Both of the texts introduce different methods to interpreting a film. Film Art explains different levels of interpretation increasingly getting more and more symbolic. However, Practices of Looking dissects a film using the viewer’s reaction to the subject, which is a little more abstract than what I can follow when it comes to giving my interpretation in class.
Of the two methods to interpreting a film, I feel like Film Art explains levels that are more organized and a lot more visual. It’s easier to begin with a more generalized summary and then eventually, step by step, head into a personal interpretation of what one thinks the producer of the piece is going for. Practices of Looking involves a broader more viewer controlled interpretation theory.
In regards to the Robert Frank photo, Charleston and taking from the steps of interpretation talked about in Film Art, one can make a general statement or “referential meaning” that this is a picture of a black woman holding a white child. It’s a bare bones plot summary for the picture. Using the Practices of Looking point of view, I don’t know at this point what the producer of the picture was going for.
One can go even further with an “explicit meaning” by saying that the black woman looks as though she doesn’t want to be in the photograph but takes the picture anyways because she is a nurse and it doesn’t matter what color the skin of her patients are. The “explicit meaning” directly stems from the context of the piece. In this case, it is race and the struggles of civil liberties in America during the 50s and 60s that come to my mind when viewing the photo almost like they were trying to say something about white and black in America, similar to the message in Gordon Parks’ Ella Watson (1942) that was talked about in Practices of Looking.
Stemming even farther away from “referential meaning” or the bare bones summary of the photo, the “implicit meaning” begins to delve into the more abstract side of interpreting a piece. For example, an implicit interpretation of Charleston would be that a black woman chooses to combat racial intolerance in America by posing in a photograph holding a small child in her arms as a mother would a child. The implicit meaning calls on the viewer to take their interpretation of the piece and analyze what their mind would subconsciously connect them to. Similar to this interpretation of the photograph used by Film Art, Practices of Looking mentioned the parodies of the Apple iPod ads that were transformed into political statements arising from the scandal at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. The ads depicted a man with hood over his head and wires threading from his fingers that would shock him if he were to let his hands fall. These photos were set to make a statement from the viewer. They caused controversy across the world, though some may not have been what the producer intended.
Lastly in Film Art there is the “Symptomatic Meaning” that is the most symbolic of them all. For example, the Black woman represents the general black population in early America, stereotyped as low-educated and willing to do menial jobs. The white child is the general white population reaping the benefits of not having to back breaking work is very abstract. It is so far away from the original summary that it allows for discussion and opinion to change the photo into a learning tool.
