Emotional Cues in Nollywood Film Culture: A Reading of Kunle Afolayan's October 1 (original) (raw)

Comparative study of Iranian and Bollywood films on children:A semiotic analysis of mise_en_scene elements

Journal of emerging technologies and innovative research, 2020

In contemporary media scenario, media content has been altered drastically affected by the factors like globalization, commercialization or deregulation of media. Media including film has become market driven, hence glamour, sensationalism finds prioritized in the media. However, there are always an exceptions, Iranian cinema is one such example.The international fame of Iranian cinema has invited global attention to the new tradition of filmmaking that are based on simple, realist, yet powerful themes. In Iranian cinema children dominate the narratives of films. On the other hand, contemporary Bollywood cinema which is known for its melodrama is also now producing child centric movies. Hindi film representation of Children keeps on changing not only with changing perceptions of audience but also with socio-political condition of the country. There is need to understand and examine the structures of these simple story lines which are not the product of sophisticated technology and commercialization as much as of artistic potential of filmmakers. The given research study 'Comparative analysis of contemporary Iranian and Bollywood films on Children" is qualitative study using film semiotics in the analyses of films borrowing ideas from early theorists Andre Bazin's ideas of mise-en-scene and among contemporaries film theorist Andrew Dix's terms of mise-en-scene. Further the researcher has also borrowed ideas from noted French semiotician Roland Barthes connotation and denotation of images and American Philosopher C.S pierces indexical and symbolic signs in the analysis of film text.

Negotiating Semiotics of Mise en Scene is the Real Challenge of Indian Cinema: A De-Westernizing Approach to Visual Culture

De-Westernizing Visual and Communication Cultures: Perspectives from the Global South, 2020

The author argues that a Westernized approach has so far failed to offer a holistic image of Indian cinema. Hindi and Telugu cinemas together constitute the greater part of the Indian film industry. Since the dawn of the talkie era (1931), both these cinemas have reflected a pan-Indian culture largely drawn from an ancient Indian heritage, including fine arts. However, approaching Indian cinema through the Western theories of psychoanalysis and Marxism since 1980s has resulted in underrating of early Indian cinema and, further, overlooked the contributions of Indian classic cinema to world cinema. As a result, several awkward theories to interpret Indian cinemas have emerged. Murthy offers not only an overview of the lacunae in such theories, but also a de-Westernized approach as a holistic cultural model that subsumes both Indian semiotics and phenomenology. The chapter is predicated on the argument that negotiating the frames of Indian cinema from the perspectives of semiotics and phenomenology is a real challenge that calls for a rich knowledge of ancient Indian heritage, its culture and aesthetics. It thus argues that a de-Westernized approach to Indian Cinema is an ideal way to understand it in its entirety.

Interpreting the Representational Meanings of a Movie from a Subaltern Perspective: A case Study of Kabali

Amity Journal of Media and Communication studies, 2016

This paper focuses on how film is used as a tool to disseminate an ideology. The film Kabali hit the screens in July, 2016 across the world. The presence of superstar Rajinikanth and widespread promotion of the movie had built greater expectations for all the Rajini fans in the world. This film had symbolically represented the problems, issues and everyday struggles of the subaltern classes. It used the film as a narration to explain the subordinated classes that they must be very cautious of the 'cultural invasion' and the necessity of education. It signifies the necessity of an egalitarian society with anti-Gandhian philosophy and the necessity of annihilating caste. The photographic images, cultural symbols and Icons represented in the movie are drawn from the 'equal-rights movements' across the world. This movie is an attempt by the subaltern classes to legitimize their spaces in the mainstream media. I will explain how semiotics is structurally used in this movie to spread the idea of the subaltern classes.

