Syntagmatic analysis can be applied not only to verbal texts but also to audio-visual ones.
In film and television, a syntagmatic analysis would involve an analysis of how each
frame, shot, scene or sequence related to the others
(these are the standard levels of analysis in film theory).
At the lowest level is the individual frame. Since films are projected at a rate of
24 frames a second, the viewer is never conscious of individual frames, but
significant frames can be isolated by the analyst.
At the next level up, a shot is a 'single take' - an unedited sequence of
frames which may include camera movement. A shot is terminated by a cut (or other transition).
A scene consists of more than one shot set in a single place and time.
A sequence spans more than one place and or/time but it is a logical or thematic sequence
(having 'dramatic unity').
The linguistic model often leads semioticians to a search for
units of analysis in audio-visual media which are analogous to
those used in linguistics. In the semiotics of film, crude
equivalents with written language are sometimes
postulated: such as the frame as morpheme (or word), the shot as sentence,
the scene as paragraph, and the sequence as chapter (suggested
equivalences vary amongst commentators) (Lapsley & Westlake 1988, 39ff).
For members of the Glasgow University Media Group the
basic unit of analysis was the
shot, delimited by cuts and with allowance made for camera
movement within the shot and for the accompanying soundtrack
(Davis & Walton 1983b, 43)
Shots can be broken into smaller meaningful units (above the level of the frame), but theorists
disagree about what these might be. Above the level of the sequence, other narrative units
can also be posited.
Christian Metz offered elaborate syntagmatic categories for narrative film
(Metz 1974, Chapter 5)
For Metz, these syntagms were analogous to sentences in verbal language, and he argued that
there were eight key filmic syntagms which were based on ways of ordering narrative space and
time.
- The autonomous shot (e.g. establishing shot, insert)
- The parallel syntagm (montage of motifs)
- The bracketing syntagm (montage of brief shots)
- The descriptive syntagm (sequence describing one moment)
- The alternating syntagm (two sequences alternating)
- The scene (shots implying temporal continuity)
- The episodic sequence (organized discontinuity of shots)
- The ordinary sequence (temporal with some compression)
However, Metz's 'grande syntagmatique' has not proved an easy system to apply to
some films.
In their study of children's understanding of television,
Hodge and Tripp (1986, 20)
divide syntagms into four kinds, based on syntagms existing in the
same time (synchronic), different times (diachronic),
same space (syntopic), and different space (diatopic).
- Synchronic/syntopic (one place, one time: one shot)
- Diachronic/syntopic (same place sequence over time)
- Synchronic/diatopic (different places at same time)
- Diachronic/diatopic (shots related only by theme)
They add that whilst these are all continuous syntagms (single shots or successive
shots), there are also discontinuous syntagms (related shots separated by others).
Beyond the fourfold distinction between frames, shots, scenes and sequences, the
interpretative frameworks of film theorists differ considerably. In this sense at
least, there is no cinematic 'language'.