There are also much more implicit ways, which we see only in a facial expression, gestures, or looks. Taken in the context of the character, the situation, and what happened prior in the story, we can generally understand what the look means and what is going on inside the character. Though it may not be described in words, dreams, flashbacks, or explicit actions at all. I think we had a discussion in one of Scott's protagonist classes about Gravity, concerning what was going on inside of Stone's character when she mentions her daughter's lost red shoe. On the surface it was simply her remembering her daughter. But inside it went very deep into her own feelings of being a lost soul and the devastation of losing a child. What if she never had that expositional dialog. All we would see is a melancholy character and feel something was up. But we wouldn't know what it was. Yet that would be a very valid way to portray that unknown (to us observers) inner world of a character. If you think about a parallel situation in life, you can understand better. For example, my son has cancer, and I am completely helpless to do anything much for him. How could you covey that feeling in a character, other than in facial expressions and such. This is also a technique that actors often use to become a character. Theses kinds of things can only be understood in context, implicitly, and are possibly even completely missed by an audience if you aren't tuned in. But I think this is the power of film to touch on very inner human qualities. Having an actor portray these kinds of abstractions in surface dialog, tone, or just facial expressions, is what sets film apart, I think. (Scott, I wish you'd post that discussion. There were some great insights.)

Jon, I know our discussion in that Screenwriting Master Class course went into more depth, but you can go here to my 7-part analysis of Gravity and click on Part 6 in which I discuss the 'red shoe' a bit. The key here for me is the specific object. That allows the reader / moviegoer to visualize something distinct and attach whatever emotions to that object. In that way, the object becomes a talisman, a physical entity with emotional meaning.