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A SEMIOLOGICAL ANALYSIS OF FILMS

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DOI: 10.22190/FUVAM1701039O

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 FACTA UNIVERSITATIS
Series: Visual Arts and Music Vol. 3, No 1, 2017, pp. 39 - 48
DOI: 10.22190/FUVAM1701039O

A SEMIOLOGICAL ANALYSIS OF FILMS

UDC (791.636:81’22)+791.41

Neven Obradović, Marija Vujović1

University of Niš, Faculty of Philosophy, Department of Communicology Communication

Sciences and Journalism, Serbia

Abstract. The subject of this research paper is a semiotic analysis of films, as part of
media semiology. From the moment when film art, also called the seventh art,
appeared by the end of the 19th century, it has become a popular medium of the
modern age. Films represent media content which can be watched by people all over
the world, without literacy as a prerequisite. However, one of the requirements for the
viewer to enjoy the film is to understand the films language. It is therefore necessary to
know the basics of film semiology. This paper, in addition to being addressed to the
professional public, that is, to audio and visual media theorists, is also intended for the
general public. This goal is to be achieved through theoretical examination of the basic
concepts and directions in the semiology of films.
Key words: media, film, semiology, meaning

THE SEMIOTICS OF MEDIA

The term media, derived from the Latin term medius – which means in the middle, is
used in this paper to imply mediators in communication, and any ”...natural and/or
artificial substance, that is, a set of natural and/or artificial conditions through which
communication is achieved” (Radojković and Miletić 2005, 95). Any discussion about the
media necessarily leads to semiology. In general terms, semiology is the science of signs,
or more precisely, of sign systems. The term itself is derived from the Greek words
semeion – sign and logos – science.
The term semiotics is often used as a synonym for semiology, (according to Giro
2001, 6). Šuvaković has recently said: “Semiotics is defined as a formal science of
signs and linguistic and non-linguistic meanings. Semiology is defined as the science of
the creation, transfer, functions and transformation of signs and meanings of linguistic

1
Received May 2017 / Accepted June 2017
Corresponding author: Marija Vujović
University of Niš, Faculty of Philosophy, Department of Communicology Communication Sciences and
Journalism, Serbia
E-mail: [email protected]
40 N. OBRADOVIĆ, M. VUJOVIĆ

and non-linguistic origin in social life, so semiology can also be defined as the semiotics of
culture” (Šuvaković 2011, 635).
Although semiology has emerged from linguistics, it does not only include the study of
language but also goes on to research other sign systems using knowledge in the field of
linguistics, information theory, sociology, and psychoanalysis. Roland Barthes, one of the
founders of the modern semiological theory defines semiology in the following way:
“Semiology therefore aims to take in any system of signs, whatever their substance and
limits; images, gestures, musical sounds, objects, and the complex associations of all these,
which form the content of a ritual, convention or public entertainment: these constitute, if not
languages, then at least systems of signification“(Barthes 1971, 317). This leads to the
emergence of applied semiology, including the semiology of media and film. More
precisely, the semiology of films is a part of a broader concept – the semiology of media,
which appeared in the second half of the 20th century, and some of the first theorists were
Roland Barthes (Barthes 1972), Umberto Eco (Eco 1979), Christian Metz (Metz 1974).
Media semiology examines the structure and meaning of signs in the media, the ways in
which they spread and the way they affect the recipients in different or particular contexts.
Semiological analysis of the media, just like meaning, is an analysis of the media process.
“The signs are intermediary instances (mediators) between the so-called reality, which is,
according to Charles Sanders Peirce, a reality mediated between the earlier processes of
semiosis and our interpretation of this reality with the use of signs” (Nӧth 2004, 469). Media
as such do not convey the “natural” reality, but it is always semiologicaly mediated.
Barthes believes that every communication process which includes media messages
consists of two systems: denotation – literal, obvious, primary meaning (which he dismisses
in some of his later papers, assuming that there is only connotation), and connotation – the
secondary meaning of media messages, including cultural, social and personal associations
depending on code systems. In addition, codes can be defined as groups of social rules and
conventions that are learned throughout living in a particular culture and which are socially
and historically predetermined. Media messages can make sense only within certain code
system of signs.
Stuart Hall's observations are important in order to explain the polysemy of media
messages. By adopting Barthes‟ semiology, and his definitions of denotation and connotation, a
system that admits that the denotative level is ideologically colored, Hall distinguishes the
coding process, which is the intended meaning the creator of the message initially implied, and
he also mentions decoding, which is the ability of the audience to understand the messages
differently. Stuart Hall proposed that there are three ways of decoding the meaning of a
message:
 the dominant reading that matches the intent of the creator of the message and
which is, for example, the goal of the creator advertising for messages who use
manipulative techniques trying to limit several meanings to one dominant meaning;
 negotiated reading which partially coincides with the intent of the creator of the
message;
 oppositional reading that is completely the opposite which means that everything
in the message is rejected.
Stuart Hall ended the practice according to which media messages are viewed as a
reflection of reality, the audience is viewed as a passive audience, and the communication
process is a linear process. Hall believes that media messages are ideologically colored
 A Semiological Analysis of Films 41

