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1 results

  • Chapter 8 - The Cinematic Nature of the Opening Scene in Heliodorus’ An Ethiopian Story

  • from III - Complex Cinematism
  • Martin M. Winkler, George Mason University, Virginia
  • Book:
    Classical Antiquity and the Cinematic Imagination
    Published online:
    15 February 2024
    Print publication:
    22 February 2024, pp 267-294

  • Summary

    Heliodorus’ An Ethiopian Tale is a precursor of modern mystery-adventure-romances. Most famous is its suspenseful but enigmatic opening, which is remarkable for its inherently visual nature. This chapter offers an interpretation of this scene from a cinematic perspective. It adapts Heliodorus’ clever opening into a screenplay, thereby demonstrating the concept of enargeia (Chapters 3 and 4) from a yet different point of view. The chapter additionally juxtaposes Heliodorus’ first scene to the intricate opening shots of two classic Hollywood thrillers: Orson Welles’s Touch of Evil and Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho. The mystery inherent in Heliodorus’ opening is solved only when an eyewitness explains it later both to the characters and to the readers. This explanation constitutes what is today called a flashback. Hence the chapter examines complex flashbacks in a variety of film genres. Hitchcock’s cinema exhibits a number of lying flashbacks, with the one in Stage Fright the best-known example. But Heliodorus was there first.