Keaton and the Kuleshov Effect

Per courtesy of Wikipedia, the definition of the Kuleshov effect is as follows:

The Kuleshov effect is a film editing effect demonstrated by Soviet filmmaker Lev Kuleshov in the 1910s and 1920s. It is a mental phenomenon by which viewers derive more meaning from the interaction of two sequential shots than from a single shot in isolation.

Kuleshov edited a short film in which a shot of the expressionless face of Tsarist matinee idol Ivan Mosjourkine was alternated with various other shots (a plate of soup, a girl in a coffin, a woman on a divan). The film was shown to an audience who believed that the expression on Mosjoukine's face was different each time he appeared, depending on whether he was "looking at" the plate of soup, the girl in the coffin, or the woman on the divan, showing an expression of hunger, grief, or desire, respectively. The footage of Mosjoukine was actually the same shot each time. Vsevolod Pudovkin (who later claimed to have been the co-creator of the experiment) described in 1929 how the audience "raved about the acting... the heavy pensiveness of his mood over the forgotten soup, were touched and moved by the deep sorrow with which he looked on the dead child, and noted the lust with which he observed the woman. But we knew that in all three cases the face was exactly the same."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuleshov_effect

When I first learned about the Kuleshov effect, I was fascinated. Up until that point I had never really considered that there was a psychological effect behind editing, something that subconsciously manipulates us into feeling a certain way. After recognizing it for what it was, I tried to pay attention a bit more to how any scene is edited, looking for that effect to pop up again. 

I’m not exactly sure why, but I think I was anticipating some sort of satisfaction at jumping out of my seat, waving my finger accusingly at the screen, and smugly announcing, “HA! YOU THOUGHT YOU COULD TRICK ME WITH YOUR EARLY 20^TH CENTURY RUSSAIN MANIPULATION AGENDA? THINK AGAIN, SUCKER.” Instead, I just got a few concerned and slightly nervous looks from my friends.

The thing about the Kuleshov effect in cinema, is that it’s rarely used to produce the same result as the original experiment was. How often do you see a close up of an actor with a neutral expression? It takes a conscious effort to produce a neutral expression, essentially wiping your mind free of thoughts. In the context of acting an actual scene, an actor is constantly in the moment expressing subtext, even between dialogue. Although it’s rare to see the Kuleshov effect in action (in a pure form), the Kuleshov effect will still amplify subtle emotions and create the same psychological result.

All the way back in the 1920s when the Kuleshov effect was discovered, the acting in films at that time were still very theater based. That’s why we still parody the stereotypical exaggerated movements and expressions in silent film performances, today. 

Seriously...what?

On stage, your movements have to be big because you are only a small dot in comparison to an entire theater filled with audience members, all straining to see the action. On film, your movements have to be very small because you become a gigantic projection on a movie screen, and everyone can easily see even the slightest inflection of a left eyebrow. When you film stage-based acting, every exaggerated motion or expression suddenly becomes too much and unintentionally sarcastic when projected onto an even bigger screen. It’s really hard to take those performances seriously. 

That being said, there was one exception to this silent film acting trend in the period of early cinema. Perhaps you’ve heard of the stone-faced comedian of silent cinema. A stone-faced, expressionless comedian? Yes. How could someone with a neutral expression, an inability to react to situations, possibly be funny? Aha! A NEUTRAL-FACED ACTOR YOU SAY? Gee, where have I possibly heard that one before?

Buster Keaton, of course! 

I could practically see the metaphorical lightbulb go off above my head. 

Now, Buster Keaton is not a completely stone-faced, expressionless actor. It only seems that way because he was the only exception to the exaggerated stage-based acting he was surrounded by at the time. Buster Keaton was, in fact, simply a master at the art of being subtle. Most people credit his spectacular cinematic performances to his acting ability, and rightly so. That being said, how much of that pathos-invoking cinematic performance was actually the Kuleshov effect in action? 

The answer is not quite so black and white (pun intended)...

What Keaton stifled in expression, he almost always made up for in body language. 

