A Gestalt Approach to the Analysis of Music in Films

• In the field of Film-Music Studies, Cognitive Psychology remains perhaps the stronger approach as an alternative to Post-Structuralism and Cultural Studies. Yet, Gestalt Psychology has recently seen a revival of interest. Gestalt can offer enlightening concepts not only to theorise how music and visuals combine in an audiovisual whole, but also productive tools to analyse concrete instances in films. While Cognitivism tends to be concerned with single mechanisms of how the brain processes the perceptual data and gives much salience to the higher cognitive operations, Gestalt is concerned with the holistic nature of our experience and attributes more importance to the lower perceptual operations. As Donnelly points out, the combination of sound and visuals into an audiovisual whole has not so much to do with cognitive elaborations as with that hard-wired orientation of our mind towards completeness and stableness that is studied by Gestalt.Employing the Gestalt concepts of Isomorphism, Prägnanz and Dynamic Self-Distribution, I propose an approach to the analysis of music in films based on the similarity/difference between the configuration (gestalt) of the music and that of the other cinematic components (cinematography, editing, acting, lighting, colour palette...). A stabilised experience of the audiovisual whole – the basis for both a formalistic analysis and a critical interpretation – is reached when their encounter makes the gestalts of the cinematic components reciprocally reconfigure and fuse to produce a wider all-including gestalt: the macro-configuration of the audiovisual experience. This Gestalt approach – being based on the fusion of the aural and visual factors into a whole that is 'different from the sum of its parts' – is also helpful to supersede the long-standing visual bias that influences Film Studies, which leads to think of music as something that is externally added to either reinforce or subvert what is already there in the visuals.

Ämnesord

HUMANIORA  -- Konst -- Musikvetenskap (hsv//swe)

HUMANITIES  -- Arts -- Musicology (hsv//eng)

HUMANIORA  -- Konst -- Filmvetenskap (hsv//swe)

HUMANITIES  -- Arts -- Studies on Film (hsv//eng)

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Psykologi -- Psykologi (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Psychology -- Psychology (hsv//eng)

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Medie- och kommunikationsvetenskap -- Medievetenskap (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Media and Communications -- Media Studies (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

gestalt psychology; cognitive musicology; film music; film theory; audiovisual analysis

Film Studies

Filmvetenskap

Musikvetenskap

Musicology

Psychology

Psykologi

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