Voice Trapped in the Body

Teresa Rutkowska

Abstract

The author using selected films as examples explores the problem of the inner speech in film, in some of its configurations and functions of meaning in relation to the representation of the body in film. The voice in question is a first-person voice, articulated by a character, that is part of the structure of the film, the voice being an introspection leading the viewer to a special insight into a sphere to which other characters in the film do not have access; in this manner the viewer becomes an instance, whose presence has to be taken into account within the discourse of the film. This technique may take a variety of forms, as is shown by examples of such films as Derek Jarman’s Blue, Dalton Trumbo’s Johnny Got His Gun, Julian Schnabel’s The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, or Life Feels Good by Maciej Pieprzyca, but also Marcel Hanoun’s une simple historie and Shirley - Visions of Reality by Gustav Deutsch. The inner speech is considered not only in terms of a film language, but also in its symbolic and artistic aspects.