ABSTRACT
This chapter considers the performance and movement of actors in films in terms of the meanings acting can create for the audience and the emotional responses that may be generated. It looks at body language and how every part of the body may be used by actors in order to communicate with viewers. The performance and movement of the actors suggests possibilities for how we might understand given characters and relationships between characters. The performance given by actors within one scene is important in itself but there is a need to recognise that each scene, and each element of performance within each scene, also operates in relation to the previous scene(s) and the following scene(s). The juxtaposition of one set of carefully considered elements of body language in one scene with a contrary set of body language codes in another scene is deliberately put in place by the filmmakers in order to create a particular impact on the audience.
