Film Endings

May 14, 2011
Stacey Mason

Jim Emerson gives an interesting and insightful analysis of how young children instinctively “know” when a movie is ending before the last shot. There are several non-obvious aspects of scene framing and social conventions that situate us within a narrative arc, and Emerson gives a good introduction to how these work. The comments also contain interesting examples of famous closing shots with good discussion of why they did or did not work.

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