Montage is an effective technique of filming we all still like to use today, and we have some russians to thank for the development of this!
Firstly, there tends to be two types of main montage to use when thinking of creating a piece; "Hollywood" and "Soviet."
Hollywood tends to be what we use today- compressed stills. say if we were filming a rom-com and wanted to show produce a montage in the middle of the film over a song to show how "in love" they were; for example quick shots of each day- characters doing different things/ happy/ etc etc. The audience interpret that time is passing without it dragging in the film.
(Another example would possibly be after a live match of Rugby on TV- at the end credits they would show a montage of the highlights as the music fades out for the audience).
Soviet was an early development of montage which was a very effective way of filming and showing pace, panic and anything the director wanted to portray.
A revolutionary film director- "Sergie Eisenstein," (1898-1948). He was a young director, famous for his silent films, and who came originally from the theatre. He believed that editing could be used for more than just expanding a scene or moment through a series of images.
He liked to collide his images into one another, manipulating the audience to feel what he wanted to get accross through his film metaphors. He wanted to add fire and contrast to everything he created- using quick cuts and fast paced shots.
His most successful film would have been the 1925 silent film "Battleship Potemkin," a scene on the "Odessa steps," being the most effective and creative sequence. There were a lot of quick cuts back and forth- showing the narrative- closely followed by the reactions of the characters. He aimed to edit in such a way that the audience would follow his vision of panic and sympathy.
"Vertov" was very different if compared to Eisenstein. Eisenstein was more interested in the script and story colliding together; whereas Vertov wanted to create something different and away from the idea of theatre and scripts. He wanted to convert filming to natural performance- and became the root of our now "Documentaral" style of filming. He combined realistic events and stylised them by using cinematic devices through editing.
And lastly, "Kuleshov," who was a filmmaker in the 1910/20's. He worked with juxtaposition from one shot to another and interacted meaningful images in order to show how editing effects the viewer's way of thinking.
He liked to experiment with the audience's perceptions and reactions and believed he could do this through the use of simple editing. For example- Three shots; First shot: CU of Male character / Second shot: CU of a gun / Third shot: CU of male's face- frightened. This would create anxiety and worry for the character through the audience. However Kuleshov believed you could use the First two shots the same, and by altering the third shot you would create a different reaction- EG Third Shot CU of male smiling- so the viewer would be relieved and at ease.
"One Taker's" were also quite the trend in this era or experimental filming. Where the director would plan out the whole sequence, prepare it and film it in one take- so no editing is required- this would create a flow and natural atmosphere to the piece.
An example of this would be Alexander Sokurov's "Russian Ark"- a sequence that took 7 years to plan and shot all at once in one weekend, based in a museum.
I've found a site called
http://www.single-shot.co.uk/ which has good examples of modern day one take pieces. Watch Sean Dower's "Automaton" piece. I chose this as an example as i like how it begins ECU of a light- the audience is unaware at what they're watching- until the camera pans out to reveal the subject. I also like the director's use of CU panning and tracking the drum set for added detail and effect.
