Eisenstein writes the following:
For instance, murder on the stage has a purely physiological effect. Photographed in one montage-piece, it can function simply as information, as a sub-title. Emotional effect begins only with the reconstruction of the event in montage fragments, each of which will summon a certain association – the sum of which will be an all-embracing complex of emotional feeling.
Traditionally:
1. A hand lifts a knife.
2. The eyes of the victim open suddenly.
3. His hands clutch the table.
4. The knife is jerked up.
5. The eyes blink involuntarily.
6. Blood gushes.
7. A mouth shrieks.
8. Something drips onto a shoe . . .
and similar film clichés.
Nevertheless, in regard to the action as a whole, each fragmentpiece is almost abstract. The more differentiated they are the more abstract they become, provoking no more than a certain association. Quite logically the thought occurs: could not the same thing be accomplished more productively by not following the plot so slavishly, but by materializing the idea, the impression, of Murder through a free accumulation of associative matter? For the most important task is still to establish the idea of murder – he feeling of murder, as such. The plot is no more than a device without which one isn’t yet capable of telling something to the spectator! In any case, effort in this direction would certainly produce the most interesting variety of forms.
Write a page-or-so, where you attempt to solve this problem of Eisenstein.
What would that free accumulation of associative matter look like?
How would you convey murder through association without resorting to plot-driven cliches?
How do we view things associatively, outside of plot/time?
