In the beginning of Robin Hood: Men in Tights, villagers suddenly find their homes on fire, set ablaze by the Merry Men dramatically shooting flaming arrows. “There must be another way of doing the credits!” one exclaims. “That’s right, every time they make another movie, they set us on fire,” yells the fire captain. Another round of arrows leaves the famed director/producer/screenwriter’s name in fire on a thatched roof. “Leave us alone, Mel Brooks!” the beleaguered villagers yell at the camera.
It’s an unspoken rule of filmmaking to rarely have the subject look into the camera. It’s unsettling and breaks the illusion that the viewer is peering into a separate world with its own reality. And that’s exactly why filmmakers like Mel Brooks do it.
The practice is commonly called “breaking the fourth wall,” so named for the pretense in the dramatic arts in which the edge of the stage represents an invisible “fourth wall” to a room. Hence, the audience can peer into another reality, unbeknownst to the characters. And yet, prior to the 16th century, theatrical performers had no such rule and often turned to the audience to get responses or even solicit participation from them. With the 19th century came the development of realism, in which dramatic works insisted that the viewer merely observe from a god-like perspective.
