Composite film
Encyclopedia
A composite film is a feature film
Feature film
In the film industry, a feature film is a film production made for initial distribution in theaters and being the main attraction of the screening, rather than a short film screened before it; a full length movie...

 whose screenplay
Screenplay
A screenplay or script is a written work that is made especially for a film or television program. Screenplays can be original works or adaptations from existing pieces of writing. In them, the movement, actions, expression, and dialogues of the characters are also narrated...

 is composed of two or more distinct stories. More generally, composite structure refers to an aesthetic principle
Aesthetics
Aesthetics is a branch of philosophy dealing with the nature of beauty, art, and taste, and with the creation and appreciation of beauty. It is more scientifically defined as the study of sensory or sensori-emotional values, sometimes called judgments of sentiment and taste...

 in which the narrative structure
Narrative structure
Narrative structure is generally described as the structural framework that underlies the order and manner in which a narrative is presented to a reader, listener, or viewer....

 relies on contiguity and linking rather than linearity. In a composite text or film, individual pieces are complete within themselves, yet they form a whole work that is greater than the sum of its individual parts.

History

The history of composite films begins with composite novels. The composite novel is a literary work composed of shorter texts that—though individually complete and autonomous—are interrelated in a coherent whole according to one or more organizing principles.

Although the composite-text aesthetic can be traced back through framework-stories
Frame story
A frame story is a literary technique that sometimes serves as a companion piece to a story within a story, whereby an introductory or main narrative is presented, at least in part, for the purpose of setting the stage either for a more emphasized second narrative or for a set of shorter stories...

 (such as the One Thousand and One Nights and The Canterbury Tales
The Canterbury Tales
The Canterbury Tales is a collection of stories written in Middle English by Geoffrey Chaucer at the end of the 14th century. The tales are told as part of a story-telling contest by a group of pilgrims as they travel together on a journey from Southwark to the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket at...

), story cycles (such as the Arthurian stories), and sacred composites (such as the Bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...

), composite texts had specific precursors in the village sketch of nineteenth century Europe and America. Reflecting its roots in the framework-story and/or the cycle, a typical village sketch may feature an introductory story and a summary story, with individually titled internal stories that do not necessarily depend upon specific sequencing.

Twentieth century experimentation with the composite whole-text aesthetic, i.e., combining individual short stories into a whole-text narrative, began with James Joyce
James Joyce
James Augustine Aloysius Joyce was an Irish novelist and poet, considered to be one of the most influential writers in the modernist avant-garde of the early 20th century...

's Dubliners
Dubliners
Dubliners is a collection of 15 short stories by James Joyce, first published in 1914. They were meant to be a naturalistic depiction of Irish middle class life in and around Dublin in the early years of the 20th century....

and Sherwood Anderson
Sherwood Anderson
Sherwood Anderson was an American novelist and short story writer. His most enduring work is the short story sequence Winesburg, Ohio. Writers he has influenced include Ernest Hemingway, William Faulkner, John Steinbeck, J. D. Salinger, and Amos Oz.-Early life:Anderson was born in Clyde, Ohio,...

's Winesburg, Ohio
Winesburg, Ohio (novel)
Winesburg, Ohio is a 1919 short story cycle by the American author Sherwood Anderson. The work is structured around the life of protagonist George Willard, from the time he was a child to his growing independence and ultimate abandonment of Winesburg as a young man...

 and accelerated thereafter, but the composite novel remained controversial among readers, reviewers, and critics. Some wanted to call these works "novel
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....

s" while others wanted to call them "collections". To their authors, however, these works were clearly not just collections of stories. Joyce insisted that Dubliners was a planned, integrated whole text. William Faulkner
William Faulkner
William Cuthbert Faulkner was an American writer from Oxford, Mississippi. Faulkner worked in a variety of media; he wrote novels, short stories, a play, poetry, essays and screenplays during his career...

 fought both publishers and critics over the whole-text coherence of Go Down, Moses
Go Down, Moses
Go Down, Moses is a collection of seven related pieces of short fiction by American author William Faulkner, sometimes considered a novel...

, refusing to append "And Other Stories" to the book's title. Later, Maxine Hong Kingston
Maxine Hong Kingston
Maxine Hong Kingston is a Chinese American author and Professor Emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley, where she graduated with a BA in English in 1962. Kingston has written three novels and several works of non-fiction about the experiences of Chinese immigrants living in the United...

 and Tim O'Brien
Tim O'Brien (author)
Tim O'Brien is an American novelist who often writes about his experiences in the Vietnam War and the impact the war had on the American servicemen who fought there...

 would wage similar battles over The Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Childhood Among Ghosts (1976) and The Things They Carried
The Things They Carried
The Things They Carried is a collection of related stories by Tim O'Brien, about a platoon of American soldiers in the Vietnam War, originally published in hardcover by Houghton Mifflin, 1990...

