L „-^ ^u ^pí-'C."-" ' , Oft 'C "'/ľ' Nearly True: Forking Plots, Forking Interpretations A Response to David Bordwell's "Film Futures" Edward Branigan \<^ i ..,- (V s> I would like to examine what is "nearly true." This phrase is not meant to characterize David Bordwell's exceptional essay, "Film Futures," which I would summarize with Orson Welles's film title, It's All True. However, since Welles never quite finished that film, perhaps I might supplement Bordwell's .argument with a few thoughts about the matter of interyxßmz, film,V v-t 1^,.*^ spedflcallyi^boujji^rgretmg; what is "nearly true" in ajplot. I believe that -^ ^ L:- ■■■ -what is "nearly true" is an important kind of "fork" jn a plot and has an /^U- h- impact on a film's future, that is, how a film acquires value,. afterJiaying :^X h^J\''^ Upon eppn ........' ~ ....... - ^ "^ ~~ Zilpm- <=■-'->■ that are quite familiar to us from classical narratives. Fo^ example,^/^^'^^'^^ JJordwell demonstrates that what he calls "forking-path" plots in such films as Sliding Doors and Run Lola Run have certain fundamental properties iÁaC !• ________ >k:-"o-'-i ^yt^r^— __—_____—__ forking-path plots are well-marked, linear, developed, cohesive,, unified with one another, ordered sequentially to make the final path a climax, and ^^-\~ Xl] -----^-< B^,' f*veJU| designed tojpinpoint clear, contrasting parallels (e.g., the parallels among the three different women in the three lives of the protagonist of Blind Chance).^ ^, < ,t x Oňe'lrľi^Fšliy^tFáP^'čh^nce" is anything but "blind" in forking-path ^ w ^-' narratives. The river of time may have divided two or three times (so that a person may step into the same river more than once) but otherwise this most familiar sort of time just flows on—on course. Wittgenstein, Lakoff a.A" ? '■,< not built on^principles;_of physics--or. philosophy, but „with. ,ťKe useölfplkl " ° "N-^ _j5syčhofogy. The screen is not blank before a film begins: a spectator does^^^ř^ ň^f watch with ho preconceptions, memories, or reasoning strategies. Hence *^ A ^t>M^Xj -^-^—^=^~^^^~>ii^-.......—.....-*■........-......~...............-^.--.-.^-fwri--......w—;........:°- ..........-.....— y(S^, .^ , U . • in^orru?rehe^ding\a narrative we normally reason from a single case using WA © Board of Regents, University of Wisconsin System, 2002 SubStarice # Vol. 31, no. I, 2002 1>- ,U)v (> ŕ- AL. v M v L/-X '7,' 4~£ 1 A.5^^- ■ 105 &rS' "W -t-vV w* M^ '--'^ ^.-JĚl, A 106 Edward Branigan ^J~>i Kí* fyvAJi n±**\ 'U}J~U an enormous varietyof judgment heuristics ^which also generate~t'^-^'-J ^i-^v, appearance/reality motifs); we focus^pn first impressions using stereotypes ^^ß^J^ß^i and prototypes;jve rely on shortcuts/ templates, and schemata; and, in ľ^V^u ffeneíalľwecneerfully riskfaulty inferences and erroneous conclusions. We ^^' ,—!—:-----------~-------^v^«T ,—:—r~---------------------t~.......--r---—......."-i<-4*a č-cx-^j do this because it is efficient and adaptive to our everyday environment. I h» ~^ Wm^ axfi nöFforgetting that oj^nv^mnejxtJs^ahyay^M V*?u*ý, a"^o^íaTs^Hin^přc5ddes~.one-..of~the-maJGr~.shapingúnf luences on_ folk ^J^yl^^V- ~....."......Ti-^M^ Filmmakers employ the psychology of the everyday in order to aidKh-* \"^^.iy^e spectators in comprehejading^a narrative. Filmmakers also employ this gs^^öl^^_ß^zns£spectators when it is important that something not be seen or fully understood during the telling of a story (e.g., to create mystery or surprisěJTOTwf^^ a. metaphorical wayjpr through jij^_dj2n j^rydati something disturbing or traumatic must.b^r^c^gux^Jby.1ihe..t©ct or repressed. As ,. ^'L' spectators^we make mistakes in making inferences because we are systematic *- d-vw^rl U-K, in drawing inferences, and authors count on that. ' ^ ^ Bordwelľs detailed analyses of our thought processes while watching "?