Now that we’ve covered the technical and formal basics of film, it’s time to raise the level of the discussion. Let’s spend some time thinking about the language of film.

Film isn’t a language in the sense that English is a language. But film is very much like a language. This is the domain of semiology, the study of signs and their meaning. The semiology of film is where a lot of the magic happens. It explains a lot about how films move us—how mere shadows on a wall can communicate such great emotions and subtle ideas.

The purpose of Lesson 6 is to introduce the basic ideas of film semiology, the signs (and their meanings) of this unusual language.

It should take 4 hours to complete this lesson’s material.

After successfully completing this lesson, you will be able to:

• Better appreciate the discipline of semiology.
• Identify how signs and their meanings interact.
• Explain how cultural codes are used in movies.
• Talk knowledgeably about the role of documentary film in our world.

During this lesson, you will complete the following activities:

• At the Movies: Citizen Kane: We’ll watch Orson Welles’s Citizen Kane, named the best American movie ever made by an American Film Institute poll.
• Outside the Theater: Analyzing Real-World Semiology: We’ll investigate the semiology of traffic signs and clothing to get a better feel for how a semiological approach applies to the larger world of our culture.