Jean-Luc Godard's Restriction Of Non-Linear Cinema

The idea that a story should have a beginning, middle, and an end, was established over two thousand years ago by Aristotle. According to the Greek philosopher, a plot must have the three components and follow a logical, linear structure to be seen as complete, simply because “it may produce the appropriate pleasure.” Aristotle’s dramatic structure has survived into the modern day and is used, today, as a template for Hollywood films, since it is the ultimate formula for an entertaining and satisfying conclusive film. However, this rigid narrative structure can be limiting when depicting the chaos of life and I believe, that abstract, non-linear cinema can be a better alternative when exploring the great philosophical questions of life. 

In this essay, I will discuss why I completely agree with Jean-Luc Godard’s statement that

“A film should have a beginning, middle, and an end, but not necessarily in that order.” To begin with, I will delve into the restrictions of the linear narrative structure and the possibilities of abstract cinema as a philosophical instrument. Secondly, I will discuss

Swedish director Roy

Rhizome, is a term borrowed from botanics, to represent a different structural fabric that rejects linearity and has no beginning or an end.

The philosopher Delueze writes in A Thousand Plateaus, of the rhizome, that it is “… always in the middle, between things, interbeing, intermezzo.” p. 25 In other words, the rhizome has no known origin or resolution, it is between things, grows on offshoots in no clear direction. Delueze notably used the theory of the rhizome, in social sciences and philosophy, to explain a different structural pattern that exists in the world. However, this nonlinear structure of the rhizome can also be applied in storytelling, as when one tries to reflect the rhizomatic organisation of the