(1990), respectively. By the end of the twentieth century, authors were announcing their whole-text intentions by insisting on such sub-titles as "A Novel in Stories", or simply "A Novel".

Composite novels have been referred to as a number of other genre-names including short story cycle, framed miscellany, multi-faceted novel, story-novel, short story blend, double-novel, short story compound, short story composite, composite, anthology novel, para novel, triptych, mosaic novel, loose-leaf novel, and short story sequence.

Titles

Within a composite film, the individual stories may or may not be titled. Most highly integrated composite films, such as Love Actually
Love Actually
Love Actually is a 2003 British romantic comedy film written and directed by Richard Curtis. The screenplay delves into different aspects of love as shown through ten separate stories involving a wide variety of individuals, many of whom are shown to be interlinked as their tales progress...

, Traffic
Traffic (2000 film)
Traffic is a 2000 American crime drama film directed by Steven Soderbergh and written by Stephen Gaghan. It explores the illegal drug trade from a number of perspectives: a user, an enforcer, a politician and a trafficker. Their stories are edited together throughout the film, although some of the...

etc., do not have individually titled components while more traditional composite films, such as Paris, je t'aime
Paris, je t'aime
Paris, Je t'aime is a 2006 anthology film starring an ensemble cast of actors of various nationalities. The two-hour film consists of eighteen short films set in different arrondissements...

, Coffee & Cigarettes, Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her
Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her
Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her is a film written and directed by Rodrigo García starring an ensemble cast. Garcías debut film was shown at the 2000 Cannes Film Festival and won the Un Certain Regard Award...

, Pulp Fiction
Pulp Fiction (film)
Pulp Fiction is a 1994 American crime film directed by Quentin Tarantino, who co-wrote its screenplay with Roger Avary. The film is known for its rich, eclectic dialogue, ironic mix of humor and violence, nonlinear storyline, and host of cinematic allusions and pop culture references...

etc., do. Titling each component reinforces its autonomy and helps viewers experience it both individually and as part of the whole film.

Unifying elements

Many different devices are used to connect the individual stories to each other and to the film in its entirety. Unifying elements include repeated images (such as coffee cups and ash trays in Coffee & Cigarettes), recurring characters (the women within Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her appear in at least one story other than their own), shared incidents (drug addiction in Requiem for a Dream), common settings (the dark streets of Sin City
Sin City (film)
Sin City, also known as Frank Miller's Sin City, is a 2005 crime thriller film written, produced and directed by Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez...

), similar themes (the three women of The Hours
The Hours (film)
The Hours is a 2002 drama film directed by Stephen Daldry, and starring Nicole Kidman, Meryl Streep, Julianne Moore and Ed Harris. The screenplay by David Hare is based on the 1999 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel of the same title by Michael Cunningham....

), a single protagonist (Tommy in The Fountain
The Fountain
The Fountain is a 2006 American romantic drama film, which blends elements of fantasy, history, religion, and science fiction. It was directed by Darren Aronofsky, and starred Hugh Jackman and Rachel Weisz...

), collective protagonists (a group of people like generations of a family, coworkers, a club etc.), etc.

Story sequencing

The sequence in which the individual stories unfold is often significant to the overall meaning of the film. Component pieces can be arranged in a number of different ways (chronologically, thematically, geographically etc.) and each method produces different results.

Composite film scores

In regards to issues with connectivity, it is important to consider the musical score of composite films. Much like visual repetition or thematic similarities, the score offers another medium through which stories can be linked. Rather than leaving viewers with content to process, decode, intellectualize and then react to, the film score can produce emotional reactions immediately, before viewers have a chance to analyze their own responses. There are three main categories of composite film scores:

Unified Score
In a unified score, there is no discernible difference between the music playing during each story segment. For example, in Sin City
Sin City (film)
Sin City, also known as Frank Miller's Sin City, is a 2005 crime thriller film written, produced and directed by Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez...

, the highly stylized background music offers ambiance and contributes to the setting and does not vary between characters and stories. In Love Actually
Love Actually
Love Actually is a 2003 British romantic comedy film written and directed by Richard Curtis. The screenplay delves into different aspects of love as shown through ten separate stories involving a wide variety of individuals, many of whom are shown to be interlinked as their tales progress...

