A title card (properly known as an intertitle) is a piece of printed text, which is then filmed and edited into (i.e. Inter-) the moving images of a motion picture. They are edited in at various points, usually to convey dialogue, and relative narrative. 'Intertitle' is an academic term invented long after the advent of sound film. These 'titles' should not be confused with the modern-day definition of subtitle or main title. Intertitles were first introduced during the advent of silent films, once silent films became of sufficient length and complexity to require their use, and would often make sense of seemingly nonsensical enacted or documented events.
Intertitles are still used today in modern cinema, although for altogether different reasons. They can be used to supply an epigraph such as a poem, or to distinguish between various 'acts' or 'chapters' of a film story arc. Their most common appearance come in the form of their usage in historical drama's epilogues to explain what happened to the characters depicted in the piece once the story has finished proper.
As 'talkies' and soundtracked movies began to become more commonplace, the use of intertitles too became slowly eradicated. However, they were still used late into the 1930s, to provide narration, although obviously dialogue was handled by the onscreen actors as new technologies allowed it to be so, and they are still used in many pieces of drama today, mainly as an artistic device; Frasier's gimmicky intertitles, or the intertitles of Threads used to give locations, dates and information on distant events outside of the home setting of Sheffield, or perhaps the intertitles of Law & Order, which are used to give the locations of upcoming scenes.
Guy Maddin is a modern filmmaker who has become well known for using intertitles, as he tries to recreate the style of older films, and some locally produced shows, such as quiz bowl shows, use various animated intertitiles to introduce new rounds to the viewers.
The small portions of a film reel that make up the intertitles are also known to be the most prone to decomposition. Often these intertitles are removed from the reels completely, apart from one or two frames, to aid in placement. Because of this, distributors of unrestored films often find it impossibly hard to replace the intertitles, and so they can seem to whiz past at an unreadably fast speed.
Intertitles are still used today in modern cinema, although for altogether different reasons. They can be used to supply an epigraph such as a poem, or to distinguish between various 'acts' or 'chapters' of a film story arc. Their most common appearance come in the form of their usage in historical drama's epilogues to explain what happened to the characters depicted in the piece once the story has finished proper.
As 'talkies' and soundtracked movies began to become more commonplace, the use of intertitles too became slowly eradicated. However, they were still used late into the 1930s, to provide narration, although obviously dialogue was handled by the onscreen actors as new technologies allowed it to be so, and they are still used in many pieces of drama today, mainly as an artistic device; Frasier's gimmicky intertitles, or the intertitles of Threads used to give locations, dates and information on distant events outside of the home setting of Sheffield, or perhaps the intertitles of Law & Order, which are used to give the locations of upcoming scenes.
Guy Maddin is a modern filmmaker who has become well known for using intertitles, as he tries to recreate the style of older films, and some locally produced shows, such as quiz bowl shows, use various animated intertitiles to introduce new rounds to the viewers.
The small portions of a film reel that make up the intertitles are also known to be the most prone to decomposition. Often these intertitles are removed from the reels completely, apart from one or two frames, to aid in placement. Because of this, distributors of unrestored films often find it impossibly hard to replace the intertitles, and so they can seem to whiz past at an unreadably fast speed.