&^.rr-ft,>.^ a forking-path narrative is reminiscent of Daniel Dennetťs argument for a vCa^t' * u^' .ultiple ctrafts" model of consciousness as opposed to the traditional notion kKh p* --^C^ of a Cartesian theater." (Indeed, at the conclusion of his essay Bordwell __ y-v^ , t_ renamestr^forkmg-pathnarratives_aS-l^mu narratives.)Dennett ^V0"^'^"T1 ^ 41 f - ^-*,.? ^ theater in the mind, but instead as a series of "distributed" internal states, a ^>* / /£", "ľ^ „^jtWvfí^í,^-----------—:--------^:—rr^-:rTT^rrrr-rrrr-r---~~--r--r-^.- ^cA ' %, ^ŕ*^^ ĺ.__;„„ // >/ Ai______i^.j. :— u___// r-\____a..___._ _í í y l-^~-tiLs,§ -a * aU^irious^ge^ferfirŕngJíiy ^J^M^ I^^í?!^6%aÍn^135,mY^mPn^_š?_s](i' *"^^ speaks oj^conscio^nessynot as located m some special place like a movie * theater in the mind, but instead as series ofdisparate ^causal trains." "At any point in time," Dennett says of the stream pfcpnscipusness,." there arejnuhjplejir^ This sentence, invoking both "narrative" and "editing," illustrates how the ^^jfeív, *«/ activities of both, wntinj>jand^ meíap]?°£0^&Ti!^L^" fp/Siestudy of mind.Irnighi add that ior Dennett the sound track of a film f^^/jľ^l^ —in the form of the ceaseless phonological loop of consciousness and in the **>»& « U vo U^-í (^ | ^u^fc- form of verbal behavior—is fundamental to a person's comprehension of the world. I believe that such a theory of mind, emphasizing^yerbal de^cnptic^sjraxe^w|th possible descriptions and alternative paraphrases ( drawn from memory, provides a firm basis for theorizing film as a "language."4 j~v We should notiorget that the unity of forking-path plots_ together with jhe unity and erficiency^of working memory js always purchased at a price, namely, the suppression and maskJpg_of disorder, excess, other 'causal trains/ and_oř/ze/^ie^^hus it may be possible to imagine more radical kinds of SubStance # 97, Vol. 31, no. 1, 2002 Vit 11-^^15 W^ ^w^l' ^ ^Y^Mv^' uJh^l K^i *>L$ ^i. «/f^ Nearly True: Forking Plots, Forking Interpretations 107 £04^' forj^g-path filmjt(a£il^ one considers that in narrafee_„eenemlly^the.phenonienon~ol.aiternarive '"ff1®1* ^^^^n' futures is merely a form of alterr^jiv^^asfe^^iíice ,the„.eiid^f the storyj.s ^> &r "*■*!&£ already known a^th^beginning of^Jhefilm; tírat is, the beginning of the ***?* f^ =ftr S film, in effect, is already past with respectteAp ffl-m's narration, which " uu'r ( proceeds from the future. The perfect premonition of narration^musjtbe carefully restricted in order to allow the spectator to imagine (with occasional, "&■ -p*±.s^.-----------_■- í i "nsiAt. forcs^^bwmg^variety of outcomes^flowing from each partis jnojnent. The specta 6 ^.rlri 7fc£>J^lCvr *řn iced that events are being told asthey Lil^*«*^ happej^jm^yhaŕa^^ í^? ^VÍ?^ Alternativetejlings of the story, and.alternate _stojgs^re^up^res^se^injavor J£v.l,jrtW7r -^T^ of the 'final version/ the 'final draft.' ./A. u 4^* 'C lOf*M« *&' «fore if oiie^were to forcejilms with multiple plot lines like Nashville, ^I'^y^^J '^hm^mcWöfSope/The Chase, The Kins:dom^Timeco<^f_^á^^ř^^]'or' ^Jg?^1 * films with multiple (hidden) histories like The Lovers of the Arctic Circle,^ ^ttfv tlit &£2ß?]^^ films about "reunions" where forking paths reconnect) like The Big Chill and Four Friends, or films with multiple partial plot lines like The Thin Red Line, An Autumn Afternoon^} ^ Z?í!H*ŕ£L2£ä^ ^ra§^entation and lj^ji , Ar disj^ej^sio^^ ŕ°>~i^tyťXJ and demanding temj^ora^sjxj^tures as^^ C/oiťá řo ř^e Resistance, Je tu il eile, TheDiscreefCharmof the Bourgeoisie, The #nfu* ^té*o Phantomj)Jljberty/T^^ Hangings A >:>**«** k/ >^ aT^ ^^^b Substance # Vol. 31, no. 1, 2002 ^^t 108 Edward Branigan ^rf frV/K* - »r V-WX. ŕ Q e. Jí™ altered, ulterior, and alternative states of awareness.7 For example, films .