, pop music blares through happy moments, ballads wail during morose moments, and triumphant strings swell when all things are as they should be.

Composite Score
In a composite score, the music within each individual segment is independent and distinct from the music within other segments. For example, in Paris, je t'aime
Paris, je t'aime
Paris, Je t'aime is a 2006 anthology film starring an ensemble cast of actors of various nationalities. The two-hour film consists of eighteen short films set in different arrondissements...

, each titled piece is accompanied by music that relates only to that single piece rather than the film as a whole. In this example, rather than linking the story lines, the music serves to further distinguish each neighborhood from the others.

Theme and Variation
Theme and variation refers to a main theme that varies slightly by story segment. For example, in The Fountain
The Fountain
The Fountain is a 2006 American romantic drama film, which blends elements of fantasy, history, religion, and science fiction. It was directed by Darren Aronofsky, and starred Hugh Jackman and Rachel Weisz...

, one main theme appears in each character's story, but there are also variations on that theme specific to those individual characters (tribal drums accompany the conquistador in Mayan territory, etc.). In Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her
Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her
Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her is a film written and directed by Rodrigo García starring an ensemble cast. Garcías debut film was shown at the 2000 Cannes Film Festival and won the Un Certain Regard Award...

, the main theme throughout the film consists of somber classical guitar and accompanying piano, but within each individually titled segment, there are minor differences. Sultry horns are added to the banker's scenes, as she is having an affair, and as the detective investigates the death of her Hispanic friend, the music takes on a subtle Latin sound, etc.

List of composite films

  • Aayitha Ezhuthu
    Aayitha Ezhuthu
    Aayutha Ezhuthu is a 2004 Tamil political film directed by Mani Ratnam. It stars Surya, Madhavan and Siddharth in the lead roles. The film's score and soundtrack is composed by Oscar winning Music Director A. R. Rahman...

  • Amores Perros
    Amores perros
    Amores perros is a 2000 neorealist Mexican film, directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu. Amores Perros is the first movie in Iñárritu's trilogy of death, and was followed by 21 Grams and Babel. It is a triptych; an anthology film, sometimes referred to as the "Mexican Pulp Fiction," containing...

  • A River Named Titas
    Titash Ekti Nadir Naam
    Titash Ekti Nadir Naam is a 1973 Bengali film directed by Ritwik Ghatak. The movie was based on a novel by the same name, written by Advaita Malla Burman. The movie explores the life of the fishermen on the bank of the Titash River in Brahmanbaria, Bangladesh.Rosy Samad, Golam Mostafa, Kabori,...

  • Before The Rain
    Before the Rain (film)
    Before the Rain is a 1994 Macedonian film starring Katrin Cartlidge, Rade Šerbedžija, Grégoire Colin, and Labina Mitevska. It was directed and written by Milčo Mančevski. The music was created by the band Anastasia.-Plot:...

  • Closer
    Closer (film)
    Closer is a 2004 romantic drama film written by Patrick Marber, based on his award-winning 1997 play of the same name. It was produced and directed by Mike Nichols and stars Natalie Portman, Julia Roberts, Jude Law and Clive Owen...

  • Coffee & Cigarettes
  • Crash
    Crash (2004 film)
    Crash is a 2004 American drama film co-written, produced, and directed by Paul Haggis. The film is about racial and social tensions in Los Angeles, California. A self-described "passion piece" for Haggis, Crash was inspired by a real life incident in which his Porsche was carjacked outside a video...

  • Darna Mana Hai
    Darna Mana Hai
    Darna Mana Hai is a Bollywood Anthology film, released on 25 July 2003. It was considered a unique and innovative attempt by producer Ram Gopal Varma and director Prawal Raman to provide Indian audiences with a horror film which consists of six different short stories...

  • Darna Zaroori Hai
    Darna Zaroori Hai
    Darna Zaroori Hai is a Bollywood Anthology film released on 28 April 2006. It was considered a prequel to Darna Mana Hai which was also produced by RGV...

  • The Dress
  • Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
    Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
    Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is a 2004 American romantic science fiction film about an estranged couple who have each other erased from their memories, scripted by Charlie Kaufman and directed by the French director, Michel Gondry. The film uses elements of science fiction, psychological...

  • Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex* (*But Were Afraid to Ask)
  • Five Senses
  • The Fountain
    The Fountain
    The Fountain is a 2006 American romantic drama film, which blends elements of fantasy, history, religion, and science fiction. It was directed by Darren Aronofsky, and starred Hugh Jackman and Rachel Weisz...

