L03 Narrative Theory

What is the difference between story and narrative?
Narrative theory:
Claude Levi Strauss-Binary Opposition-Good vs Evil
Todorov (1977)
A story is a series of events-plot. The narrative is the way it is communicated and the meaning behind it.
Narratology-To study a text through relative theory.

The product I am studying is the film ‘The Notebook’. The main plot is about a couple who fall in and out of love through the years despite parent disapproval and the war. Despite being in different locations there love never leaves.

Key Theory 1- Tim O’Sulivan et al (1998) All media texts tell us some kind of story. Through careful mediation, media texts offer a way of telling stories about ourselves (as a culture) these are ideologies. Ideologies are the beliefs and ideal values.

In my text the ideologies are that everyone should have one love that means more than everything else.

Key theory 2: Pam cook (1985)
The standered Hollywood structure should have
Linearity of cause and effect within an overall trajectory of enigma resolution.
A high degree of narrative closure
A fictional world that contains verisimilitude especially governed by spatial and temporal coherence.
Realism- verisimilitude

The enigma in my film is that the main character Noah goes off to war without telling Ali amidst an argument which means they’re split up. They then have the enigma of finding one another again after the war ends.

Key Theory 3- Tzvetan Todorov (1977)
Stage 1- A point of stable equilibrium
Stage 2- This stability is disrupted by some kind of force, which creates a state of disequilibrium
Stage 3- Action directed against against the disruption
Stage 4- Restoraton of a state of new equilibrium.

The couple are in love. They fall out because ali’s Family disapprove and then Noah has to go off to war. Years later when Noah returns from war he starts to make a house for Ali whilst she is is engaged. When she learns of this she leaves her finance for Noah and they die together.

Key Theory 4: Claude Levi-Strauss (1958)
Binary opposition

The binary oppositions in the film I am studying are rich vs poor because Ali is from a wealthy family whilst Noah is a working class boy.

Key Theory 5- Vladimir Prop (1928)
All narratives feature stock characters and that audiences understand stories because of such features:
Villain/antagonist
Hero/protagonist
Helper/supportor (sidekick)
Princess (the prize for the hero) not one that is rescued or saved.

Ali is the princess because she is the prize for Noah after he builds her a house.

Key theory 6: Roland Barthes (1977)
Narrative codes:
Enigma code work to keep up setting problems or puzzles for the audience.
Action codes work inform the audience in terms of what is happening in the next shot/scene.
Always a close up insert shot edit

The enigma code in the notebook