THE SEMIOTICS OF COMPUTER GENERATED IMAGES (CGI): A READING OF SELECTED NOLLYWOOD FILMS

Introduction Nollywood as an industry is a highly placed commercial industry which is developing rapidly. Its film narratives are characterized by Nigerianness which is easily understood from the perspective of the Nigerian context. Nollywood films are produced in different genres which includes ritual genre, the vigilant genre, comic genre; epic genre, religious genre, love, and other genres. This notwithstanding, there are films which display aspects of more than one genre. In all, these films are representations of different ideologies of the Nigerian society. As such, their visual images are constructs of cultural representation in which meanings can only be deduced from the context of culture. Most recently films employ the use of computer generated images to construct

semiotic misrepresentation of punjabi culture in punjabi cinema

This study investigates the misrepresentation of Punjabi culture in the Punjabi Movies. The focus of the study is to investigate the multiple signs as means of communication employed in the movies carrying certain meanings for the audience. The study sheds lights on the issues relating to the misrepresentation of pure culture of Punjab on the big screens. The key theoretical concepts running through this work are those of misrepresentation and semiotics, both interconnected to each another and underline the fact that production of meaning is indeed a complex and an unconscious process. The tools of analysis employed in this investigation are primarily those of semiotic analysis and Critical theories to investigate into the apparent and hidden messages in the images. Different images from different movies have been selected f or the analysis subjected to a detailed a al sis usi g Pie e s Model f or sign analysis. This is a multidisciplinary study that is going to venture into the domains of semiotics, cultural and media studies. The study is basically qualitative in nature.

Spectral Aesthetics And The Construction Of Reality In Nollywood Video Films

International Journal of Communication Research 13(1), 2023

Spectral aesthetics is concerned with the use camera and editing techniques as well as the specialized vocabularies of film productions to create meaning and to arouse the feelings of the audience. These techniques and vocabularies include but are not limited to signs, codes and conventions, camera distance and angles, lighting, sound, graphics and editing. The authors conducted a semiotic analysis on select Nollywood films to see how the elements employed are related to what comes before and after them as in the steps of a plot-syntagmatic relationships and the enduring principles and rules that organise the filmsparadigmatic relationships. The key signifiers in each of the select video films were discussed in relation to the signified (what they stand for). The formal arrangement of the thoughts, ideas and emotions of the filmmakers, and how they are able to create latent meaning using certain signifiers of meaning were also revealed.

Hum Aapke Hain Koun...!: An Example of the Coding of Emotions in Contemporary Hindi Mainstream Film

Projections, 2009

Taking Hum Aapke Hain Koun. .. ! as an example, this article asks whether models that were developed for the analysis of narrative forms and their intended emotional effects in Hollywood cinema can be regarded as universal, and to what extent they may be reasonably applied to commercial Hindi films. The often voiced reproach that Hindi cinema lacks realism, usually accompanied by a critique of the excessive use of emotional cues, arises in part from the fact that scholars tend to view the narrative forms of Western mainstream cinema as the norm from which Hindi cinema deviates. By contrast, this article argues that we need to search for a proper understanding of a cinema whose films follow different rules. In so doing, this article also contributes to the debate on how cognitive models of film reception may be expanded to include culturalist elements of explanation.

Multisemiotic Patterns of Emotive Meaning-Making in Film

Alfred Nobel University Journal of Philology

The aim of the article is to highlight multisemiotic patterns of emotive meaning making in feature films. The research tasks are: to explore the meaning-making mechanism in a cognitive-pragmatic perspective; to determine the cognitive-semiotic basics of emotive meaning making; and to identify the meaning-making potential of semiotic resources as well as to single out multisemiotic constructive patterns. To reach the aim, we apply an integrative cognitive-pragmatic and cognitive-semiotic approach, which requires the use of discursive and semiotic research methods. In cognitive-pragmatic perspective, we stress the intersubjective interaction of filmmakers and viewers in constructing ‘meaning-in-context’. The cognitive-semiotic vantage point emphasizes dynamic, enactive, and embodied character of meaningmaking in cinematic discourse. Film is a multimodal and multisemiotic phenomenon, where a synergistic combination of verbal, nonverbal, and cinematic semiotic systems constructs the fil...