Narrative is an extremely important concept in cinema studies and is present in almost all lengthy movies, so what is it? Narrative can be considered to be a chain of events linked by cause and effect and occurring in time and space. It is what we usually mean by the term ‘story’. It typically begins with one situation and then evolves through cause and effect, our engagement depends on the understanding of the pattern of change and stability, cause and effect, time and space.

Story may be presented in various ways. If we use flashbacks instead of linear time or if we decide to organise events around one character rather than another than we will be creating a different plot. The same story can be presented in a number of different ways(or different plots). There are both diegetic and non-diegetic elements in in narrative, with diegetic elements being things inside the world of the film such as the skyscrapers and Roger Thornhill talking in the opening of Alfred Hitchcock’s North by Northwest and non-diegetic elements being things outside the world of the film like it’s credits or the orchestral music played in the background.

Characters create causes and register effects, often setting in motion ’cause and effect’. Their actions and reactions contribute largely to our engagement with the film. The opening provides a basis for what is to come and initiates us into the narrative. It raises our expectations by setting up a specific range of possible causes for what we see. Indeed the opening quarter of a film is often called the setup. The development sections of films create patterns of development. These patterns may be through change or events which create turning points in directions or they could be could be goal oriented(character is in search of something). A plot will typically resolve its causal issues by bringing the development to a high point or climax in which the action is presented as having a narrow range of possible outcomes.