  • Four Rooms
    Four Rooms
    Four Rooms is a 1995 portmanteau comedy film telling four stories set in a hotel in the US city of Los Angeles on New Year's Eve. Tim Roth stars as the principal character of the frame tale; he also takes part to some degree in all four stories....

  • Go
    Go (1999 film)
    Go is a 1999 comedy thriller film written by John August and directed by Doug Liman, with three intertwining plots that happen to involve one drug deal. The film stars William Fichtner, Katie Holmes, Jay Mohr, Sarah Polley and Scott Wolf and features Taye Diggs, Breckin Meyer, Timothy Olyphant,...

  • Grindhouse
  • The Hours
    The Hours (film)
    The Hours is a 2002 drama film directed by Stephen Daldry, and starring Nicole Kidman, Meryl Streep, Julianne Moore and Ed Harris. The screenplay by David Hare is based on the 1999 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel of the same title by Michael Cunningham....

  • Invitation to the Dance
    Invitation to the Dance (film)
    Invitation to the Dance is a 1956 anthology film consisting of three distinct stories, all starring and directed by Gene Kelly.The film is unusual in that it has no spoken dialogue, with the characters performing their roles entirely through dance and mime...

  • Kanchenjungha
    Kanchenjungha
    Kanchenjungha is a 1962 Bengali film by Bengali film director Satyajit Ray. It was Ray's first original screenplay and his first colour film....

  • Ken Park
    Ken Park
    Ken Park is a 2002 drama film. The screenplay was written by Harmony Korine, who based it on Larry Clark's journals and stories. The film was directed by Larry Clark and Ed Lachman....

  • Kids
    Kids (film)
    Kids is a 1995 drama film written by Harmony Korine and directed by Larry Clark.The film features Chloë Sevigny, Leo Fitzpatrick, Justin Pierce, Harold Hunter, and Rosario Dawson, all of them in their debut performances...

  • Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels
  • Love Actually
    Love Actually
    Love Actually is a 2003 British romantic comedy film written and directed by Richard Curtis. The screenplay delves into different aspects of love as shown through ten separate stories involving a wide variety of individuals, many of whom are shown to be interlinked as their tales progress...

  • Magnolia
    Magnolia (film)
    Magnolia is a 1999 American drama film written, produced, and directed by Paul Thomas Anderson, narrated by Ricky Jay, and starring Tom Cruise, Philip Baker Hall, Philip Seymour Hoffman, William H. Macy, Julianne Moore, John C. Reilly, and Jason Robards in his last feature film appearance...

  • Me and You and Everyone We Know
    Me and You and Everyone We Know
    Me and You and Everyone We Know is a 2005 American romantic comedy-drama film written and directed by Miranda July and stars July, John Hawkes, Miles Thompson, Brandon Ratcliff, Natasha Slayton, Najarra Townsend, Carlie Westerman, and JoNell Kennedy.-Plot:The structure of the film consists of...

  • Midaq Alley
  • Mumbai Meri Jaan
  • Mystery Train
    Mystery Train (film)
    Mystery Train is a 1989 independent anthology film written and directed by Jim Jarmusch and set in Memphis, Tennessee. The film comprises a triptych of stories involving foreign protagonists unfolding over the course of the same night...

  • Nashville
  • New York Stories
    New York Stories
    New York Stories is a 1989 anthology film; it consists of three shorts with the central theme being New York City.The first is Life Lessons, directed by Martin Scorsese, written by Richard Price and starring Nick Nolte. The second is Life Without Zoë, directed by Francis Ford Coppola and written by...

  • Nine Lives
    Nine Lives
    Nine Lives may refer to:*The common myth that cats have nine lives;- In film/television :*Ni Liv, Nine Lives, a 1957 Norwegian-language movie*The Nine Lives of Fritz the Cat, 1974 adult animated film...

  • Paris, je t'aime
    Paris, je t'aime
    Paris, Je t'aime is a 2006 anthology film starring an ensemble cast of actors of various nationalities. The two-hour film consists of eighteen short films set in different arrondissements...

  • Personal Velocity
  • Pulp Fiction
    Pulp Fiction (film)
    Pulp Fiction is a 1994 American crime film directed by Quentin Tarantino, who co-wrote its screenplay with Roger Avary. The film is known for its rich, eclectic dialogue, ironic mix of humor and violence, nonlinear storyline, and host of cinematic allusions and pop culture references...

