves. Contrasting the Hollywood tradition with the critical tradition, this chapter lists ways in which a young scriptwriter can consciously choose his/her own use of images. Most Hollywood scriptwriting gurus encourage film students to use techniques which ‘hypnotise’ the audience with emotional catharsis. Instead, this chapter helps film students to break the mould of this canon.

Abstract

Closing images of films are used to maintain a status quo. Thus images of a happy ending ‘mend’ our critical experience of the world by washing audiences in the escapist glow of cinema light, hiding the chains with flowers. I Am Legend (2008) is an example of how a happy ending sanitises the cinema exit, neutralising subversive images before the audience leaves. Contrasting the Hollywood tradition with the critical tradition, this chapter lists ways in which a young scriptwriter can consciously choose his/her own use of images. Most Hollywood scriptwriting gurus encourage film students to use techniques which ‘hypnotise’ the audience with emotional catharsis. Instead, this chapter helps film students to break the mould of this canon.

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Introduction 1
  4. Part I. Approaches to visual communication and the question of power
  5. Chapter 1. Images 11
  6. Chapter 2. The critical tradition in visual studies 39
  7. Chapter 3. The map, the mirror and the simulacrum 55
  8. Chapter 4. Disenchantment with politics and the salience of images 69
  9. Part II. Case studies
  10. Chapter 5. Organising political consensus 91
  11. Chapter 6. Walls, doors and exciting encounters 113
  12. Chapter 7. The politics of visual representation 151
  13. Chapter 8. The politics of identity and visuality 181
  14. Chapter 9. Visual politics and celebrity humanitarianism 199
  15. Chapter 10. The economics of gay reality television 225
  16. Chapter 11. Mending endings 245
  17. Chapter 12. Representing the state of exception 269
  18. Index 291
https://doi.org/10.1075/dapsac.44.14dul

Chapters in this book

  1. Prelim pages i
  2. Table of contents v
  3. Introduction 1
  4. Part I. Approaches to visual communication and the question of power
  5. Chapter 1. Images 11
  6. Chapter 2. The critical tradition in visual studies 39
  7. Chapter 3. The map, the mirror and the simulacrum 55
  8. Chapter 4. Disenchantment with politics and the salience of images 69
  9. Part II. Case studies
  10. Chapter 5. Organising political consensus 91
  11. Chapter 6. Walls, doors and exciting encounters 113
  12. Chapter 7. The politics of visual representation 151
  13. Chapter 8. The politics of identity and visuality 181
  14. Chapter 9. Visual politics and celebrity humanitarianism 199
  15. Chapter 10. The economics of gay reality television 225
  16. Chapter 11. Mending endings 245
  17. Chapter 12. Representing the state of exception 269
  18. Index 291
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