A Final Go

While all of us have been busy with our communications project, I reckoned I could do a miniature one for a closing entry as well. This would serve as a summary of what I have learned from all the lectures hitherto.

Since this is the last entry, I have decided to work on an all-time favourite movie of mine: The Lord of the Rings trilogy.

The following is an extract from the movie which made use of numerous communication theories in its presentation.


It shows the creature, Gollum, talking to the dark side of himself (yes, he's developed split personality). Let's just name them Gollum A, for his normal self, and Gollum B for his other self.

• Verbal/non-verbal communication

Producers made use of verbal communication between both Gollum A & B throughout the scene. It is the most direct way of conveying ideas, messages, opinions, emotions and feelings with the use of language and spoken words. In addition, with the help of non-verbal cues, it greatly enhanced the process of communication between Gollum A & B as well as communication with the audiences.

For instance, when Gollum A says "I hate you" to Gollum B, he says it with much agony on his face. From the diction, we know that A hated B; through affect display and facial expression(kinesics), we can tell how much he hated Gollum B.

• Cues/Perception

Filmmakers also made use of massive amount of non-verbal cues to shape the audiences' perception on Gollum. Firstly, Gollum appears to look very unique physically; his looks epitomises unfriendliness, darkness, devilishly gunky; anything but positive. As first impressions are often persistent, audiences would typically see him as the anti-protagonist and loathe this character for the rest of the movie, regardless of what he does. Moreover, oculesics were also used to magnify the evilness of the character. Observe Gollum B's menacing glare when he was daunting Gollum A; it reinforce his character as a villain.

• The Knapp Model
  

Let's try applying it to the relationship between the main character of the movie, Aragorn, and one of the female leads, Eowyn.

Initiating:
In this scene, Eowyn would swing her sword, throwing Aragorn's arm and knife to one side swiftly. Her face does not soften at his gaze.
(cautious and 'safe' feature of initiating stage)


Experimenting:

This scene would see them having a somewhat self-disclosing small talk.
Dialogue:

Eowyn: My uncle told me a strange thing. He
said that you rode to war with Thengel,
my grandfather. But he must be mistaken.
Aragorn: King Théoden has a good memory. He was only a small child at the time.

Eowyn: Then you must be at least 60? 70? But you cannot be 80!
Aragorn: 87.(self-disclosure)

Intensifying:
When Aragorn comes back from battle, Eowyn could no longer hide her feelings; she hugs him with delight and relieve.
(Disclosure of feelings; physical contact)


Terminating:
Their relationship never hit the next stage of integrating due to Aragorn's commitment to his girlfriend.
Dialogue:
Aragorn: Why have you come?
Eowyn: Do you not know?
Aragorn: It is but a shadow and a thought that you love.I cannot give you what you seek.

These stages hence reiterate the fact that the Knapp Model is not linear; the stages in reality do not necessarily follow that of the model.

• Group Communication

The following is another extract of the movie, illustrating groupthink in group communication.


We see, in the video, that some of the characters agree on destroying the One Ring while some do not. Boromir (the one who insists not to destroy the ring) and his followers are so confident that with the Ring, they could oust evil altogether, once and for all. This is obviously untrue as told by the other veterans. The actions of Boromir illustrated the illusion of invulnerability, believing in the group's own morality as well as the collective rationalisation qualities of groupthink. Such actions, if not ceased by the wise, could probably lead to severe outcomes which would damage the entire population in the movie.

• Intercultural Communication
  

I supposed we can say that intercultural communication do exist in the movie as well, with all the different races:

Men, hobbits, wizards, elves, dwarfs.



The video shows how people in different cultures are met with impediments due to the difference in languages. As the culture of the various races are inherently different, it goes without saying that it affects the way they receive and interpret cues from members of other cultural groups. Being affected by their long history of unhappiness with each other, it has become a norm to hold prejudices and discriminate one another for dwarvish and elvish cultures. Such cultures would inevitably affect the communication between the races, usually in a negative way.

• The media

All directors will seek to use the most efficient methods to publicise their film across the globe. As internet and television are norms today and majority in the more developed countries have access to these services, producers emphasised their promotion through these mediums. For instance, before the actual screening of the film in theatres, the public will be able to see the trailers on TV very frequently. Producers also created a website specially for the movie. Making use of such media will ensure maximum awareness of the film and the quality(technology used etc.) of the trailer will determine how profound the impressions are imprinted on the audiences.


Finally, to end off, these are the official trailers of the trilogy. It is a truly fascinating movie.




For those who have not already watch it, please do. It is worth watching.
For those who had already watched it, might want to watch it again. :))