and encoded in a way that suits the dominant society groups, and in a way, that it is in line
with formal features of the particular media. Therefore, the media do not present, but
rather represent a reality based on interests. An active audience decodes the meaning from
the media messages. “Before this message can have an `effect`, however one defines it,
satisfy a `need` or be put to a “use”, it must first be appropriated as a meaningful discourse
and be meaningfully decoded. It is this set of decoded meanings which “have an effect”,
influence, entertain, instruct or persuade, with very complex perceptual, cognitive, emotional,
ideological or behavioral consequences“ (Hall 2008, 277).
Once decoded, the message becomes social practice. Hall answers the question of
whether and how encoding codes may differ from decoding codes, and emphasizes that
this is conditioned by the differences between the sender and the recipient. “Wrong”
understanding is possible.
After investigating visual communication, in particular television, Hall says that the
television sign is an icon following Peirce‟s trilogy12and emphasizes that such characteristics
are always encoded, although sometimes they look as if they were natural. His point is that,
“Certain codes may, of course, be so widely distributed in a specific language community or
culture, and be learned at so early an age, that they appear not to be constructed – the effect
of an articulation between sign and referent – but to be “naturally” given (Hall 2008, 279).
However, even apparently `natural` visual codes are culture-specific, claims Hall. Actually,
when it comes to naturalized codes, there is a fundamental alignment and reciprocity, sort of
equivalence between the encoding and decoding sides of an exchange of meanings. Hall uses
the domestic animal cow as an example and talks about the link between the visual sign for
`cow` and the linguistic sign for this animal. Both the image of a cow and the word cow are not
`natural`, they are rather conventional. “Iconic signs are, however, particularly vulnerable to
being `read` as natural because visual codes of perception are very widely distributed and
because this type of sign is less arbitrary than a linguistic sign. The linguistic sign, `cow`
possess none of the properties of the thing represented, whereas the visual sign appears to
possess some of those properties” (Hall 2008, 280).
These rules also apply to the film as a medium of mass communication.

SEMIOLOGY OF FILMS
According to Radojković and Miletić (Radojković and Miletić 2007, 122–123), films
can be defined as content that is communicated very widely, as an aesthetic message
above all, and as an audio and visual medium of mass communication, although it is also
broadcast in other mass media. Film is also defined as artwork “...which is put in place of
the potential, expected or random individual fantasy of the viewer. In this way, the films
create a paradoxical development of the imagery or a simulation of fantasies for a large
number of mutually unrelated individuals...” (Šuvaković 2011, 211). Moreover, “... the
film is the display of a display (mimesis of mimesis) because it does not only show what
the eye sees (the scene, the body, the person in the scene, the event, the presentation and
storytelling of the event, the chronology of the scenes), but it also shows what cannot be

1
Icon – a sign has a similarity to the object that it represents, the sign points to an object based on its
properties; Index – there is a direct physical connection between the sign and the object, it is causally linked
with it; Symbol – the sign is conventionally linked to the object.
42 N. OBRADOVIĆ, M. VUJOVIĆ

