Examining the Boundaries Between Fiction and Fact in the Narrative Cinema

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4 Examining the Boundaries
Between Fiction and Fact in the
e Cinema
33
DAVID HILES
bstract
le boundaries between fiction and fact in the
onventions of narrative cinema.
torytelling in Stand By Me
“It is the tale, not h hen King (Different Seasons, 1982)
erent”. Only the friendship between
Gordie and Chris survives the adventure.
Narrativ
A
The film, Stand By Me, has been described as a small gem. First impression
reveals little more than a linear plot, a story told, from Gordie’s point-of-view,
of a journey made by four boys to find a dead body. But, on closer inspection,
the film reveals itself as far more complex in narrative structure. The film uses
ambiguity of character, flashbacks and two types of voice-over narration, to
offer not only an exploration of the nature of fictional storytelling, but also a
profound examination of the subt
c
S
e who tells it”. Step
The plot of the film, Stand By Me (SBM), directed by Rob Reiner, was based
on an original short story by Stephen King (1982). It is the summer of ’59, in
Castle Rock, Oregon. A group of 12-year-old boys, Gordie, Chris, Teddy and
Vern, overhear a story concerning the sighting of a dead body. Carried away
by the sense of adventure, and the prospect of getting their names in the papers
and becoming heroes, they set off to find the body. At the town scrapyard,
Gordie narrowly escapes being savaged by Chopper, a dog with a reputation
that is more myth than reality. Crossing a trestle bridge, Vern and Gordie are
panic-stricken by a pursuing train. The boys camp for the night, and Gordie
demonstrates his skills as a storyteller in his story of Lardass Hogan. Crossing
a swamp offers a rite-of-passage in Gordie’s growing up. Finally, they discover
the body, but are challenged by a gang of teenagers, led by Ace Merrill. Chris
is defiant, and Gordie frightens them away with a loaded gun. They decide to
leave the body, and anonymously inform the local authorities. Returning to
Castle Rock, “ . . . the town seemed diff

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On first impression, the film offers a nostalgic reminiscence of youthful
adventure, naive grasping at emerging manhood. The plot is a simple linear
telling of the story from Gordie’s point-of-view, with brief flashbacks
concerning Gordie’s relationship with his dead brother, and the rift with his
parents. However, on closer inspection it is a little more complicated. We
cannot overlook that the story of the film is the writing of a story about four
boys by the man in the car (played by Richard Dreyfuss) at the beginning of
the film. The film is therefore a-story-within-a-story. Placing Gordie as the
narrator, seems to identify “Dreyfuss” as the grown-up Gordie, who is now a
writer and story-teller, recounting a childhood experience. But, in the final
credits, “Dreyfuss” is identified only as the writer, (not Gordie). The identity
of the writer is clearly ambivalent, and possibly the four boys are no more than
the product of a writer’s fictional imagination. It is interesting to note the
importance of the use of Dreyfuss, a hollywood star-image, as the unnamed
writer. This helps us recognise him in the final scene as the man in the car at
the beginning.
Figure 1: Gordie, Chris, Vern and Teddy
“STAND BY ME”
© 1986 Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc.
All Rights Reserved
Courtesy of Columbia Pictures