The Cameraman (1928)

The best example of this comes from the Cameraman. As you see, Keaton’s expression never changes, but his body language produces the emotion-filled audience reaction equivalent to having your heart ripped out and smashed into a million different pieces as your shaking hand desperately tries to reach for the tissues. In this case, this would not be an example of the Kuleshov effect because the focus of the action is not on his neutral face.

When the Kuleshov experiment was developed, the focus was only on the actor’s face. Realistically however, body language can also convey emotion separately from the face. For example, someone putting on a brave face during an interrogation could accidentally sabotage themselves by nervously tapping a leg or curling in on themselves. Nervous ticks pop up all the time during speeches, even if the speaker appears very enthusiastic and interested in the subject. Expression and posture can either work together or contrary to each other, so it’s hard to find an example of ‘the Kuleshov experiment’ in its purest form (a simple close up of an expressionless actor) in any film. 

From a historical standpoint, Buster Keaton at the time most likely had never heard of the Kuleshov effect. His stone-faced persona was developed in vaudeville, and he had been making films in a different country around the time the experiment took place. The Kuleshov effect wasn’t studied again until the 1990s, and it is very unlikely that the Russian filmmakers of the 1920s would have publicly explained to their audiences that they were specifically trying to manipulate them into being docile. 

Despite the probability that Keaton had never heard of the Kuleshov effect, it does seem to make an appearance in his films. That being said, this brings up another question.

Did Buster figure this phenomenon out on his own?

The Haunted House (1921)

We know for a fact he was incredibly conscious and interested in the psychological reasons of why a gag either worked or fell flat. He wrote about this in his autobiography, My Wonderful World of Slapstick. In the original cut of his feature film The Navigator, during the diving scene where Buster descends to the sea floor to repair the ship before he and his girl are overtaken by the approaching cannibals, Buster took a moment to act as a traffic cop to direct schools of fish swimming in different directions. This gag was one of his personal favorites. When he put it into the trailer of the movie, every audience member that saw it howled with laughter. However, when the test audience saw the entire movie, none of them cracked a smile at that same exact scene. Baffled and disappointed, Keaton became fixated on answering the question, ‘why?’

“It is always an interesting problem to me when an audience rejects any such sure-fire-laugh-getter. I wondered whether it is because the customers were too concerned in figuring out the mechanics of the gag, how it was done, to be amused. Or it might be something else. In this case we showed it again in the trailer, and everybody once more liked it. That gave me an answer that satisfied me. The other gags were accepted by audiences who saw the whole picture, because they did not interfere with my job of saving the girl. But when I directed the submarine traffic I was interrupting the rescue to do something else that couldn’t help us out of the jam. I threw the gag out. There was nothing else to do. Some of my co-workers thought the gag flopped because it was so intricate. But I still believe it fell dead because it showed the hero interrupting the job of saving himself and the girl.” 

 The Navigator (1924)

In addition to the psychological insight of why some gags worked and some didn’t, Keaton often spoke (and wrote) about the effect timing had on an audience. 

“Just as in vaudeville, you lost a gag when you threw it away too quickly, or for that matter too slowly. The difference was that on the stage you had the chance to test and retest your comedy material before live audiences. The customers only saw a gag or comedy scene in a movie after it was made, cut, and in the can. …we were trying to figure out what made movie fans laugh, and why…” 

He went on to explain how he eventually figured out that although ‘impossible gags’ (gags that realistically could not occur in real life) invoked less of a comedic response from an audience than natural ones, it was the impossible gags that audiences remembered better than the natural ones many years later.

 Examples of 'impossible gags'

Simply by experience and curiosity, Keaton did (unofficially) study both the psychology behind comedy and the effect timing can have in an edit. Whether or not he also consciously figured out his own variation of the Kuleshov effect is impossible to tell, but the Kuleshov effect does seem to show up in his films nonetheless. 