shown and experienced visually (pain, passion, death, pleasure, orgasm, thoughts, divine,
general, ideology, ethics, subconscious, fantasy – what the eye wants to see but never sees
in real life, etc.)” (Šuvaković 2011, 213).
From the 1960s, film theorists have begun semiological analysis, first in France and
Italy.23The semiology of films is a part of the theory of film, and among the topics it deals
with, what we should emphasize as the structure and meaning of the signs used in films, the
communication processes in the making and reception of films, the relationship between
films and the cultural context. According to Nevena Dakovic, the theory of film could be
defined as a science about the media and communication nature of films (Daković 2012, 19).
The semiology of films deals with the kind of meaning a film will communicate. Film studies
appeared a little later, in the second half of the 20th century, first in the United States, as part
of the Culture Studies. By nature, film studies are interdisciplinary, studying the film
comprehensively. The film is above all analyzed as a cultural text in a particular context.
Throughout history, it is possible to distinguish a first and a second semiotic level. The
first, classical semiology of the film was developed in the spirit of structuralism34and the
center of interest was the structure of the movie code. The synonyms of the film semiology
of that time were these metaphors: the grammar of the film language or the language of the
film. There is an analogy between films and language. The structure of the film is compared
with the structure of the language, and the grammar of films is compared with the grammar
of verbal language. One of the first authors, Robert Bataille, compared a film frame with a
word (Omon 2006, 154). Thus, Sergei Eisenstein, a representative of the Russian films
semiology, for example, equated the film image with the word, and a combination of images
obtained by editing – with a sentence (Nӧth 2004, 500). According to Radojković and
Miletić, the basic unit of motion – photogram is analogous to phonemes or graphs, a film
frame is equated to a word, the scenes are syntagms, and a film sequence is analogous to a
sentence. “A film frame is everything that is seen and heard during one continuous recording
step, from turning on to shutting off the camera. More frames create a scene, multiple scenes
– a sequence, and a series of sequences – a short film or a feature length film” (Radojković
and Miletić 2005, 125). Frame4,5as the basic unit of the film language is determined
spatially, so the film space include everything that can be seen, as well as all that cannot be
seen, and is just assumed. It is also defined temporally, so we are talking about film time.
The ideological, social, political, psychological dimension of the film, the context, the
communication processes in the process of making and reception of the film, are at the center of
the attention of the second semiology, within the framework of post-structuralism.56In addition

2
However, the founder is considered to be Reymond Spottiswoode, who published the book A Grammar of the
Film: An Analysis of Film Technique in 1935, in London, where he talks about film structure and its specific
elements (according to Omon 2006, 153).
3
Structuralism is a theoretical movement that appeared in France in the 1950s, and it is predominantly used in
the research of culture and its creations, as well as in the mass media. The basic concept of structuralism is that
human activities and their products, as well as thinking itself, are constructed, and not naturally given. The
representatives are Claude Lévi-Strauss, Roland Barthes, Ferdinand de Saussure, Louis Althusser.
4
Frame is determined by the relation between the camera and object which is being recorded, and in that
relationship film plan is very important, as well as the angle of the camera, the motion of the camera, the
composition of the frame.
5
As a criticism of structuralism, the theoretical stream of post-structuralism appeared in 1960s in France, but it
only became famous in 1970s in the Anglo-Saxon world. As a theory of postmodernism, it encompasses several
theoretical schools, among which are: semiology, discursive analysis, deconstruction, text theory,
 A Semiological Analysis of Films 43

to the syntactic, the semantic and pragmatic dimensions of the semiology of films began to be
studied. “Whilst the first semiology, as linguistics and media-centralized, deals with denotation
and description, the second semiology is focused on the social aspect, and focuses on the
ideological, psychological and political aspects and influences of films ... applied within the
framework of the Theory of Film, and exploring the ways and methods in which films construct
the subject and his position, determined by a sense of belonging to an ideological or social
group” (Šuvaković 2011, 39).
Some of the representatives of the second semiology of the film are Jean Louis Baudry
and Christian Metz who is also associated with the first, classical semiologist. Within the
framework of the Marxist ideological criticism, Baudry points out that the film, due to its
technical characteristics to reproduce a three-dimensional image of the world is able to
create a civil ideology. According to him, the film with its technical characteristics enables a
`way of representation` of the three-dimensional world that places the viewer in the position
of the `subject of transcendence`, the bearer of an idealistic sense which originates in the
circumstances where the viewer sees the recorded scene from a central position that suggests
a monocular perspective of the Quattrocento. From the `mirror role` of the media and the
viewers‟, `security about their own identity`, arises due to the `artificial regression` to the state
before the formation of the ego, where the difference between oneself and the other is not yet
established, and therefore there is no differentiation between the perception and the
performance, it is something similar to a hallucination, to the vision of reality that is not real. It
is the `belief mode` where the impression of reality is enhanced by the similarity to a dream,
the so called `fiction effect`, which stimulates the `subject effect`, the place where the
subconscious desires are created. They are the source of meaning and thus generate a civic
ideology regardless of the mode of use and of the intentions of the author” (Stojanović 1991,
8–9).
The work of Christian Metz, the French film semiologist, the leading name of European
film semiology (Stojanović 1983, 31), could be defined as work aimed at discovering
meaningful structures in the film message, inspired by the works of the linguists Saussure
and Peirce. In his research, Metz prefers narrative, feature films, but he does not exclude the
possibility of carrying out semiological analysis of other types of films as well.
According to Dušan Stojanović, Metz's work can be divided into four stages: In the
first stage he believed that the film image is analogous to reality. He made a distinction
between denotation and connotation in films, presented and expressed an aesthetic
instance of the film, perceptually and affectively annotated. When it comes to denotation,
he talks about diegesis: ”…the story itself, but also the fictitious time and space which are
intertwined and interwoven within it, as well as the personalities, landscapes, events and
other narrative elements, provided they are considered in their denotative sense” (Metz
1973, 90). Metz rejects the double articulation, and recognizes codification only in large
syntagmatic units (rational dimensions), in scenes, sequences, syntagms. He believes that
the basic parts pertaining to film semiology are film editing, frames, sequences, large
syntagmatic units, camera motion, image and word relationship (Metz 1973, Metz 1978).
At a second level, Metz talks about film codes, which make up the language of the film.
“…The term language in the narrow sense of the word, which refers to everyday language,

