Musings Often in Stereo

Note: Another in the series of papers! This paper was written for CSCL 3177: On Television. It uses a text from Kaja Silverman’s The Subject of Semiotics on suture, the film and literary technique that places the viewer or reader into a text. I used the pilot episodes of NBC’s The West Wing and Fox’s 24 to give a thorough analysis that validates Silverman’s points.

I don’t necessarily think that analyzing these shows in the light of cinematographic techniques is a good idea; far from it, in fact. A close reading of the episodes brings out these characteristics if you’re digging for them, sure, but I find it difficult to think that the people who write, shoot and act these shows are well-steeped in cinematic theory. The same sort of issue pops up when analyzing texts in light of tropes; you skirt giving an analysis of what people are saying if you focus exclusively on how they say it. In that spirit, I added the caveat in the end of the essay: the producers of The West Wing and 24 aren’t effective in their use of suture because they follow the norms, but because of how subconscious, or unintentionally, it feels.

Analyzing Methods of Suture in Political Melodrama

In her book The Subject of Semiotics, Kaja Silverman presents a series of arguments about the cinematographic technique suture. Silverman defines suture as, “the name given to the procedures by means of which cinematic texts confer subjectivity upon their viewers.” These procedures are rooted in the syntactic difficulties that plague language. French theorist Jacques Lacan notes that it is impossible to anchor a signifier to a signified; instead, meaning comes from the discourse that presents the signifier and signified (195¹). Silverman applies these difficulties to cinema: “When a subject… views a film it performs only… identification. The representations within which we recognize ourselves are clearly manufactured elsewhere, at the point of the discourse’s origin” — in short, the discourse of film is one-way and requires the context of the origin. In cinema, “that point of origin must be understood as both broadly cultural [i.e. as the symbolic field] and as specifically technological [i.e. as encompassing the camera, the tape-recorder, the lighting equipment, the editing room, the script, etc.]” (197). Silverman suggests through the citation of many theorists that suture works through shot relationships like the 180° rule (201), through presenting ideology (215), and through a relationship with sexual difference that includes fetishizing women (222).

Silverman’s summary of suture is clear in a close reading of a wide variety of television genres, including the political melodrama. In analyzing Silverman’s presentation of suture, I will use the pilot episodes of The West Wing and 24. These shows present clear parallels in the sense that both are melodramas that both use basic cinematic norms and are based around present-day political issues and fears, but also striking differences that make and expand the points of Silverman and the theoreticians she cites. Namely, each show clearly represents suture’s use of cinematography and its use as an apparatus to advance ideology.

Suture relies on the use of a variety of film techniques to draw the viewer into the text, or as Silverman paraphrases Jacques-Alain Miller, “the subject inserts itself into the symbolic register in the guise of a signifier, and in so doing gains meaning at the expense of being” (200). These film techniques specifically include shot relationships, which Silverman declares replace the syntactic relationships from linguistic discourse and in turn create cinematic discourse. Film’s most seemingly prevalent shot relationship is the 180° rule, which finds two shots shown back to back. In these shots, the first, shot 1, acts to show the subject head on. Shot 2 then pivots 180° to show the view of the subject in shot 1, often the second person in a conversation or the landscape (201-203). By presenting the view of the subject, it achieves the goal of cinematic organization: “The operation of suture is successful at the moment that the viewing subject says, ‘Yes, that’s me’” (205). The importance of the shot relationship’s form is not necessarily sacrosanct. Theorist Stephen Heath suggests that the argument for its use as part of suture isn’t based on the syntax but, as Silverman describes, as part of how it works as “cinematic signification” and “its relationship to the viewing subject” (203). Furthermore, Silverman displays alternate uses of camera work in suture in an analysis of Alfred Hitchcock’s film Psycho, specifically noting the nine different camera shots in the shower scene and the editing in how the viewer becomes disoriented into having “no choice to identify with Marion in the shower” (210-211).