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Moreover, the film explicitly explores the nature of narrative in many subtle
ways. For example, the character, Gordie, is a story-teller, and, within-the-
story-within-the-story there is a third level of storytelling, a series of stories,
about a dog called Chopper, about the death of his brother Denny, the school
milk money, and especially, Gordie’s fictional creation of “Lardass Hogan”.
The very nature of story-telling is examined in each boy’s response to this
Lardass story. At this deeper level of story telling, each narrative provides a
site for contestation between historical fact and fictional possibilities.
Approaching Film as a Discursive Practice
My own approach to the study of a film such as SBM, stresses a cultural
psychology perspective, with its emphasis on a study of the meaning-making
process. It is therefore less concerned with the processes of visual perception
and human cognition, instead focusing on visual communication as a cultural
activity and as a discursive practice (Turner, 2006). This involves the study of
how the film viewer constructs meanings from complex presentations of
stimuli (ie. edited shots, camera angles, elaborate visual and sound images,
etc.), as well as responding to film as a text (ie. shots assembled into segments,
scenes and complete narrative structures). Such an approach is not concerned
with the production or making of films itself, or with the place of the film
industry in our culture, or the aesthetics, authorship and criticism of film texts,
except insofar as this might have a bearing on the psychological issues
involved.
The perspective I will adopt is that visual meaning-making is a
construction, and this happens between the film text and film viewer.
Especially important is the idea that meaning is not a simple consequence of
the shots chosen in compiling a film text, but is chiefly the result of contiguity
between shots, and their placement within sequences, segments and scenes that
make up the film (Worth, 1981). Towards this end, I have adapted and
developed a set of analytical tools including: Bordwell’s ways of meaning-
making, diegetic analysis, scene analysis, shot analysis and visual code
analysis, for the close examination of fictional narrative in the cinema.
Meaning-Making in SBM
The first tool that I use has been adapted from David Bordwell’s four possible
ways of constructing meaning (Bordwell, 1989). Bordwell's proposal is that
there are only four possible ways of constructing meaning. The first two,
referential and explicit, he considers to be literal denotative meanings,
concerned with comprehension. The second two, implicit and repressed, are

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concerned with connotation or interpretation. In addition, I have proposed a
fifth, self-reflexive meaning, in which the text draws attention to its own status
as a text, or cultural artefact, explicitly engaged in the meaning-making
process. My view is that this fifth category of meaning-making is important
and distinctive enough to be recognised in its own right, and cannot to be
simply placed with repressed meanings. Other good examples of films that are
self-reflexive might include: Born on the Fourth of July (Dir. Oliver Stone,
1989), Unforgiven (Dir. Clint Eastwood, 1992), Orlando (Dir. Sally Potter,
1992).
Referential Meaning
This is how the viewer constructs a concrete “world”, real or fictional, drawing
on knowledge of cinematic conventions together with conceptions of causality,
time, space, etc. In SBM this includes the small American town of Castle Rock,
the boy’s outline characters, gangs, parents, railways, junk yards, dogs, trestle
bridges, swamps, leeches, a dead body, etc, etc.
Explicit Meaning
This involves moving up a level of abstraction by assigning a conceptual
meaning to the diegesis (story world) being constructed. In SBM, the most
obvious examples include the film’s representation of America in the late 50s,
family life, bullying, and the observations on friendship, which, despite the
pettiness, mocking and superficiality, is never to be regained in later life (made
explicit in the last words of the film).
Implicit Meaning
This involves the themes, issues or questions that the text raises, often in terms
of the contradictions, tensions, ironies and ambiguities that the narrative
presents. In SBM, these include the emotional/physical closeness and distance
of individuals to each other, eg. Gordie to Chris, Gordie to Denny, Teddy to
Vern, in contrast to the distance between Gordie and his father, Chris and Ace.
SBM explores the construction of identity in a group of young boys,
highlighting the cruel treatment received by children from adults. Chris carries
the stigma of his family and delinquent brother, and suffers from a teacher's
deceit. Gordie, the invisible boy, cannot come to terms with the death of
Denny, his brother. He feels annihilated by a rejecting father who cannot
recognise his talent as a writer. Teddy hardly had a chance in life, his father in
a fit of rage held his ear to a stove and almost burnt it off. Vern is the perpetual
scapegoat and victim. There are the issues raised by humiliation, intimidation,
leadership, bullying, lies, deceit, shared pleasures, private moments, growing-

