Montage

A montage is several shots juxtapositioned with one another. The way they are edited together makes the audience innovate their own narrative instead of telling them the story, like done in continuity editing. Montage is when several shots are edited together rapidly, sometimes showing continuous action.

The first time montage was used, Kuleshov done an experiment using the same ‘beginning and ending shots’ then putting something totally unrelated in the middle. In one of Alfred Hitchcock's narratives to the experiment, he mentioned that when the first shot of the man was combined with the woman and her child, he looked like a nice man. Then when the shot was put together with a woman in a bikini, the audience would instantly think that he was a dirty old man.

Montage was then used again in a very famous film by Eisenstien called The Battle Ship Potemkin. This film is remembered for its astonishing use of montage. The main scene is set on a large set of stairs with people running down the stairs then eventually fighting with each other. The effect of Eisenstien’s montage is to emphasise destruction and cause panic. Continuity editing is used rarely in this piece. A mother is at the top of the stairs with her pram and then all of a sudden she loses grip, the shot changes and you see the pram tumbling down the stairs.