DEFAMILIARIZATION AND FILM (Essay Sample)

DEFAMILIARIZATION AND FILM
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Defamiliarization and Film
Introduction
Victor Shklovsky who is a Russian Formalists introduced the idea of “Defamiliarization” in his Art as Device essay in the year 1917. The term was invented as the means of distinguishing poetic from the realistic language by formers perceptibility. Hence it is an artistic approach of forcing audiences to view common things in a strange and unfamiliar way, to enhance the insight of well-known. It is an ambiguous word to understand, and the formalists use an example from the Tolstoy who uses the method throughout his work. For example, the narrator of the holster is a horse, and it is a point of view of the horse which makes the entire content of the story to be unfamiliar. Furthermore, Defamiliarization comes with both the increase and slowing down of the process of comprehending and reading and also the awareness of artistic processes causing them. It also includes the use of foreign languages within the work. Also, it draws attention to the use of the common word to alter a personal perception of the easily understandable concept or objects. The paper will briefly discuss the idea of Defamiliarization and how it can be applied in films.
Defamiliarization is viewed as the effect of the literary work which disrupts the audience or readers constant perception of the entire world. It is done by making familiar things on the film to look unfamiliar (Wu Ying 2007, p54). According to Shklovsky, the art of films achieves defamiliarization through the removal of objects from automatism of perception. It, therefore, produced if the theme, structure, and style of the film are presented in an unfamiliar and strange way, as long as the presentation can cause the viewers to reconsider, actively and slow down think about what he or she is viewing, hence defamiliarization is therefore achieved. The primary objective is to provoke the viewer to be more thoughtful and active when thinking and learning (Wu Ying 2007, p54).
For example, the technique was used in the drama “alienation effects” that was introduced by the Berthold in his own Epic Theater, to disrupt the audience passive complacency and also force them into a critical analysis of the entire film/art as well as e entire world (Nsrullah 2016). Also, the approach is applied in film art to challenge the viewer's expectations and also jar their sensibilities. It forces the viewers to see the film from a different perspective and also appreciate the form of the film and not just the meaning and the content (Nsrullah 2016). For example, at the play of Samuel Beckett “waiting for Godot, “it plays with defamiliarization and also estrangement. It is where that audience is compelled to reconsider and consider what is going on, who Godot might be and so on (Nsrullah 2016). Anything which causes the audience to take their time to reconsider and ponder things or anything that is strange is considered the use of the defamiliarization.
Furthermore, the film titles are the first windows that are opened up for the audience. Hence it directly influences the first expression of the passion of enjoying it and the entire film (Mangesh 2013). Therefore, it title need to be translated in a manner that will attract the audience attention and make the movie enjoyable and can be with the use of defamiliarization of the film. Since the film is comprehensive of art, it is an art of spreading culture. Hence in film, the title can be kept in an unfamiliar way, and its effects remain unfamiliar (Mangesh 2013). For example, when a rain man is being released, the rain man itself was a novel and new expression. Hence according to the title one will find the audience associating the film to the rain man, and after they have watched the movie, they find out that the leading character in the film has an issue of a lisp when he is pronouncing his name Raymond which sounds like rain man (Mangesh 2013).
Also, the technique of the art allows the audience to perceive the world as new through defamiliarization of the people perception (Lawrence 1984, p210). It is seen in film industries since films are not made up of the images which are drawn purely from the imagination of the filmmakers but of the pictures which are drawn from the world and also being captured by cameras. The filmmakers will make a particular film through the encounter with the world (Lawrence 1984, p210). For example, Francesco Casetti who is an Italian Film scholar indicated that in cinema the reality usually appears on screens in all its destiny and richness that is liberated from the indifference and habit that has hidden our standard view. And to the film, it usually means to reactive and captures the world. Hence filmmakers highly use the technique of defamiliarization to attract the attention of the audience (Lawrence 1984, p210).
For example, a scene from the Midway of part one of the Gullivers Travels, where the Gullivers receives the word that some Lilliputians have discovered a “great black substance that is very oddly shaped.” Somewhere out within the country (Daniel 2019, p26). They looked at it over and over again and discovered that it was not a living creature as they apprehended at first. They viewed it as being even