ABSTRACT
In Chapter 3, set-ups were referred to as the “words” of film. That was a simplification designed to permit elementary definitions and descriptions of the various shots used in filming. In practice such simplification is most uncommon; to continue the metaphor, setups are really the sentences, often the paragraphs, on rare occasions even the chapters, that make up the body of any and every film. Without them the modem film would not exist. And without the filmmaker’s ability to take advantage of the set-up’s responsiveness to personalized manipulation, no matter how crude or how sophisticated, there would be no cinematic style and, of course, no art.
