Music Video Saana Kujala-John: Narrative Theory: Todorov

What is narrative?

Narrative is the way the story is organised. It is often associated with the words "story and "plot". There are several elements of narrative which include time, closure and enigma. Time refers to the time spanned across the earliest chronological moment to the last chronological moment. Closure is the end point/resolution of the text. Enigma is a problem that needs to be solved.

Classical Hollywood Narratives

Classical Hollywood narratives are often linear where the events take place in a chronological order. They have a tendency towards closure and include few, if any, sub-plots within the narrative.

Theories of Narrative

Todorov, Propps and Barthes have proposed individual theories to explain a typical structure of narrative.

Todorov

Tzvetan Todorov suggested that all narratives have different phases. Firstly, the audience are presented with an equilibrium where everything appears to be safe and at ease. However, there is a disruption which throws the narrative into disorder which then presents a number of enigmas. There must then be a resolution in order to solve the problems caused by the disruption. Once resolved, Todorov explains that a new equilibrium is put into place whereby the characters' situation has changed and so represents what they have learned as a result.

The Outlaw Josey Wales

The opening of this film can be briefly analysed using Todorov's theory as it begins with a normal, calm family day with the father and son farming in the field. This can be described as the equilibrium.

The next phase of disruption is first heard with the sound of birds frantically flying out of the trees- shortly followed by the sound and a close-up of horses running through the woods. We then see a large cloud of smoke which we then identify as the main character's house on fire. A shot of an unfamiliar group of men dragging his screaming wife out and his son's still body in a sack lead to the enigmas.

The enigmas that are presented are:

Who killed his wife?
Why did they burn his house down, take his wife and kill his son?
What is the main character going to do about it?

The last shot in the scene is a shot of him holding a gun which indicates that he is going to resolve the situation by finding the group of men and murdering them.

The new equilibrium would reveal the main character either having resolved or accepted the enigmas.

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