The Kuleshov effect in its pure form (juxtaposition of shots)

The Kuleshov effect in it’s pure form is all about editing, the physical cutting and juxtaposition of shots. With the A + B + A = C formula, the ‘A’ shot is a close-up of a neutral-faced actor, and the ‘B’ shot can be anything. ‘C’ is the emotion the audience reads on the neutral-faced actor’s face.

Keaton, specifically, rarely used close-ups in his films. However, the way he used them strongly suggests the Kuleshov effect was intentional.

"Damfino" The Boat (1921) 

Keaton generally used close-ups only for character introductions and props. His use of character close-ups were always emotion-motivated. This was a chance to let the audience in on the ‘feel’ of a character, and hint at the relationship or interaction between the existing ones. 

One thing that every Keaton fan jokes about is his character’s tendency to fall in love immediately and without noticeable reason. Keaton has used this situation in his films so often it’s almost developed into a distinctive formula. Buster meets girl, girl gets a close-up while batting her eyelashes, Buster gets close-up while melting to her every will and whim. 

Do you know how hard it is to look stupidly in love without moving a muscle? Take a minute, go to a mirror, and act completely and utterly hopelessly in love like Buster does. No smile, no lip biting, no obvious movement of any kind. This is a performance you can only convey through your eyes. Just for fun, I tried it. Instead of looking stupidly in love, I just looked stupid. So how does Keaton manage to convey this intense and immediate desire without a smile?

YOU GOT IT. 

We’re back to our good friend Kuleshov. 

If A + B + A = C, then stone-faced comedian + attractive girl + stone-faced comedian = lust. We’re not picking up Keaton’s reaction to the lady, we’re picking up on our own assumptions from seeing her, and placing them on Keaton’s stone-faced expression like a blank canvas. 

 The Cameraman (1928)

Just as much as he does this with his leading ladies, he also does this with Big Joe Roberts. We often get a shot of Buster’s blank expression, then shot of this hugely intimidating man towering over him, then back to Buster’s blank expression. From this we interpret fear and instant regret at ending up in this situation written all over Buster’s face, even though he doesn’t actually change his expression, or does so very subtly. Keaton often uses body language to convey what his face lacks in emotion, but in this case, it’s the Kuleshov effect that amplifies what we see in his expression because of the physical cut and juxtaposition of the shots.

 The Goat (1921)

Although Keaton tended to use the Kuleshov effect more so with characters than with props, his most recognizable example of the Kuleshov effect in action was actually with a prop. It was between him and a boxcar, of course. 

Keaton seemed to use the Kuleshov effect more so in his features than in his shorts. The most of which came from The General. This film seemed to exemplify Keaton’s mastery of the Kuleshov effect almost constantly throughout the entire film. This particular example also happens to be my favourite scene, possibly because he used the Kuleshov effect so well.

Keaton + Boxcar reappearing after struggling to get rid of it + Keaton = Annoyance/Exasperation

Keaton + Boxcar disappearing with no explanation + Keaton = Confusion/Exasperation 

In conclusion...

To test this definitively, I designed a poll for people to take that weren't familiar with Keaton's work. 

Pretend you’ve never seen The General and have absolutely no idea who Buster Keaton is. Look at theses two clips separately. 

Startled & Confused

Awestruck

Without the context, and by replacing the “B” shot, his expression changed a bit each time, didn’t it? Perhaps you saw a slight smile in one, or a shiver in the other? None of that was really there, of course, but our brains put it there nonetheless. 

 

For the old man, 

81.8% said Keaton looked startled & confused

13.6% said Keaton looked hurt

4.5% said Keaton looked awestruck

 

For the young woman, 

52.9% said Keaton looked awestruck

41.2% said Keaton looked startled & confused

5.9% said Keaton looked hurt

For the exact same clip to have such drastically different results, the Kuleshov effect must absolutely be in play within Keaton's work.

Keaton's subtle acting style is definitely enhanced through his editing, giving us the best stone-faced comedian the world ever saw.

If you enjoyed this article, check out Lea Stan's blog Silent-ology for more Buster Keaton blogathon participants, sponsored this year by the International Buster Keaton Society!