FORMALISM AND REALISM
Formalism is a theory of film and film making. It considers the combination of elements in film to create an atmosphere or feeling. For example, a formalist would take a scene of a film and consider how the music track in the background creates a more comforting effect, or adds to the sadness of a scene depending on the action taking place.
Formalism is something that is used in the making of most major hollywood movies, it makes the audience passive and means they can pay attention to storyline or character rather than the way a movie is shot, it is about making a film, not trying to represent real life.
Realism on the other hand is almost entirely about recreating real life and naturalism. Often a realist when making a film will reject such film techniques as flashbacks or dream sequences, because these are film devices rather than projections of real life.
Many realist films are documentaries,one such film is 'supersize me' by Morgan Spurlock. It is about a man who eats only McDonalds for a period of time and becomes extremely unhealthy. This is obviously a realism film because it is non-fictional and not dressed up as a story in any way.
Some films however are less easy to define, 'Spinal Tap' for example is a fictional film, with actors, but uses all realist techniques. It follows an imaginary rock band and how they slowly fall a part. But it can be seen as more than just a 'mockumentary' or spoof because of the unique way in which it was created. Instead of being given lines to deliver like in an ordinary film, it uses an almost Stanislavskian method of creating the dialogue. The actors are told to get into the mindset of the characters, and then improvise. So in this sense it is far closer to a documentary than your average spoof.
A good example of a formalist film would be 'Jurassic Park'. The famous Steven Spielberg film about a dinosaur park. It uses many conventional formalist techniques. Creatures that no longer exist, backing music, and sensational ideas that reflects nothing realistic.
