The Formalist’s contribution to narrative theory, propounded during the classical formalist era of the early twentieth century, could be considered one of the founding principles in contemporary narrative analysis. It’s central philosophy, originally devised by Victor Shklovsky, was based upon the distinction between fabula and syuzhet (Stam et al, 1992, p70). The ‘fabula’, loosely translated as story, can be seen to constitute the chronological chain of cause and effect events which occur within a perceived dimension of space and time (Bordwell, 1985, p49). This concept relies upon the audiences ability to link and construct interrelated events in order to build a series of representations which inform the viewer as to the nature and direction of a perceived story. The ‘syuzhet’, loosely translated as plot, on the other hand, could be considered to be the formal devices used to organise and manipulate the events of the aforementioned fabula or story (Stam et al, 1992, p71). In filmic terms, the syuzhet is often associated with the stylistic devices unique to the medium of film that allow the filmmaker to alter the audiences perception of the spatial and causal relationship between chronological events. Such techniques or formal attributes could be the use of editing, sound design, art direction or shot composition to name but a few. Juri Tynianov argues, the least interesting examples of cinema were such texts which were heavily reliant on the fabula as a constructive factor in the process of narration (Stam et al, 1992, p71). Therefore, texts which employed a complex system of formal techniques to present a distinct style and conflicting pattern of the syuzhet in order to deform the fabula were considered the more artistic and formalist processes of filmmaking. For example, if we view the ‘odessa steps’ sequence from Sergei Eisenstein’s Battleship Potemkin (1925) below, we find a complex and innovative relationship between the events of the story (fabula) and formal techniques used deform and disrupt the natural order of the cause and effect relationship inherent to the perceived space and time.