the film to be able to get the most entertaining experience. I also think a lot about how I would be in the same situations as the characters in a film. While watching the opening of Michael Powell’s Peeping Tom, the point of view shot gave me the feeling that I was actually the person attacking the lady. The different point of view shots also gave me this feeling; not only being able to see through the eyes of the man, but also through the “eye” of the camera. It is a scary feeling to feel like you are the one that is about to kill someone, but that is why the film is really good.I agree with Christian Metz in his essay. Story/Discourse: Notes on Two Kinds of Voyeurism. He explains that the "traditional film succeeds in giving the spectator the impression that he is himself that subject," and gets pleasure when there are no “traces of the subject of enunciation." When movie-goers realize things that are used for production in the film, they feel left down.
I have seen Leni Riefenstah
l’s film Triumph of The Will before, but when it was pointed out that you could see the cameras in some of the shots in the film, I felt kind of weird. I didn’t ruin the film, but it did make me realize that the way I was watching film before did not allow me to see things like this. The past couple of movies that I have watched, I have tried to analyze films in a production type of way. I try to pay more attention to how the film was made and why it was done in such a way instead of trying to follow plot and character development. I feel that this also detracts from the full movie watching experience, but I have always been more interested in production that screenwriting.
I like what you said about seeing things from the perspective of a character. In Peeping Tom, "It is a scary feeling to feel like you are the one that is about to kill someone, but that is why the film is really good."
ReplyDeleteI'm reminded of a literature class I took my senior year of high school. We were discussing tragedies and what effect they have on readers/viewers. There seems to be a somewhat therapeutic effect when you can experience the mistakes, the pain, and the hard lessons that the characters face, but at the end of the story you walk unscathed and more knowledgeable than before.
I see a strong similarity with the effect we get from films. One can watch Juno, for example, and see how scary and awkward it is to be a pregnant teenager, but at the end of the movie the viewer has the ability to learn the same lessons as Juno without living through that situation. Films teach us and give us new experiences without screwing up our lives.
Collective response -->
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I feel like you were lucky to have seen this film before. Since most of the films we watch in class are films I have not seen before, my first viewing of these films is with a critical eye. I would prefer to watch the films for fun or curiosity first. This would give me a true experience of being a spectator rather than a critic. Unfortunately logistics prevents this from being possible. So we as film students have to watch this film with a critical eye from the get go. We can still enjoy, sometimes even more, but we never get that experience of complete wonder that you can get the first time you view a particular film.
ReplyDelete"I feel that this also detracts from the full movie watching experience, but I have always been more interested in production that screenwriting."
ReplyDeleteI don't know whether to be sad or happy for you! What do you think explains this contradiction? I hope that we haven't ruined movie watching for you forever :)
As that ad from my youth used to say: "You've come a long way baby!"
ReplyDelete