The Conflict of the Comical and the Rational in Short-Short Film Dialogues

Abstract

This article considers the conflict of the comical and the rational in the dialogues of the short-short film serial entitled “Tu mourras moins bête” (“You will die less stupid”) produced on the basis of comics of a French artist and caricaturist Marion Montaigne and broadcast by the French-German company ARTE. In the framework of the study we define a short-short film as a comic microfilm text whose structure includes a thesis and an argumentation sentence with an unexpected ending. This meets the specificity of the present popular scientific discourse both to inform and influence the viewer, thus making the interpretation easier.
Analyzing the comical in popular scientific discourse, we rely on its conceptualization by the French philosopher Henri Bergson proposed in his essay “Laughter”. He considers the comic as the phenomenon appropriate only to the humans. Defined as the formula of laughter and a way of semiotization of funny aspects, the comical is used to express emotions which reinforce the impression the viewer receives from the information in the text. It is argued that due to frequent usage of the comical (typical of everyday speech) the author manages to convey both the rational and the emotional information in popular scientific discourse.
A video sequence provides a good example of the two trends’ interaction in popular scientific discourse. The rational verbal description which already contains the main information needs to be demonstrated as the part of argumentation. In the film it is the borderline symptoms (manifestations) which are discussed and one of them “anger / impulsivity” is demonstrated in a comical form. The dialogue demonstrates the above symptoms of the character’s behavior with his/her usage of slang and vulgar language to make the situation funny and to add a stronger argumentative force to it.
Another characteristic form of presenting knowledge in argumentation is realized by means of nonsense which makes the conflict of the rational and the comical possible. A necessary condition for it is the creation of two worlds (planes): one is real and rational, the other is fictional and irrational. Absurdity is supposed to play a game with the viewer in which audio and video sequence shows the absurdity of the naïve worldview in order to get home the knowledge more effectively.