intertextuality, the theory of signifying practices. The representatives are Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault,
Gilles Deleuze, Judith Butler, Jean Baudrillard and Julia Kristeva.
44 N. OBRADOVIĆ, M. VUJOVIĆ

Metz replaces with the word code and defines it in opposition to a complementary term,
message. The code is a logical relationship that allows the message to be understood. A code
is composed of signifying elements, while a message is composed of the tagged ones. In
order to earn his name, the code must be instantiated in several texts: the text can have one
or more codes, or none” (Gavrić 1983, 48).
The code is defined as the system, and the message as the text, and the relationship
between a code and a message is parallel to the relationship between the system and the
text. Metz also mentions the syntagms as a horizontal set of messages which make up a
text, from the paradigm in a movie, which reflects the code as a system. According to Metz,
in addition to this, semiology often studies the syntagmatic relations, because paradigmatic
relations are partial and fragmented.
He also makes a distinction between the extra-cinematographic codes that exist
outside the film in other signifying systems, and the cinematographic codes that exist only
in films. He further divided them into general ones that apply to all the films (driving a
camera with a panorama, for example), and special ones, which he calls sub-codes, and
are characteristic to certain epochs and genres (for example, classic western).
In this stage of his work, Metz rejects the idea that signifying units are only found
within large syntagmatic units, and believes that in films, in the code, there is no common
signifying or non-signifying minimum unit, and that each code has its own. For technical
codes, that is a photogram, in editing – it is a frame, in narrative codes – syntagmatic
units, in psychoanalytic code – a symbolic object. “This denial of the film's reliance on codes
has developed under the influence of ideas that emerged in the late sixties in a French
magazine Tel Quel, by authors such as Jacques Derrida, Philip Sollers and Julia Kristeva.
Starting from one ideological point of view, they questioned Ferdinand de Saussure's idea of
the sign as a relation between signifier and signified, claiming that these are a product of a
civic ideological need for a speaking subject, which should be replaced by the concept of
signifying production in which the sign does not appear as a solid link between signifier and
signified. Only the relation between the independent signifiers would make what Derrida
called the difference” (Stojanović 1983, 39).
On a third level, Metz is under the influence of Lacanian psychoanalysis and speaks of
the film as the “institution of the signifier”…while the forms of the signifier can be found in
the subconscious and archetypal, imaginary and symbolic of the whole civilization. The
experience of the film text arises on a dynamic mid-point of the imaginary and the symbolic,
bordering with scopophilia/voyeurism and fetishism, and through primary film identification
(identification of the viewer with the act of watching, that is, with his own view, similar to
the Lacan‟s Mirror Stage, the initial establishment and simultaneous loss of the pre-Oedipal
ego, where the fantasy and desire are triggered by the subconscious), and secondary film
identification (with personalities, actions and all symbolic constructs), such as the present in
the absent, similar to a dream” (Stojanović 1991, 62).
On a fourth, and final level, Metz puts forward the thesis about statement as a
„semiological act where parts of the text speak of that text as an act‟, combining the
„fireplace‟ and the „target‟ of the statement and becoming a non-personal statement
embedded in the film itself (and in the experience of the viewer), which in its own way
speaks for itself. He thoroughly analyzes the forms of such statement as direct-camera
address, voice off, inscriptions, screen on the screen, mirrors, technique detection, film in
 A Semiological Analysis of Films 45