  • The Red Violin
    The Red Violin
    The Red Violin is a 1998 Canadian drama film directed by François Girard. It spans three centuries and five countries as it tells the story of a mysterious violin and its many owners...

  • Requiem for a Dream
  • The Rules of Attraction
    The Rules of Attraction (film)
    The Rules of Attraction is a 2002 satirical dark comedy film directed by Roger Avary, based on the novel of the same name by Bret Easton Ellis. It stars James van der Beek, Shannyn Sossamon, Ian Somerhalder, Jessica Biel, and Kip Pardue.-Plot:...

  • A Scanner Darkly
    A Scanner Darkly (film)
    A Scanner Darkly is a 2006 science fiction thriller directed by Richard Linklater based on the novel of the same name by Philip K. Dick. The film tells the story of identity and deception in a near-future dystopia constantly under intrusive high-technology police surveillance in the midst of a drug...

  • Sarvam
    Sarvam
    Sarvam is a 2009 Indian Tamil romantic thriller film written and directed by Vishnuvardhan, who has earlier directed highly successful Tamil films like Arinthum Ariyamalum , Pattiyal and Billa . Starring Arya and Trisha Krishnan in the lead roles while J. D...

  • Short Cuts
    Short Cuts
    Short Cuts is a 1993 American drama film directed by Robert Altman. Filmed from a screenplay by Robert Altman and Frank Barhydt, it is inspired by nine short stories and a poem by Raymond Carver...

  • Sin City
    Sin City (film)
    Sin City, also known as Frank Miller's Sin City, is a 2005 crime thriller film written, produced and directed by Frank Miller and Robert Rodriguez...

  • Snatch
    Snatch (film)
    Snatch is a 2000 crime film written and directed by British filmmaker Guy Ritchie, featuring an ensemble cast. Set in the London criminal underworld, the film contains two intertwined plots: one dealing with the search for a stolen diamond, the other with a small-time boxing promoter named Turkish ...

  • Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her
    Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her
    Things You Can Tell Just by Looking at Her is a film written and directed by Rodrigo García starring an ensemble cast. Garcías debut film was shown at the 2000 Cannes Film Festival and won the Un Certain Regard Award...

  • Thirteen Conversations About One Thing
    Thirteen Conversations About One Thing
    Thirteen Conversations About One Thing is a 2001 American drama film directed by Jill Sprecher. The screenplay by Sprecher and her sister Karen focuses on five seemingly disparate individuals in search of happiness whose paths intersect in ways that unexpectedly impact their lives.-Plot:The film is...

  • Thirty Two Short Films About Glenn Gould
    Thirty Two Short Films About Glenn Gould
    Thirty Two Short Films About Glenn Gould is an award-winning 1993 film about the piano prodigy Glenn Gould played by Colm Feore. The film's screenplay was written by François Girard and Don McKellar....

  • Three Colors trilogy
  • Three Sisters
  • Traffic
    Traffic (2000 film)
    Traffic is a 2000 American crime drama film directed by Steven Soderbergh and written by Stephen Gaghan. It explores the illegal drug trade from a number of perspectives: a user, an enforcer, a politician and a trafficker. Their stories are edited together throughout the film, although some of the...

  • Trio
    Trio (1950 film)
    Trio is a 1950 British anthology film based on three short stories by W. Somerset Maugham: "The Verger", "Mr. Know-All" and "Sanatorium". Ken Annakin directed "The Verger" and "Mr...

  • Twenty Bucks
    Twenty Bucks
    Twenty Bucks is a 1993 film that follows the travels of a $20 bill from a crisp new note from the ATM in downtown Minneapolis through various transactions and incidents from person to person through the city....

  • 21 Grams
    21 Grams
    21 Grams is a 2003 American drama film directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu and written by Guillermo Arriaga. It stars Sean Penn, Naomi Watts, Danny Huston, and Benicio del Toro....

  • Waking Life
    Waking Life
    Waking Life is an American animated film , directed by Richard Linklater and released in 2001. The entire film was shot using digital video and then a team of artists using computers drew stylized lines and colors over each frame.The film focuses on the nature of dreams, consciousness, and...

  • The Yellow Rolls-Royce
    The Yellow Rolls-Royce
    -External links:, a promotional short subject for the film...


Further reading

  • The Complete Film Dictionary, 2nd ed., Ed. Ira Konigsburg (1997).
  • Maggie Dunn, "Composite Structure in Three Contemporary Composite Films", JAISA 9.1 (Autumn 1999): 33-41.
  • The Norton Anthology of American Literature, Vol. C, 6th ed.
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