------.-------i___----------í----------------- V*^*,*?*----------------^^Jm^^fr^r^-^--------ĽL—'_------------- . like S 12, Belle de Jour. Jacob's Ladder, A Letter to. ThreeJNiyes, Lantana, The ' Three Faces ofEveJSyb^^ ' Manilla Sky, Mulholland Dr., and Lost Highway, along with "memorxplpblem'' filmswhere characters experience dual identities like Total Recall, The Matrix, DarkJ2ity,MtttwBuddwing, Shattered, AngelFteart^jmaMemento.hi_general, _ a character may have various^degrees of awareness, or no awareness, that Kijořjihe^ on Elm Streetj,Groundhog Da\[)._ It would seem to be a fact that many filmmakers conceive their work on the basis of a kind of 'forking-paths' or 'multiple-drafť model of narrative thinking (including the evasions and detours provoked by censorship). The wide popularity of DVD's permits the ordinary viewer to gain access to storyboard comparisons and the cutting-room floor: we can now witness deleted scenes,., alternate endings.4. , even deliberately scrijged/a/se out-ta^es (A Bug's '-*^TZ, ď JJßb and after-endings {Carrie, Wild Things, Married^ to the fylop). •*H-i- v.. <ř Mu~ -r?^v>;-^*s Given the waysXmentioned above). thätthe nptipn^f^kemaíiyejplo^sj^ r a^^ * bin&i,»*Tir w Vt££$$jtof"*^ * a ffixftQj^^ ö£a_trjgüDs£Dcaiati^^ . ^ H^L., ^i^^ "^fS^í^m. That is, there are situations in which an actual transformation need not occur ^;j^A^>i ÍĎ i roF^ie~spectätCfŕ to experience an 'alternative world/ There are limits, of 2 J^J^^ ^^^^f^r-'-''^z.^- ■■■-■....... •............. ......—".■—~ t^^??*^^7—-...........-.,-—-.- ■ ^\ ^ &UX fr~L- coursé;t:o~howlTeel5rw'e~will re-čoňcěivě a character's identity, life story, or ^%fci«í our own life story when we respond to that momentary state of inexistent (y/^ŕ4Nh> *m{i animation' that appears in a morph, a forldrjgjpjävor a 'hyjpoÄetícaHor^gT ^Ä'äf/ ^^E^Š^ordweu™shows"in his essay, explicit forking-path narratives are I* *■ ^tw-vs* 1 often rather modest in their ambitions, perhaps because we can hold only a small number of alternatives in conscious awareness and classical narrative strives for a certain economy of thought: "at any moment we can easily imagine two or three alternative chains of events . . . but not twenty or sixty a u í » e , let alone an infinite number" (91). ___ _ Ý^^S- r- r> j Nevertheless, if the image of the^igjMmorphjeaptures something of n^t ^ ^\$ /^the experience of forMng.paths,. then anew group of films appears in which ^nL^. ^^V^7 a character is shown to have radically segajcatej^klen^^ (k^wti w jfyl \^ "^jgoggstomovebetween separatejivesJjKtug^^ inonly one_ vr?T\diAs.¥ßyDe$fa The Idiots^BeingThere, In * i >*íft a Year with 13 Moons, Face/off, Sunshine, Fiorüe, Orlando, Zelig, All of Me, Ä Zed & Two Noughts, Braindeada/k7a Dead Alive, Re-Animator, the Body Snatchers films, Strange Days, Being John MalkovkhfK-PAXjJThe Man Who Fell to Earth, That Obscure Object of Desire, and The Double Life ofVéronique.Closely related d-vicwQ 4^^; are those films that concern "twins" and alteregosjpeflrf Ringers, Cat Ballou, Twin Falls Idaho, Ä Zed & ŤwoŇoughts, My 20tJi^enttir^Nou^leJ\^m]ie^___. iVU,u i ^\ > , V"> ^ 110 Edward Branigan i * é the mind through a process he calls "overwriting." This "overwriting" creates ^^ ^ ^ i w,hat a literary theorist would perhaps call a "palimpsest" and what ^^ -^vi,^ narratologist Gerald Prince calls "the disnarrated.^l. would like to suggest /^ /^ ^-,^ that a "film text" with its narrative structure stands intermediate between a ZCÍÚ^^' * '^ tllmmäker and a spectator, not unlike the crucial 'in-between moment' of a t^1 j^;t^' itäľ'mórphľ When a""Hľm text" is seen Jess^as^n^jec^andjrwreas a/V^r ..........