We pioneered a new way of analysing multimedia, motivated and directed by cinematic conventions used by film directors. We called the field “computational media aesthetics”. This was the first work to apply this new way of thinking to meaningfully segment video, and index and extract abstractions, directly addressing the challenge of bridging the semantic gap that exists between the simplicity of features that can be computed in automated content indexing systems and the richness of semantics in user queries posed for media search and retrieval. It proposed a unique computational approach to extraction of expressive elements of motion pictures for deriving high-level semantics of stories portrayed, thus enabling rich video nnotation and interpretation. It used film grammar as a first step toward demonstrating its effectiveness, and used the attributes of motion and shot length to define and compute a novel measure of “tempo” of a movie. Tempo flow plots were derived for a number of full-length movies and edge analysis performed leading to the extraction of dramatic story sections and events signalled by their unique tempo. The results confirmed tempo as a useful high-level semantic construct in its own right and a promising component of others such as rhythm, tone or mood of a film.