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7
up, coming of age, death, etc. Some other important things to look out for are
the extensive intertextuality; non-diegetic soundtrack; compression and
expansion of time; and symbolic motifs (Hiles, 1997) such as: the tree hut, the
gun, the rail track, the bridge, the train, cigarettes, the river, a symbolic
circumcision, etc.
Repressed or Symptomatic Meaning
This is disguised meaning, often at odds with the referential, explicit or
implicit meanings, sometimes difficult to identify, and each viewer may have
their own individual repressed interpretations. An example is the unconscious
death wish that the boys are subjected to. Their journey is not without danger,
eg. the dark looming train, setting out without food for an overnight journey,
the gun, the stand-off with Ace’s gang. Another consideration is that this type
of meaning may be a consequence of the artist’s obsessions. So, we cannot
overlook the fact that the film is based on a short story by Stephen King, who
grew up in Castle Rock as a child, with his own anxieties as a writer. It is
therefore significant that Gordie is a storyteller and would-be writer, who feels
that his talents go unrecognised (except by his brother, Denny, and by Chris).
He is confused, and feels guilty about his brother's death. Asked, “What do you
do?” by the store-keeper, he answers “I don't know!” Gordie’s suppressed
anger is his motivation as a storyteller, realised in his creation of Lardass
Hogan, who is misunderstood and mocked by his community. Lardass’
ultimate revenge is Gordie’s and King’s fantasy of their own ultimate revenge.
Self-Reflexive Meaning
Finally, it is important to approach SBM from a fifth, self-reflexive construction
of meaning operating in the text. We cannot overlook the fact that the
character, Gordie, is a story-teller, and, within-the-story-within-the-story is
another, crucial story, the story of Lardass Hogan. The very nature of story-
telling, and what a story is, becomes examined in the responses of Teddy and
Vern to the Lardass story. Both seem to have difficulty in understanding what
a story is in the first place. Teddy wants another more complete ending –
“Then what happened?” Vern asks, “Did Lardass have to pay to get into the
contest?” Gordie’s resistance to such requests for changed endings and further
details, affirms his position as a skilled storyteller, and this in turn affirms SBM
as a film that is concerned with the nature of storytelling. Another aspect of the
self-reflexive meaning making in SBM concerns the position one wishes to take
with respect to the writer’s sources. The film can just as easily be interpreted as
a fictional account inspired by reading a newspaper article, or as a historical
account of an event remembered from childhood. This ambiguity indicates that
the film is also concerned with the boundaries between fiction and fact.

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Diegetic Analysis
It is useful to begin any visual analysis with a close study of the text’s story-
world (ie. its diegesis). In broad terms, SBM’s diegesis can be represented
formally as follows:
(The writer (The journey (Denny) (Chopper) (Lardass) (The milk money) ) )
The outer brackets acknowledge the world of the writer, who “creates” a world
in which the four boys go on a journey to find a dead body. Within this
journey-world, several other story-worlds are introduced – Gordie’s conflict
over the death of Denny; Chopper, the dog that is more myth than reality;
Gordie’s fictional creation of Lardass; the stealing of the milk money by Chris,
contested by the different narrative accounts on offer. This simplification of the
diegesis hardly does full justice to other narrative asides, such as the issue of
“who or what is Goofy”, or the deep discussions of why “Wagon Train never
gets anywhere”. Nevertheless, it does seem that SBM celebrates narrative,
myth, and the discovery of storytelling in the mind of a young boy.
Scene Analysis
The scene is a film’s smallest dramatic unit. It represents a coherent sequence
of action, approximately happening over a continuous period of time, in one
location or possibly several related locations, with the same characters.
Allowance is made for ellipsis, and/or other discontinuities introduced for
dramatic effect. The start of a scene will involve a significant dislocation in
terms of place, and/or time, and/or characters. The first shot of a scene involves
an establishing shot, with the editing between scenes following different
conventions to the editing within a scene. A scene can usually be broken down
into several segments. A segment is a group of several shots that is basically
centred on one location of action, and is coherent in terms of elapsed time.
The shot is the basic unit of film construction, consisting of an
uninterrupted sequence of frames, shot by the camera from more or less one
position (allowance being made for camera movements, special effects, etc.).
Nevertheless, while it is can be regarded as the basic unit of meaning in the
construction of a scene, it is, in turn, constructed from the more basic cinematic
codes.
It is relatively straightforward to breakdown the diegesis of a film into its
constituent scenes. Scene analysis then proceeds by breaking a scene down into
a number of segments of action, then subjecting these to a visual code analysis

