I found both of tonight’s films to be strange but they also had unique ways of narration. Many of the elements and devices that are used to tell stories from our list from class were evident. Camera angles is one of these devices and the director of Stronger than Paradise used many long shots with limited cuts to help tell the story. Some shots go on for minutes without any editing. The characters  move toward and away from the camera as well as off-camera and on-camera without any editing. I think that this was a rare thing for films made in the 1980’s to have such reduced editing. I do not remember any close-up shots or medium close-up shots in the entire film. When he wanted to end a shot, he would often cut to a completely black screen and then introduce the next shot. Another element of story telling that we discussed is the notion of inter-titles. I remember two titles in the film. The first one said “one year later’ to indicate a time shift which is significant towards the narrative. The second one was the word ” paradise” which I believe indicated the main characters’ trip to Florida. Ryan’s writing on the definition of narrative from the reading states that narrative is about conflict, narrative is about problem solving, narrative is about interpersonal relations, narrative is about human experience, narrative is about the temporality of existence. I think that using really long shots can be tough to effectively keep a narrative flowing. For example, I think that close-up shots allow for a better way of learning about the interpersonal relations of a narrative.