~~~"......."' ~~ jHv, process of 'overwritinglby filmmaker andspectator aswellasbearjhe traces k «A^ ^' nrgcedijr^^ bA^-^-> j,^,, ^process of 'overwritinglby filmmaker andspectator as. weUasbearthie traces C *AQ ^ of a double suj^ressjo^^bu^pnly^^r^ly^^ alternative plots and ^^f^'NJ--'^ > /•, c hypotheses that are nearly írae^thajbtťg^ p ;, yX^^ ^ľľ!l~Jfo~ ^^^a spectator. ThaHs^jvü^^ 0tr,H.Ž ^rjo, ,VK K-tl JU^cfn ,^ ^j/jI^Tv. Tailed stories whose suppressed re^^ffinfT^lne conditonjo^what is seea_ ^-55^3, tobeTn^ that one of tne v valuable tasks_o^^e^greta^nS^Lm^^^rí^of jKgsehidden 'narrative />\^t-( 4 Jv*^^' morphs/ of these nearly true versions (or drafts) of jth^ploji/which mavjead toward—or be the result of V an experience of déjä vu or the uncanny in éticä], -^ ufrf -a ■ ;^™Ji.±iu~-^~_~^t^"^r^___"~* ~* »;.ľ—_"_____________J —r—" — e*se ^^Jľ-ŕ^i *^~ suppressed in a text under a more general, "as if." Nevertheless, the ability ^ ^ <^J~ . ^töimägS "What if?" and "What if I have Sreä^ôcpérienced this in another ^ÍÄ'.ÍT^0^ of what makes us human.10 K*W*o<- n~h^.. v^Vl Bordwell expresses something like my idea of the "nearly true" when l~K*-U'f M&r-yf^ A*4sC+\s\ *pWi. /rV^'V"^ ip/tUso^t- /^ ,ne says tnat me spectator tends to treat the ending phase—the last for^—of ^ ->< J.^.íV^ v/ Ýl&^ľ^^ľ'a ^king'path narrative as "the culmination of what went before it...even if ^Sf4^: #£ /ApKof /»M,ŕwhat went before couldn't really have come before" (102, suspension points ^ ^ f^ut I í V^ *n or*Sinal)- ^n fact/1 thipk ther_eare maiw_situations that arise ro.uMnely_iri 1 i£^j 7 nar££^Ye_coÍílEre^nens^on tHat^ solicit_u.s tc^onsider^^ejrj^edd^c1 punter. 0 Jfi 1*t4*.y{ U, A. ^akmd of fiction about 'what wentbefore, even iHt couldn't 'Th^tuf^^ i -SL «peally have come before.' To put it another way, Bordwell fmds^c^sjjV,^^' ^':' ^ly ft-u_ J^'t^ jt£- ÍPgic amonff for^igj^thjjlots despite.the..absenceof any chrono-logical^ ■ , t ^ihk iTu /K-. i>' M ■X »>«- ^ gipport. I am arguing that a furtherstep should be taken w^ere one searches i for the psychological and sociological alternatives underlymg_a spectator's jp ^tC} feehngjhat jm (arbitrary) catfsat^ve has_acguired yalueand^j^ŕtinence.11 J ^/^ ? ; This remains true when narrative in general is seen as a set of multiple drafts p^ ^^J^ V subiecttoötraImS"viewlngaÄÖ >«Cc?'\Ť^ iM. V j™ c*^ V- have späcé^ôŕonly one example. (My next example would have been 0%,, , , ' Malcolm f-Ct^ his own tM\V^/ft*-Vv' bedroom by a mysterious, forkner patient. As he lies dyings on his bed, ^^ hfj V; '■^\'l f\ v -i p SubStance # 97, Vol. 31, no. 1, 2002 i:\ X\\ 1* ' _ f, , j ŕ r-\ *>- Nearly True: Forking Plots, Forking Interpretations m Malcolm projects two forkjng^paJtífe ajia^atiye^to? (his next wedding ^tTlZľč " anniversary) that he hopes will represent the true state of his present life ~*- V^ /*-imaging the existence of an eight-year-old boy. Cole (played by Haley Joel^ ^w^ / Osment). Malcolm himself has constructed Cole as a sort of "ghost," a A , , % convenient mental hypothesis, that permits him to re-evaluate his past as a y^^ v**^"~ví therapist to discover how he failed so disastrously in diagnosing a former ^/£ *0 ^^>-patienťs illness that the patient grew up to return, like the repressed, to kill *fyu t^fa him. Although the boy, Cole, apparently sees ghosts, Malcolm was not shot nJiZX^iT mT/ by a ghost nor need the story of Malcolm's past life be about ghosts at all, ^^A^t ^v*U/ but about real, though unrecognized, family violence. The end of The Sixth fw__ ,, A^y Sense returns to its beginning: Malcolm lies dying on his bed. He has solved^^íCv ^Kifl the problem concerning the faithfulness of his wife so that he can now die in u . ^ ďgv ^^ peace knowing that he is living on the