Definition...kinda
The term ‘Montage’ refers to how shots are arranged or edited together. Montage is the logic (or illogic) of how thought proceeds from image to image. In our case, this montage organises the relationships between shots, which demands of us that this film is operating on a cinematic and meta-cinematic level, and that we the real-world audience are being asked to move our thoughts between these worlds. Whilst this montage sets for us a filmic language, such as rhythm and narrative flow, it also instructs us how we should be perceiving the film (particularly in this opening scene).
In movement-image cinema (e.g., Eisenstein, classical Hollywood), montage is central. It establishes sensory-motor links: action follows perception and leads to effect. In time-image cinema (post-WWII auteurs like Ozu, Antonioni), montage becomes decentralised or non linear. The links between shots become disjunctive or irrational; time may be directly expressed, and images don’t follow action-reaction logic. This montage, and others throughout the film, doesn’t just tell us the story or part of the story, it manifests thought through the intervals between images, or as Deleuze puts it, “the interstice.”
I contend that Weir directs this thought in a specific direction, and that is towards our own ethical position vis-à-vis digital control and manipulation. (insert term!!) . A key aspect of how Weir does this is through a crystal-image disruption of our universe. He use (and mixing) of different regimes of time and perception comes about through the frame, shot and montage of different camera viewpoints (and their relationship to The Whole).
