"Pillow Talk embeds the split screen in intricate ways in the narrative of the film. In total, the film has ten split–screen scenes that are unevenly distributed over the length of the film. Two thirds of the split–screen scenes are in the first act of the film, while none are in the last act. Far from being coincidental or arbitrary, this uneven distribution functions as a play of foreshadowing and allusion as it provides the couple with a shared (virtual) space before they actually share a (physical) space. Therefore, the device fulfils a double narrative purpose: on the one hand, this technique has an economic function as it enables the film to refrain from clumsy and complicated parallel editing patterns, presenting two separate images in one frame. On the other hand, and this is more important, the spectator can already witness how well the couple fits together as the halves of the split screen correspond to each other in terms of colour, mise–en–scene, montage and internal movement. The spectator sees already the shared communal space, while the narrative has to work through the intricate plot movements in order to get rid of such an unclassical device as the split screen. ...
All split–screen scenes in Pillow Talk are telephone scenes, echoing, as argued, the basic properties of the telephone conversation. The paradoxical tension between distance and proximity, between absence and presence is overcome in one scene in particular when the physical division and acoustic closeness are confused as touch complements the visual and aural situation. The split screen shows the protagonists lying in their respective bath tubs, the woman on the left and the man on the right (this placement is consistent throughout the movie) – mise–en–scene, lighting and colour all work to downplay the visual distinction between the two separate images – as if they were in the same bath together (fig. 1). When Brad gently strokes the wall with his toes at the exact point where Jan has put her foot, she pulls it back as though she has been tickled by him (fig. 2). Even though physically impossible (Jan and Brad are in distant places and only talk on the phone), the separating wall becomes semi–permeable. This incident literalises the strange configuration in which the division is at the same time visibly present (both images are in the same frame), yet also visibly negated (we know that we are watching two separate images)."
(Malte Hagener, 24 December 2008 )
Journal of Entertainment Media (ISSN:1447–4905)
Fig. 1&2. Pillow Talk (Michael Gordon, 1959). Image Source: DVD Universal 2003.
1959 | cinema | communication | Doris Day | environment | film | intra-frame | Journal of Entertainment Media | Malte Hagener | mediated | mise-en-scene | Pillow Talk | rear projection | remediation | Rock Hudson | screen-mediated virtual space | space | split-screen | story space | telephone scene | virtual space | visual communication | visual language | visual literacy |
1959 |