film, subjectivity, first person speech, figures of speech, „neutral‟ images and sounds)”
(Stojanović 1991, 62).
Film communication, according to Metz, is mostly one-sided, and the viewer has the
role of a voyeur (Nӧth 2004, 502–503). The audience can react only when the film is
finished and shown. Therefore, the film is more a means of expression. On the other hand,
the audience is more involved in film than in many other media, due to the fact that there
is an impression of reality, which Metz speaks about in the first stage of this work.
Referring to Barthe‟s conclusions that photography can also give the impression of
reality, but with the illogical connection of “here and once upon a time this happened”,
Metz also believes that the impression of reality on film is greater because this connection
exists here and now. Film, unlike photography, contains movements and “... creates a
feeling of actual life and perception of objective reality” (Metz 1973, 8).
When it comes to film signs, while following de Saussure‟s division, Barthes describes it
as a blend of film signifiers (decor, costume, landscape, music, gestures) and signified
(concepts). He states that “in general, the signified has a conceptual character, it is a single
idea” (Barthes 1978, 421). It is a conceptual entity which exists only in the spirit of the
viewer. In the film, claims Barthes, there are non-signifying elements. Barthes, just like
Metz, thinks that the relationship between signifier and signified is analogically motivated,
and that there is a short distance between the signifier and the signified in films because of
the given iconic nature of the film sign, and the impression of reality. Yet, there are
disconnected signs when the connection between the signifier and the signified is weak.
Metz claims that the signifier in the film is the picture, while the signified is what that picture
represents. Due to this close relationship between the signifier and the signified, the other
articulation is not possible, and the film is universal.
Barthes also distinguishes film expression from film signage. Film expression is being
displayed to the audience directly, while the signage exists outside the film picture, too.
Eco makes a distinction between film code and cinematic code. The cinematic code
implies the ability to reproduce reality by using technical means and applies to all audio
and visual media. On the other hand, the film code is based on narrative rules, it creates
narrative messages, and relies on a cinematic code.
When it comes to film icons, theorists go from the view that the film sign is completely
motivated iconically due to the analogy with reality, a position that negates the iconicity of the
film sign. Eco is one of the first semiologists who denied iconicity, emphasizing the importance
of cultural conditionality. Metz negates that the structure of the film and the structure of the
language match. He rejects the double articulation as well, explaining that there is nothing in the
film that could be compared to language phonemes or language monemes, since the basic film
unit (the frame) is closer to a statement than to a word. However, Metz does not reject methods
of language analysis which can be applied to analyzing the structure of the film. “Semiology
can and must firmly rely on linguistics, but it should not be confused with it” (Metz 1973, 35).
According to the early papers by Metz, film is a type of language in the broader sense of
the word. Still, ”the concept of film language in the broader sense is a methodological
abstraction: in films, that language never appears alone, it is always mixed with various other
signifying systems – cultural, social, stylistic, perceptive ...” (Metz 1973, 55). Unlike language
in a narrow sense of the word, and unlike double articulation, the film, Metz claims, has
codifications, and different types of articulation. He mentions five levels of codification
(Metz 1973, 55–56):
46 N. OBRADOVIĆ, M. VUJOVIĆ

 perception – a system of acquired intelligibility, which varies according to different