fork of a path that leads to marital r^U^^j^f-happiness. Malcolm has not, however, discovered the motive of his killer or ^\"^fo^jJi^ ^5> the meaning of the killer's words to him. ^J^^-tľ^ **'M' ^ AíHph yjt° t^V *~*/ Nonetheless, I believe that the spectator whojsjvjlli^^ Y^Tpwffi/^' Ja=Tv U^X^qj^čz/ has been 'overwritten' and suj^ressedbyjhejÜm in creatingUs 'ímúámň^^i *aJ &ľp" ^t-teľ^ o, jř wířáTli^Te^šTlíěflř^lrHeabout the abuse suffered by Cole, will sense an^^^^^*WL ^^ \\"" § alternative that is all too real in this world: the abuse of a child at the hands ^1 ^^^^ , /\J$jfä£ v^i^j ofa parent — a parent who takes shape in distorted forms in "ghost" stories 'V^^a^T^ uŠj ľ'íuX' tnat are told to a psychiatrist. Malcolm visualizes the "ghosts" on the basis ^i^^i&H "V^ ácÝSLtU-0^ hearing the tape-recorded words of his former patient. Malcolm fails, ^^C $ pvUvJ \^^,t^-^ however, to see through the ghosts, to see through the dreams aíi4Jj^íÍP}£j~~:~~ p-jJLrO^—r- ^dxäff§[_ofa_patieryy o see the significance, for example, of Cole's story about í 'ífcír uaA-^L ^ ateie^hc^T^irrwho needs desperately to tell her story about being slowly/ m^ ^ ^h»t-u^ ^ poisoned by a mother. l/w^^vfe, -4_____.......-—-í------------------- I^/ŕ^wC Asjvuman beings, we are at every moment engaged in_constructing S-<*ur~-*^fc too, prompt us to entertain many sorts of hypothetical situations. AUfilms j ^ f^S\ - U.j^ tíyus4}ave_gíosís. In an important way, it is we who may choose to deceive^ / *- -U^^TT' ^^ ourselves through the failure to see ghostly "alternative plots," since the i^Jf^-iý^ final author of a film is the spectator, and the final arbiter is the spectator's 4^yi^-~ ' encounter with a world that he or she calls reaLÜ is, for this reason that the 9$& value pf a film may lie not with the explicit outcome of its plot, but with the "crushed potentials for the future that were contained in the pásť'13—in what^ «/£ *%"*^ was nearly true. t\^1 i^^c^-^ University of California, Santa Barbara ^ °^h f-e v Substance # Vol. 31, no. 1, 2002 ^v ^7^/ ** ^ <-0 112 Edward Branigan Notes My thanks to Christy Cannariato, Torben Grodal, John Kurten, Melinda Szaloky, and Charles Wolfe for their insightful comments. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the conference "Narrative at the Outer Limits/' organized by H. Porter Abbott at the Interdisciplinary Humanities Center, University of California, Santa Barbara, in May 2001. 1. On the river of time, see, e.g., Wittgenstein's Lectures: Cambridge, 1932-1935, From the Notes of Alice Ambrose and Margaret Macdonald, ed. by Alice Ambrose (New York: Prometheus Books, 2001), Part I, §§ 12-14, 22; George Lakoff and Mark Turner, More than Cool Reason: A Field Guide to Poetic Metaphor (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1989), pp. 34-49. 2. On the conventions and history of interpretation, see, e.g., David Bordwell, Making Meaning: Inference and Rhetoric in the Interpretation of Cinema (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1989). See also James Elkins, Our Beautiful, Dry, and Distant Texts: Art K History as Writing (New York: Routledge, 2000). 3. On the social ground^jafjggnijjon^see, e.g., Ziva Kunda, Social Cognition: Making X Sense of People (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1999); Susan T. Fiske and Shelley É. Taylor, ''^SůěMfšžgmmn^ 2nd ed. 1991): Paul Hernadi. Cultural Transactions: Nature, Self, Society (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1995); Mark .! ~~~Jčfansořip!lfimaTIňw of Cognitive Science for Ethics (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993). For an account of second-generation cognitive science, see, e.g., George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, Philosophy in the Flesh: The Embodied Mind and Its Challenge to Western Thought (New York: Basic Books, 1999); on time as a path, pp. 137-169. O^narratiye itself as a schematicjpathway/ see Johnson, pp. 150-184, and Lakoff/ and Johriäönjgix^^J6Jg^^^ " avidLA,-Black,.Lflzt? m Film: Resonance and Representation^ TUrbani University of Illinois Press, 1999), chaps. 