The West Wing both uses and contorts the conventions on shot relationships that Silverman presents. The contortion from the traditional is most evident in the show’s use of the Sorkin Effect, an effect that writer/creator Aaron Sorkin is renowned and notorious for. In the Sorkin Effect, the camera follows two characters in movement, briefly abandoning the 180° rule in favor of straight-on or perpendicular shots through windows, doors, or even walls before stopping and continuing with a more classic shot relationship. This effect sutures the viewer into the text by giving a visible representation of what the character is feeling; the speed of the camera as it passes through a wall and the appearance of a cramped hallway disorient the viewer into feeling as rushed as the characters appear to be, with the abrupt shift to the traditional shot 1/shot 2 relationship acting as a beat that feels less like a shot transition and more comparable to a car braking in rush hour traffic. “Pilot” uses this effect multiple times, notably in the first scene inside the White House. The camera follows Chief of Staff Leo McGarry, portrayed by John Spencer, as he enters the building. The first shot, taken in the vestibule, pans out to show the expanse of the White House, before taking the Sorkin tour of the West Wing bullpen with a tight closeup on Leo’s head and shoulders. Leo stops only for brief meetings with a staffer, his deputy Josh Lyman, and the presidential secretary before reaching his office. During all of these short encounters, some variation on the 180° rule is used; in the meeting with the staffer, for example, the camera sits at desk level, with Leo standing and the staffer seated to display his authority. As soon as the encounter breaks, Leo continues down the halls and the tight shot running through hallways continues.

24 is also known for its use of alternative versions of cinematographic suture. The first is obvious: the use of “real time.” 24‘s format displays one hour of narrative within the 45-minute episode; in “12:00 A.M.-1:00 A.M.,” the action begins at midnight and ends an hour later. Doing this creates a sense of reality for the viewer; the volume of events within the hour even creates a sense of hyperreality. The sense of reality comes from how the viewer isn’t forced to accept any leap of faith about the length of time² that other shows present; one need not consider that a DNA test takes longer than fifteen seconds, or a heart surgery often is an all-day affair. Instead, a viewer of 24 can accept that a minute is a minute. It helps that the show uses this timing as a beat; its commercials roughly come in at the same amount of time into the show as is real time, with gaps in time and action falling during the commercial break. Next, the show uses multiple frames to show action. In these shots, the main character is often shown in two to three different camera angles; one continues the previous shot, another comes from farther out at an opposing 180° angle, while a third shows action going on outside of the traditional frame. It sutures the viewer into the action by presenting the peripheral vision lost through the 16:9 or 4:3 camera view and fosters an enhanced view of reality. For example, in “12:00 A.M.-1:00 A.M.,” Jack Bauer often appears in this style of shot while on a phone call; the first shot is his side profile, the second is the other side profile or a straight-on shot from farther away (in the episode, one shot is lower to the ground and zoomed out), while the third is often the pensive glance of the other person on the call or a busily working and highly suspicious co-worker. Additionally, 24 is known for, in times of action, diverting from the use of a steady cam. Using shaky camera work disorients the viewer, which enhances the view of action if used appropriately. 24 utilizes this effect in shots that present tension; an example is in the presentation of Palmer’s assassin. Instead of showing a traditional shot one-style view of the staffer/co-conspirator, the camera shakes as it pans in for a close-up, which in turn shakes the viewing subject. The queasiness that comes in when the steady cam is removed makes the viewer feel unsafe in the text; 24 abuses this fear and uses it to denote the villain.

Both The West Wing and 24 represent a shift in television and cinematography away from conventional views of suture and toward Heath’s view of suture as signifier. Each show uses cinematography as a signifier of reality; The West Wing applies it to the feel of the White House, while 24 uses it as a utility of an uneasy rush. In each, the viewer’s need for something that looks and “feels” more real than what is conventionally presented is satisfied, even if it involves the manipulation of actual reality. But suture does more than make the viewer say, “Yes, that’s me.”

Daniel Dayan first posited the idea that suture can be used for ideological coercion, declaring that in a shot 1/shot 2 relationship, a code is created and attracted, then disappears as shot two is visible, becoming fiction. “The code, which produces an imaginary, ideological effect, is hidden by the message… His imaginary is sealed into the film; the spectator thus absorbs an ideological effect without being aware of it” (215). Silverman refers heavily to Louis Althusser’s discussion of ideology, which he declares to be “the imaginary [or culturally initiated, as Silverman explains] relation of those individuals to the real relations in which they live” (216). Silverman summarizes Althusser and melds the discussion of ideology into cinema, saying that the link between the subject and the discourse of film often involves the story: “films re-interpellate the viewer into pre-established discursive positions not only by effacing the signs of their own production, but through the lure of the narrative.” She also declares that suture acts to “re-articulate the existing symbolic order in ideologically orthodox ways” (221).

