FILM- One of Man's Greatest Endeavors (Part 1 of Many)
I am among a minority when I speak for the greatness of film and video. Often when I venture to defend the medium, I am confronted by people who are emphatic about the value of books over movies. I don't intend to contest the advantages of written text, for books are the only source of inspiration, where we encounter reality in a visual form that is neither perceivable nor completely invisible. Like dreams, they are an index of our mind’s eye, inspiring our thought and influencing our deeds.
That said, it is not the equivalent of film, for the intent is not to replace one medium with another, but to appreciate each for its own worth. Is a book’s merit made with reference to a great painting, or a magnificent sculpture? Is Shakespeare greater than Mozart? Is Albert Camus’ Myth of Sisyphus of greater value than da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man?
Jean Renoir, the famous French film director / actor once said of cinema that "The saving grace of the cinema is that with patience, and a little love, we may arrive at that wonderfully complex creature which is called man."
I have been reading film theory for over five years and am passionate about this surrealistic world of fragments where everything looks like the real world but isn’t.
The only disadvantage that this hundred year old medium has is the reluctance on the part of the people to give it the same respect that they give books. which have been a source of influence since and before the invention of paper in 1400 BC.
And yet, for a relatively new medium, it has created enough ruckus to exasperate people and hold responsible for all the negative activities that we employ. What about this medium that is capable of negatively impacting our mind, prove unpersuasive as the new archetype for positive behavior? In my opinion, it is nothing but our unwillingness to give it a chance. Movies for the most part, do not have the same cultural aspirations as literature, so they aim more to entertain and less to elucidate or provoke deep thought in their audiences. As a result, they serve as a reflection for our cravings. Contrary to our belief, mainstream cinema does not aspire to influence our beliefs but is a result of our beliefs.
That said, there are several films that are made every year that are equally entertaining as are mainstream films but are moving, perceptive and packed with wisdom. However, like many written classics that gather dust in the greatest libraries of our world, these polyester film stocks resentfully melt away in many dark storage rooms.
As much as the obstinate older generation is incensed by our disregard for books as an edifying medium, I am infuriated by people’s reluctance to give cinema a chance.
What film hopes to do in an hour, a book has the luxury of creating in pages that may be read over days and even months. It tells us a story that looks so terrifyingly real that we sometimes forget that we are not part of the world we see in the film. Everything that is shown limits our mind’s imagination, but everything that is to be assumed in the plot due to the lack of time as the story uncovers enriches our power to explore the unknown using the knowledge of the known. This is just like with a book, where every breather we take between chapters gives us an opportunity to scrutinize its words and create a world that is influenced by the world created by the author.
The greatness of a movie is in the number of elements that go into the making of it. There are the artists whose only job is to make the film look as beautiful and captivating as a painting or a sculpture. Where film almost fails to capture the beauty of stillness, it makes up for it by creating a paintings that move, and nonexistent creatures that look as convincing as those we are familiar with in reality.
There are the editors who so seamlessly assemble the film together into a coherent body that we are fail to see the transitions between shots or each sequences as we do with chapters in a book.
And then there are script writers who write the story and actors who bring the written form to life.
If film were to be viewed as a form of art, then each of these affect the artistic genre of the film. The work that the film team produces together is a result of their individual ideologies that we unconsciously experience as an audience.
For instance, in some documentary films, the way the film is edited determines the truthfulness of the subject being presented to the audience. In a mystery film, what the camera does not capture for the audience adds to the anticipation of the audience.
The expectations on a film are not just to tell a story, but to tell it in a way that looks as beautiful and convincing as it sounds.
(to be contd...)