1, 2, 5, and 7. Á "multiple drafts" model of consciousness would seem to touch on deep issues of language comprehension involving 'forking paths'; consider, for example, mental "tree diagrams," garden path sentences, and lexical and syntactic ambiguity. See, e.g., Steven Pinker, The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language (New York: Harper Perennial, 1994), pp. 192-230. 5. It is no accidenHhat when the comprehension of.a,naxtajjv_e_bggins to foc^sonjgroblems ^ "öf selection ančTOřrušsion, rather than on ordering and emphasis, interpretation oflfie" f 'nammveSS^ author, narrator, or character. óľlEKe^aŕ^mp^fTflsT^áífly^d Down by Law dramatize the idea of forking paths by ^-^./-o^^ showing roads that fork. There is even dialogue in the latter film, and in The Family MflraTfocušlng^nRÔbeŕtTrosťs classic poem on the subject, "The Road Not Taken." Of these three films only The Family Man elaborates the forking paths as distinct plots. 7. Gilles Deleuze discusses forking paths in film plots by situating them within a general context of flashbacks and memory. See Cinema 2: The Time-Image, trans, by Hugrř^T Tomlinson and Robert Galeta (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1989), pp. 47-55. 8. Therei jnay^e^a^^gatiye side_io..tl^freedom and fluidity, pj rnprphs/_metaphorsrand foíídngpaths. For e^mpleTtSremay be a suggestion that "identity" is arbitrary,.iUusory,,. or empty. Vivian Sobchack observes, "Making formally visible the very formlessness at i^_enter/Jhe_morph also makes visible our national and political sense that although SubStance # 97, Vol. 31, no. 1, 2002 Nearly True: Forking Plots, Forking Interpretations 113 there is power, there is no center, that centers no longer have substance (at least as we once believed)...." Sobchack, "Introduction/' Meta-Morphing, p. xii (my emphasis). Another visualization of the feeling induced in a spectator by forking paths and morphs may be round in those moments in Tmgsoäe when two of the "plots" come together and we-see an event-simultaneously from two perspectives, or řafhěr our^att^^JOhifts^ "restlessly between the perspectives (as it does also with mirror imagery), Cf. the scene when Veronika and Véronique "cross paths" in The Double Life ofVéronique. Interesting variations on these ideas may be found in Win, Place or Show (Stan Douglas, 1998) and Nantes Triptych (Bill Viola, 1992). J 9. Gerald Prince, "TheDisnarrated/' Style22,1 (Spring 1988), pp. l-8;J^arij;-LjmreRyan, "Allej*orie£3fhriB^^ Uj pp. 262-286. Cf. Bordwell's notion of "superscription" (as oppc^e^Jo^'inscriptio^), analogous to a palimpsest, which hejisjís_ta5näTyze^ of vanous^fagěsTíFT^ filnis of GodaxdiNanation in the Fiction Fitin^ (MacUsonjJJniýers^ty relies on a different strategyjhat uses emgm^cxohjunc the viewer to discover concealed sociological layers which justify the 'border crossings' ^»^a*^ **jv undertaken by the characters. Islote that "overwriting" is related to such psychological ^^^C mechanisms as decay, fading, interference, and masking. ' ~"y 10. F^king-path plots_ďramatize our ability to construct a "What if?" scenario whichis an ability_central.to human language and subjectivity. According to Ian Tattersall: When we speak of "symbolic processes" in the brain or in the mind, we are referring to our ability to abstract elernents-O.Lour_experience and to r«p_resent_them with discrete mental symbols. .Other