Montage
A technique in film editing in which a series of short shots are sequenced to condense space, time, and information.
In depth
Famous for 'training sequences', montages allow directors to show a long process (like falling in love or getting in shape) in a short amount of screen time.
Example
“The 'Rocky' training sequence is the quintessential movie montage.”
Origin and history
The Soviet montage theorists — Sergei Eisenstein, Lev Kuleshov, Vsevolod Pudovkin — developed montage in the 1920s as a complete theory of cinema, arguing that meaning came not from any single shot but from the collision between consecutive shots. Eisenstein's 'Battleship Potemkin' (1925), particularly the Odessa Steps sequence, remains the most studied application of the theory. Hollywood absorbed the technique and stripped it of its political ambitions, turning montage into the familiar 'time passing' shorthand.
Why filmmakers use it
Montage is one of cinema's superpowers — the ability to compress weeks, years, or relationships into ninety seconds without losing emotional weight. The technique is most effective when paired with strong music and a clear narrative arc, because the viewer needs an emotional throughline to interpret the rapid visual fragments. Bad montages feel like a shortcut; great ones feel like the only possible way to tell that part of the story.
More examples in cinema
- The opening of 'Up' compresses the entire life and marriage of Carl and Ellie into a four-minute montage that audiences still cite as the most emotional sequence in animated cinema.
- The newspaper-spinning montage in classic 1940s journalism films is now a self-aware genre marker referenced in modern parodies.