Answering the whats, hows and whys of film spectatorship:

An empirical investigation and comparison of film reception

CarrieLynn D. Reinhard

Dominican University

Christopher Olson

DePaul University

Theorizing the film spectator

• Cognitive approach• Meaning-making strategies employed to comprehend and

interpret film texts• Meaning constructed by spectator using textual cues • Cues editing, music, cinematography, narrative elements…

• Affective approach• Understand how film spectators receive pleasure• Pleasure something “actual” spectator constructs from text • Results from cognitive/affective reactions to text

Need for Systematic Empiricism

• Theoretical advancement: spectator as active sense-maker• Barker: theoretical interest in “conditions of comprehension”

• Problem: lack empirical studies audience research. • Except via recall methods (ex. Orero, 2008; Waldron, 2004)

• Staiger: loses factors brought into engagement by spectator accounting for response and reception• Sociohistorical context and lived experiences, aka evaluative

criteria

Need for Systematic Empiricism

• Question then becomes:• If cognitive/affective approach coupled with

evaluative criteria• Then how best empirically test this theoretical

approach?

• If specific textual cues direct spectator’s meaning-making, then best measured as they occur, moment-by-moment

Minutia Reception Analysis• Minutia reception analysis: each moment of reaction to

specific cue is unit of analysis • Allows for comparisons:

• Within text• To overall reception • Between individuals, or same individual over time.

• Allow for understanding how relates to evaluative criteria

• Help us to understand:• “What” react to• “How” reacting• “Why” react

Method Developed• Measure spectator’s responses

moment-by-moment• Slows down reception through

viewer empowerment• Asked to report reactions as they

occur, with what responding to• Uses content analysis to code cued

responses

• Possible now given digital technologies & access interactivity

Pilot Testing the Method

• Pilot tested with Western genre films• Two films to represent different eras

• Myself & mother: Stagecoach (1939) • Myself & brother: Unforgiven (1992)

• Three comparisons possible:• Myself to Myself (C)• Myself to Mother (M)• Myself to Brother (B)

Minutia Reception Worksheets

Content Analysis Codes

• Question: Scratch head• confusion, wonder, ponder,

gap

• Guess: Look forward• expectation, hypothesis,

prediction

• Conclusion: Aha!• idea, understanding,

supposition

• Surprise: Jump back• startled, unexpected

• Positive Emotion: • desirable, wanted, uplifting

• Negative Emotion: • undesirable, discard-able,

depressing

• Judgment: Step back• criticisms, metatextual

reflections and observation

Frequency of coded responses per engaging

Stagecoach (C) Stagecoach (M) Unforgiven (C) Unforgiven (B)0

5

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

45

50

JudgmentNegativePositiveConclusionSurpriseGuessQuestion

Coded film spectatorship• Example of B & first five reactions to Unforgiven

Comparisons of Coded Responses

Discussion of Westerns Pilot Study

• What focus on• Specific cues structured into film text

• Narrative• Visceral• Metatextual

• How focus on them• Responses coded into seven types of reactions• Same cue same reaction but different spectators• Same cue different reactions, different spectators

Discussion of Westerns Pilot Study• No interrogation of whys

• Need further methodological step

• Spectator’s reactions to superhero genre films• Research project: sense-making different media technologies• Interviewed their sense-making processes• Begin find links between cues, reactions, evaluative criteria

Conclusions Thus Far

•To understand the whats, hows and whys • “Whats” text• “Hows “ text + spectator• “Whys” spectator

Conclusions Thus Far

•Addresses “actual” spectator •Provides evidence for amount of activity during engaging

•Links between:• Text cues• Evaluative criteria• Overall reception

Future Directions• Understanding different media engagements

• Various contents, technologies texts

• Comparison purposes• When and where divergences occurred• How relate to differences in reception• How individuals with different backgrounds

respond to same text

Future Directions• Example application: replication of transcultural audience studies• Global appropriations of

Westerns• How audiences learn about

cultures • Compare reactions to specific

cultural signifiers• Reveal unfettered responses,

such as stereotypes or appropriations

THE ENDBut really, just the beginning…

ReferencesBarker, M. (2006). I have seen the future and it is not here yet...; or, on being ambitious for audience research. The Communication Review, 9. p. 123-141.

Bordwell, D. (1979/2004). The art cinema as mode of film practice. In L. Braudy & M. Cohen (Eds.). Film theory and criticism: Introductory readings (6th edition) (pp. 774-782). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

Bordwell, D. (1986). Classical Hollywood cinema: Narrational principles and procedures. In P. Rosen (Ed.). Narrative, apparatus, ideology: a film theory reader. New York, NY: Columbia University Pres..

Bordwell, D. (1989). Making meaning: Inference and rhetoric in the interpretation of cinema. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Dervin, B. & Foreman-Wernet, L. (2003). Sense-Making Methodology reader: Selected writings of Brenda Dervin. Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press, Inc.

Knight, D. (1995). Making sense of genre. In A. Casebier (Ed.). Film and philosophy, Volume 2. Retrieved on 2/26/07 from http://www.hanover.edu/philos/film/vol_02/sweeney.htm. 

Mayne, J. (1993). Cinema and spectatorship. New York, NY: Routledge.

Plantinga, C. (1995). Movie pleasures and the spectator's experience: Toward a cognitive approach. In A. Casebier (Ed.). Film and philosophy, Volume 2. Retrieved on 2/26/07 from http://www.hanover.edu/philos/film/vol_02/sweeney.htm.

Sweeney, K. (1995). Constructivism in cognitive film theory. In A. Casebier (Ed.). Film and philosophy, Volume 2. Retrieved on 2/26/07 from http://www.hanover.edu/philos/film/vol_02/sweeney.htm

Waldron, D. (2004). Incorporating qualitative audience research into French film studies: the case of Gazon maudit (Balasko, 1995). Studies in French Cinema, 4(2), p. 121-133.