In "The Third Meaning," Roland Barthes explores the concept of an obtuse meaning in film, which is a signifier without a signified. This third meaning is not located in language or language use, but rather in the image itself. It is a subversive element that disrupts the practice of meaning-making and is outside of articulated language, yet within interlocution. The filmic, which is the founding act of the filmic itself, lies precisely in that region where articulated language is no longer more than approximative and where another language begins.
Barthes argues that the still, a photograph taken from a film, offers us the inside of the fragment and throws off the constraint of filmic time. It is a quotation that is parodic and disseminatory, and it is the fragment of a second text whose existence never exceeds the fragment. While film is bound by the constraint of logical time, the still allows for a reading that is instantaneous and vertical, teaching us how to dissociate the technical constraint from what is the specific filmic and which is the "indescribable" meaning.
Barthes's exploration of the third meaning and the filmic provides a theoretical framework for understanding the ways in which film operates beyond language and meaning-making. It suggests that the power of film lies not only in its narrative or aesthetic qualities but also in its ability to evoke an ineffable, indescribable meaning that cannot be captured by language alone.
