TECHNES Encyclopedia Database

This structure, which can be understood as a change of focalisation, is present in most cases in which movie cameras are shown on screen, especially when they are used in filming situations. François Truffaut’s Day for Night (La nuit américaine, 1973), for example, begins with a meticulously choreographed sequence shot inviting us to enter into the fiction. But the shot is interrupted by an insert of the diegetic film director (Truffaut himself) shouting “Cut!” The set quickly fills with extras, members of the crew and other things, and then, in a master shot, we see a crane. On its platform, now close to the ground, is attached a Panavision camera, which the camera operator is operating with the help of assistants.