An audience for the subtitles

An original account of an invented film workshop.

Our silent film showed someone trying to carry too many boxes through a door. We wrote subtitles explaining every movement. During the first screening, the audience spent so long reading that they missed a box sliding off the top of the pile.

For the next version, we removed the lines that merely described visible actions. We kept one subtitle explaining why the character refused to make a second journey. That information was not apparent from the pictures, and it made the struggle funnier. The film was the same length, but the audience now had time to notice the character's expressions. Cutting the writing had not removed the story; it had allowed the images to tell their part of it.

In your own words, explain two reasons why the revised subtitles were more effective.