Examining the Boundaries Between Fiction and Fact in the Narrative Cinema
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of the editing, cinematography, mise-en-scene, and sound. Discretion is needed
with respect to the detail this analysis takes, and only certain key scenes need
to be analyzed in this way. In what follows, it is well worth remembering that
the focus is always upon “what is happening when we watch a film?” My
approach is to present the analysis diagrammatically, as in Figure 2. We will
analyze just three scenes closely here: the Trestle Bridge, Junkyard and
Campfire scenes.
The Trestle Bridge Scene
The analysis (Figure 2) involves determining where the scene starts and ends,
measuring the length of the scene in seconds, and using a bold line of suitable
length marking this appropriately (“0 sec” labelling the start of the scene). This
scene seems to consist of four segments of action, (i) the arguments concerning
whether to cross, (ii) beginning to cross the bridge, (ii) the panic of an
approaching train, and (iv) the final jumping from the track, landing
unceremoniously on the ground. These segments are then measured, placed on
the line, and labelled appropriately (as in Figure 2). Next, the shots in each
segment are counted, and the average shot length for each segment is
calculated and written above the line. Then below the line, annotations of
relevant cinematic codes used in the segment are made. The striking feature of
this scene is in the contrasting use of editing to drive the narrative. Segments
(i) and (iv), involving dialogue, use the codes of shot reverse shot, eye line
match and continuity editing, whereas in Segment (iii) the panic/action uses a
shorter average shot length, montage editing, reaction shots and the innovatory
use of overlap editing to expand “real time” for dramatic effect.

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Figure 2: Scene Analysis - Trestle Bridge
Trestle Bridge Scene
[4 segments of action: (i) to (iv)]
Argument (i)
69(12) = 5.8
Jump / Landing (iv)
22(6) = 3.7
Crossing (ii)
76(20) = 3.8
S/
c
Trains!! (iii)
88(35) = 2.5 S/
c
0
sound→0
cam. move
est. shot; C.E.
pov, s-r-s
dialogue
69
sound, dialogue
est. shot, long shot
(r)pov; C.E.
m-e-s (comb)
233
est. shot
s-r-s; e-l-m; C.E.
dialogue
Notation:
69(12) = 5.8 - Segment length / (No. of shots) = Av. shot length
S/c - scene change
seg. - segment of action
pov, s-r-s, e-l-m - point of view shot, shot reverse shot, eye line match
d/m - diegetic marker (transition shot)
est. shot - establishing shot
C.E. / M.E. - Continuity / Mont age editing
seg.
145
sound
reac. shots
overlap editing
M.E., C.E.
255
d/m
The Junk Yard Scene
This scene is one of the most complex in the whole film. Made up of eight
segments, it uses cutting to Gordie at a store some distance away, involving
substantial ellipsis of time; a flashback to Gordie eating a meal with Denny, his
father and mother; a return from the flashback to the store; followed quickly by
a further elliptical cut returning to the junkyard (Figure 3). The scene makes
dramatic use of non-diegetic voice-over (n/d-v/o) narration, using here the
voice of Dreyfus, the “writer”. The striking feature of this scene is that the
viewer effortlessly follows the narrative development without ever being aware
of complexities in the visual codes being employed.