24 presents one of the most clear examples of this impressment of the “existing symbolic order” through its depiction of terroristic threats on the United States. The series’s glamorization of the Counter-Terrorism Unit has been widely interpreted as a not-too-subtle endorsement of conservative policies on national security. Such an interpretation rests on the show’s elevation of Jack Bauer to heroic status. Bauer will readily use brutal torture to extract information from suspected terrorists³, taking a page from Machiavelli in justifying terrible means with the threat of a deadly terrorist attack. “12:00 A.M.-1:00 A.M.” introduces the element of fear and protection and the conservative ideology involved in two ways that impress the writers’ ideology in a way that satisfies Silverman’s interpretation of Althusser. First, there is the aspect of torture. The initial view is that torture and other questionable methods are a right and reasonable way to keep the world safe, no matter how morally questionable they may be. This is turned on its head through the series and its depiction of Jack as a less than sane actor; Jack’s actions are shown to be irrational and immoral. However, by the end of the day, the threat is lessened — the terrorists lose, the government wins. This follows an Althusserian model of ideological coercion; the ideology is presented, effaced, then shown to be the correct thought all along. The second exposition is far more subtle and is never explicitly stated. The initial suggestion is that the policies of CTU are an appreciable method of keeping America safe. However, the show suggests that David Palmer “would gut the agency,” and glamorizes him as what appears to be a Democrat. This would seem to be a promotion of Democratic policies, particularly with the deference and respect that Palmer commands through the show. In the end, though, it ends that the work of CTU saves Palmer. The conservative ideology of the show is first presented, coyly effaced, then is validated through Bauer’s heroism.

In a politically flipped way, The West Wing presents a variety of ideologies that are impressed on the viewer throughout its pilot and its seven seasons. The West Wing details the work of the policy shop in a Democratic-held White House; naturally, then, there is a tendency to promote liberal politics and values. The narrative includes a level of moralization that follows Silverman’s assessment of how ideologies are impressed on the viewer; namely, the plot sees moral issues turn from a presentation in the ideology of the screenwriter to an opposite ideology before being re-presented in the original. In the episode, a large group of Cubans are attempting to defect to the United States; meanwhile, a firestorm is brewing over anti-Christian jokes made by Deputy Chief of Staff Josh Lyman. Furthermore, the president embarrasses himself by riding his bicycle into a tree, and Deputy Communications Director Sam Seaborn inadvertently calls an escort service upon discovering his pager has been switched with the prostitute he slept with overnight. The Cuban tale initially plays out with the staff suggesting a humanitarian mission to rescue them; as a weather system threatens their safety, a xenophobic attitude creeps in. The episode ends with much of the group going missing; the president calls on the staff to direct the INS to grant them asylum. The other tales cycle in the same way: Josh is demonized by the staff and press, then is exonerated in a meeting with religious leaders, then belittled by the president; Sam’s issue starts a story arc in which prostitution is moralized and vilified again; the president returns from the hospital and begins a series-long discussion about respecting leaders that ebbs between the ridiculous (a season four episode where he takes far too many Valium after a surgery) and the stately.

Political melodrama presents a clear format for the presentation, deconstruction, and reconstruction of ideologies because of its nature. All political melodramas use the melodramatic trope of inserting social issues into the narrative, but because they involve political action to drive the narrative they require a stance to be taken. 24, through the use of non-elected and theoretically non-partisan characters, uses broad strokes in drawing off of societal fear of terrorism to paint a need for security at all costs that only conservatism can bring; The West Wing, which uses microcosmic anecdotes to create a wider narrative, promotes a leftist world view. They are able to take this sort of stance because of the success each has in suturing the viewer into the text. Without suture, each show would be seen as cheap propaganda or sloganeering; instead, the feeling that the viewer is within the show and the identification that occurs between the viewer and the subject makes it possible to incorporate ideological discussion into the discourse of television. The viewer becomes privy to the discussion instead of prisoner to it.

In this regard, political melodrama utilizes suture in a way that validates the analysis of Silverman. The West Wing turns to action shots and the Sorkin Effect to use cinematography while utilizing small events to advance the ideologies of its characters. 24 takes elements of fear and hyperreality in the construction of its narrative to suture the viewer into a broad picture that glorifies conservatism in an age of terrorism. Caution must be paid, however, to avoid a conflation of the use of suture with its effectiveness, as Stephen Heath eludes to. The two shows are effective not necessarily because they use the syntax of suture, but that they use it effectively, sparingly, and with artistic talent. Each show’s use of the elements is done with a certain level of skill, avoiding the self-consciousness that plagues melodrama and weakens its plausibility. Suture, then, involves not only the rules of syntax that film norms create but a level of quality.