Diegesis and grotesque: the film adaptation of The Overcoat by Yu.N. Tynyanov

The article is devoted to an investigation of grotesque in theories of the Formal School and its realization in Tynyanov's screenplay "The Overcoat" and the eponymous film. In the works of the Formal School members, one can distinguish two aspects of grotesque comprehension. On the one hand, grotesque is considered in a compositional way as a contrast non-theological combination of textual fragments in the composition aimed at creating a defamiliarizing, sensibilizing effect. On the other hand, grotesque is denoted as a destructive diegetic "world of artificial experiences" with respect to which the composition is defined by the principle of textual analogy. The object of this research is the diegetic level of grotesque. This approach is justified by the fact that the 1920s is the time of intensive interaction of the cinema and narration; therefore, the notion of diegesis has the key role in the research. The adaptation of Gogol's "The Overcoat" was based in many ways on the theoretical positions of formalists according to which the film and Gogol's works are considered as similar objects. The film opposes the naturalistic models of reality in the same way Gogol's works do. Tynyanov's screenplay should be considered as a re-actualization of these properties of cinema through the presentation on the screen of the "montage" story, including the motifs of different Gogol's works. In the article, the author has analyzed the complex of deformations on the spatio-temporal level and in the subjective sphere of the screenplay and the film united by the general notion of the diegetic world. The author proposes to understand Bashmachkin as the centre of this system and as the medium of the view that subjects the world to systematic reduction and recombination. The manifestations of grotesque are different characters, loci of Saint Petersburg and nightmares of Bashmachkin understood as the central point in the set of deformations. Gogol's works, the screenplay and the film not only recreate grotesque but also participate in its theorizing, for Tynyanov introduces this notion in his "Preliminary remarks". An important role in this process belongs to the properties of cinema as a medium: "flatness", "insipidity" and montage supporting. In the analyzed meaning, grotesque is a complex of disruptions of the referential norm of plausibility building the dieget-ic world. In the author's opinion, grotesque became the way to point to diegesis which, on the contrary to mimesis, assumes a share of "artificiality", "madeness". In this sense, the theoretical and creative search of formalists can be examined as a precursor to narrative conceptions of the cinema.

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