cultures;
 recognition and identification – of visual and auditory objects appearing on the screen,
which also varies according to different cultures, and leaves open the possibility of
manipulation at the denotative level;
 Symbolisms and connotations of various kinds and their relationship in film, but also in
culture;
 Great narrative structures – in films and culture in general;
 Proper cinematographic systems that, in a specific type of discourse, organize the
diverse elements furnished to the spectator by the abovementioned codification levels.
Therefore, film has no double articulation, no phonemes and no monemes. All the
units are signifying. Frame, as the smallest unit of the film, a minimal part of it, as Metz
calls it, is more like a sentence, a statement, rather than a word. He gave the example of
an image of a revolver, which, Metz tells us, does not signify “revolver” but “Here is a
revolver”. In addition to the frame, which is the minimum section, but not the minimal
element of film meaning, Metz speaks of minimal parts, optical acts, such as masks,
dissolving, etc., which are also signifying.
Pier Paolo Pasolini claims that the film language, similarly to linguistics language has
double articulation (minimum units are real objects or persons that make up a frame,
kinemes, units of secondary articulation, which are not the same as phonemes, because the
images of real objects or persons can be recognized, which is why they are signifying units,
and therefore they more resemble a seme, which when grouped create a frame, while at the
level of the first articulation, he compares a single shot (frame) with the monemes).
Eco, on the other hand, believes that there is a third articulation in the film, which
should divide the dynamics of the film image into constituent parts, and its basic unit is a
kinemorph (a signifying unit, a sign or a seme, which is a blend of kines, the smallest
parts of motion without any specific meaning). Eco considers figures to be the smallest
units of film, and that they do not carry any meaning. The iconic sign corresponds to the
words in a sentence, while a seme corresponds to a sentence. A frame is a syntagm or a
seme. Eco borrows the example from Pasolini: a frame where a teacher is holding a book in
his hands is a syntagm (one man reads a book) and it is the first articulation, which can be
further divided into iconic characters (eye, nose...) which are the second articulation, and in
their turn can be divided into visual figures (angles, shadows), which are the third
articulation.
When comparing a film to a photograph, Metz claims that photography cannot speak.
“One isolated photo cannot tell us anything, that's for sure! But how is it then possible, by
means of some strange consequence that two photographs following each other can tell us
something? Switching from one image to two images means moving from image to
language, in the broader sense of the word” (Metz 1973, 41). Unlike the film where
denotation is codified, this is not the case in a photo; it is only a print of reality, while the
connotation is created by photographers. “Speaking via an image, regardless of whether it is
a language or art, is an open system that cannot be subject to codification so easily with all
its basic „non-discrete‟ units (images), its overly natural readability, its lack of distance
between the signifier and the signified. Regardless of whether it is art or language in a
broader sense of the word, a finished film is an even more open system, consisting of
signifying units that are directly conveyed to us” (Metz 1973, 52–53).
 A Semiological Analysis of Films 47

Metz claims that meaning in the film is not arbitrary, it is more or less motivated at the
level of denotation through analogy, while at the level of connotation it is symbolic.

DISCUSSION
It is possible to define a film in two ways: as content that is massively communicated,
and as an audio and visual medium of mass communication. Although the fact that it is a
visual medium suggests that it reflects reality itself, that reality is semiologically mediated.
Semiological analysis of the film, as part of media semiology, started developing in
Europe in the second half of the previous century. Just like semiology is a science of the sign
systems, the semiology of the film is a science of sign systems used on film. In order for
viewers to enjoy watching films, they do not have to be literate, all they need is to
understand film language, and infer meaning from the context. According to Metz “film is
not only film language in the broader sense of the word, it also includes thousands of social
or human meanings that have been created in some culture, and which appear in films”
(Metz 1973, 67). That is why the semiology of the film relies on the theory of information,
but also on sociology and psychology.
What the film will mean depends on its creator, but also on the recipient of the film content.
It also depends on the social and historical context, the cultural system, as well as on the
personal characteristics of both sides. Decoding meaning may be done in different ways, and it
does not necessarily have to coincide with the intentions of the filmmakers. Therefore, the
topics film semiology deals with are the structure and significance of the signs used in film, the
communication processes between the creator and the film audience, the relation between the
film and the cultural context, as well as the ideological, political, social and psychological
dimension of the film. Semiological analysis is therefore important because, “it is a
characteristic of the film not only to transform the existing world but also to create a new one,
which will be independent and partly virtual, where the media and the seventh art become an
important link and mirror of the interaction of man with the world” (Daković 2012, 22).

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znanstveni časopis za pitanja medija, novinarstva, masovne komunikacije i odnosa s javnostima, god. 2,
No. 4, 61–99.

SEMIOLOŠKA ANALIZA FILMA

Predmet istraživanja u radu je semiološka analiza filma, kao deo semiologije medija. Od kada je
nastao krajem veka, film, nazvan i sedmom umetnošću, je postao popularan medij savremenog doba,
medijski sadržaj koji mogu pratiti ljudi širom sveta, a pritom pismenost nije uslov. Ali uslov da
gledalac uživa u filmu, jeste razumevanje filmskog jezika. Zbog toga je neophodno poznavati osnove
semiologije filma. Stoga je ovaj rad, pored toga što je usmeren ka stručnoj javnosti, teoretičarima
audiovizuelnih medija, namenjen i široj javnosti. Cilj se postiže teorijskim pregledom osnovnih
pojmova i pravaca u semiologiji filma.
Ključne reči: mediji, film, semiologija, značenje

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