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Figure 3: Scene Analysis – Junk Yard
Junk Yard Scene [8 segments of action (i) to (viii)]
No trespassing (i)
52(8) = 6.5
S/
c
Store (iv)
48(8) = 6.0
0
(ell.) zoom-out
est. shot
C.E.
Narration
52
est. shot (close-up)
dialogue
trav-cam.
close-up
329
FLASHBACK (dissolve)
dialogue
C.E. (grouping)
seg.
281
ell.; est. shot (m-e-s)
dialogue
180º rule; s-r-s; C.E.
zoom-in
“We knew exactly who we
were” (iii) 167(52) = 3.2
114
est. shot (close-up)
n/d music; dialogue
C.E. (grouping)
Narration (x2) i.e. (n/d-v/o)
“I’ll race yer” (ii)
62(13) = 4.8
Store (vi)
25(6) = 4.2
377
est. shot (cut)
ell.
C.E.
Chopper!! (vii)
77(22) = 3.5
402
est. shot; s/m; trav-cam.
(un)steady-cam; C.E.
Narration (i.e. n/d-v/o)
Face-off with j/yard man (viii)
90(29) = 3.1
479
dialogue
180º rule; s-r-s
C.E. (grouping)
569
S/
c
The Campfire Scene
The story of Lardass Hogan, the-story-within-a-story-within-a-story, is told by
Gordie during the Campfire scene. The scene can be broken down into five
segments, with segment (iii) employing visual cutting between Gordie and the
Pie-eat contest; a subtle flashback to Lardass’ preparation before the start of the
contest; and extended diegetic voice-over by Gordie, himself, telling the story
(Figure 4). The scene finishes with two short segments where Teddy and Vern
dispute Gordie’s skill as a storyteller. The viewer cannot fail to learn
something about the nature of storytelling from this sequence.
Figure 4: Scene analysis – Campfire

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Camp Fire Scene (Lardass’ Story) [5 segments of action (i) to (v)]
Mealtime (i)
48(13) = 3.9
S/
c
Bake Off & Pie Eat (iii) (The story within a story within a story)
302(122) = 2.5
0
trans / est. shot
n/d music
dialogue
C.E.
48
trans. / est. shot
dialogue
reaction shots
328 338 369
(G.) f/back v/o→
sound
seg.
162
est. shot (m-e-s)
diegetic sound
diegetic music
“Hey Geordie, why don’t you tell us a story” (ii)
114(39) = 2.9
Teddy! (iv)
43(10) = 4.3
507
dialogue
538
S/
c
464
dialogue
V
erne! (v)
31(3) = 10.0
435 443 452 456
(G.) (L.) (G.) (L.)
+v/o +v/o
v/o(G.)→→→→→
←←“a complete and total Barfarama”→→
The “Older Gang” Scenes
One final feature that must not go unacknowledged, is the subtle observation
that some of the story concerning particularly Ace’s gang cannot be within
Gordie’s experience. Indeed, throughout the text we know more than any one
character, ie. the viewer is given privileged status with respect to the narrative.
If Gordie is the historically younger “Dreyfuss” who is narrating events as he
remembered them occurring, how could he be offering these accounts of Ace’s
gang? Is this dramatic licence, or the craft of the fiction writer at work? Or, is it
Reiner challenging any simplistic boundary between fiction and fact?
The Boundaries Between Fact and Fiction

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The main purpose of the scene analysis and visual code analysis is to provide a
rich description of the techniques of cinematic narrative in action. One major
outcome of this work is the complexity and subtlety of the narrative meaning-
making that is involved. SBM is revealed as a self-reflexive text with a
complex diegetic structure that celebrates the nature of narrative itself. By
presenting the identity of “the writer” as ambivalent, it is quite possible that the
boys are no more than the products of the Dreyfuss/Reiner/King imagination.
At the heart of the film lies a tension between the text as a retelling of an actual
event and the text as a work of imaginative fiction. Offering both of these
possibilities simultaneously, with no clear basis for deciding between them, it
would seem that SBM suggests that the boundary between fiction and fact in
the narrative cinema can be very narrow indeed.
References
Bordwell, D. (1989) Making Meaning: Inference and rhetoric in the
interpretation of cinema, Cambridge, Mass., Harvard.
Hiles, D.R. (1997) The Division of Signs: A four-fold symmetry, in I. Rauch
and G.F.Carr (Eds.) Semiotics Around the World: Synthesis in diversity,
Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter.
King, S. (1982) The Body, (Novella published in “Different Seasons”),
London, Futura.
Turner, G. (2006) Film as Social Practice, 4th Ed., London, Routledge.
Worth, S. (1981) Studying Visual Communication, Philadelphia, Univ. of
Pennsylvania Press.