species>_certainly__ posse^consciousness. in some sense, but as far as we know, they live in - the world simply as it presents itself to them. Presumably, for them the environment seems very much like a continuum, rather Jhan^ placeTlike ours, that is divided into the huge number of separate elements to whicli we humans give individual names. By separating out its elements in this way, human beings are able^cousj^^^ individual-aspects .ofit, in their minds. Andjyhat^makesjhis. possible is_ the ability to~ŕc«ifrančrto~rnampulate mental symbols that correspond to elements we perceive in the world within and beyond ourselves. Members of other species often display high levels of intuitive reasoning, reacting to stimuli from the environment in quite complex ways, but only human beings are able arbitrarily to combine and recombine mental symbols and _tojask^themselves questions such as "What.if?" _And it is the ability to do this, above everything else, that forms the foundation of our vaunted creativity. (60) The fact that humans seem, to be: unique in not being confined to a 'present cpntinuunV. É^f^^^^^^^^^^C^^^^^^^^S^}^^^^^^^ hesTn memory and Jlaähback^See note 7 above. ...... 11. Writing in 1916, Hugo Münsterberg argued that a film device should be defined in terms of its effectson the mind — on attention, memorj^magination^nd foegg^otigjis^ Film ea^tingijpxexample^has thepower to make our spemlati^nsjmm^^dj^oe^iiOnl. " amoment rather thamnaking definite a single interpretation-Qr_possibi.l.i^; that is, editing may depict by showing^^MWKtjr.. „Münsterberg describes editing as follows: It is as if different objects could fill the same space at the same time. It is as if the resistance of the material world had disappeared and the substances could penetrate one another. In the interlacing of our ideas we experience this superiority to all physical laws. (Dover:79; Routledge:135) SubStance # Vol. 31, no. 1, 2002 m 114 Edward Branigan 12. The feit presence of multiple drafts and ghostly alternatives may partially explain why a spectator may watch a film many times even though the end (and all else apparently) is already known. See generally Richard J. Gerrig, "Reexperiencing Fiction and Non-Fiction/' The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 47, n. 3 (Summer 1989), pp. 277^ 280. 13. Slavoj Zizek, The Fragile Absolute or, Why is the Christian Legacy Worth Fighting For? (New York: yerso^OpO), p. 90. I have taken this quote out of context. Zizek is concerned with the "disavowed ghosts" that haunt a consciousness of history, not narrative (p. 3). In this connection an interesting film example might be To Sleep with Anger. See also Avery F. Gordon's compelling argument that literary fiction contains ghostly truths that are not registered in social science or historical narratives; Ghostly Matters: Haunting and the Sociological Imagination (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997). Works Cited Bordwell, David. "Film Futures." SubStance #97 (Vol. 31, no. 1, 2002) pp. 88-104. Dennett, Daniel C. Consciousness Explained.&oston: Little, Brown, 1991. Fisher, Kevin. "Tracing the Tesseract: A Conceptual Prehistory of the Morph" in Meta-Morphing: Visual Transformation and the Culture ofQuick-Change, ed. Vivian Sobchack. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2000, pp. 103-129. Münsterberg, Hugo. The Film: A Psychological Study—The Silent Photoplay in 1916. New York: Dover, 1970 [1916]. Currently available as Hugo Münsterberg on Film: The Photoplay— A Psychological Study and Other Writings, ed. Allan Langdale. New York: Routledge, 2002. Tattersall, Ian. "How We Came to Be Human," Scientific American 285, n. 6 (December 2001) pp. 56-63. SubStance # 97, Vol. 31, no. 1, 2002