ABSTRACT
Pacing was identified early on in the history of motion pictures as an element that distinguishes a good silent picture from a bad one. D. W. Griffith once wrote, is a part of the pulse of life itself, and, being common to all human consciousness, its insistent beat has the curious power to seduce and sway the emotions, as the rhythmic tread of marching troops sways a suspended bridge. Jean Mitry says that only music can create pure rhythm, a system of strong and weak melodic or harmonic beats, while rhythm in literature, employing words, is less pure but attainable. The film automatically captures time unfolding in a certain space, the existence of film rhythm seems indisputable: Mitry notes that there are film genres that "quite consciously involve the use of a specific rhythm. Clearly, a psychological film does not have the same rhythm as, say, an epic; it would be foolish to think otherwise.".
