A main idea question tests whether you can state what the whole text says about its topic. Name the topic, then find where the text changes direction and ask what point follows. If the ending adds a limit, ask how that changes the point rather than leaving it out. Predict a sentence that covers the whole text, including what the examples show. A choice can repeat a true detail and still miss the main idea.
Hints
- Hint 1
Read the first two sentences together and find where the text moves away from the scholars’ earlier view.
- Hint 2
Use Salas’s comment about static framing to check what Brandt could have chosen differently.
- Hint 3
Compare the example sequence with the final sentence. Ask what repeats and what remains true of most scenes.
Step-by-step
Follow the turn and the ending
Step 1Find the starting view and the turn
The opening calls Brandt’s painted cityscapes inexpensive substitutes for location footage, but restored prints complicate that view. Where should we look for the main idea? In what those prints reveal about the settings, because the scholars’ view that the sets saved money is the starting view, not the text’s conclusion.
- Step 2
Read what the sequence does
Why do the visible seams matter? Brandt could have concealed such seams through static framing, so showing them wasn't her only option. A pan exposes the boulevard’s edge; the next shot shows a performer crossing the platform while framing the boulevard as continuous with it. The sequence exposes the join and then restores the illusion.
- Step 3
Use the ending to shape the prediction
Comparable shifts recur throughout the films, so this isn't a single example. What limit does the ending add? It says most scenes depend on viewers accepting painted streets as coherent spaces, so the films still need believable settings despite these disruptions. Our prediction is painted spaces that seem real but sometimes reveal how their illusion is made.
- Step 4
Check what each choice adds
Which choice describes that pattern without adding more? Accepted visible seams whenever adds a practical reason, chiefly so that adds a purpose, and ultimately takes priority says which matters most. The passage doesn't say any of these things. The choice with create credible cinematic spaces and through intermittent disruptions instead covers both what viewers believe and what they briefly see about how the sets are made. Choice D.