Tragedy is a voilent force. It is profound. It doesn't put you through emotionally orgasmic fits like thriller or comedy does. It is far more subliminal and potent. Dramatic tragedy is almost celebratory. You cannot subdue your temptation to erupt in applaud and awe.
Truly tragic stories are highly psycho-analylitical, where people end up being what they never wanted to be, but couldn't help it. Tragedy may not have the verbal or situational acrobatics as other forms of theatre. They grow slowly, draw you in and if played out well you never get bored out of them. Even the best comedies suffer from the slack even if faintest. But tragedies have an upward narrative trajectory.
Death of a salesman, by Arthur Miller, is a classic tragedy. Truly modern in fervor yet so classical and universal. The sense of brutal conflict and sheer hopelessness of life can bring an entire family to a breaking point. There is no way out, not even death, for a truly tragic human. The hopes parents pin on their children, the unfounded hatred which children develop for their parents and the utter stalemate out of it. People don't change. They are too powerless to change anything, anything around them. People should never venture out changing the world. You are too humble for that. Human heart is too noble to be tricked into some emotional jitterbug. It may be only faintly influenced but nothing more.
To be Contd.....
Saturday, December 4, 2010
Films: more than just stories
Shocking revelation! I felt today that the art of good reading good may not be relevant even essential to understand visual aesthetics. You may be a truly juvenile reader and yet be a visual genius. On the hindsight, it seems obvious. It's so stupid of me to have such an stilted notion about the film art. I might be talking my head out, but it is genuinely unintelligent for me think that way all along.
I associated all good art to stem from developing an intellect. I mean how could one serve the higher purpose of creativity if one doesn't realize his own power, his intellectual prowess to mock at the ordinariness of people around him.
But this new-found knowledge is vastly devastating. It puts into perspective a lot of unnecessary questions I had about the film art and film language. My beliefs are changing. Reading and writing have their own virtues but filmmaking may not entirely lean on these capabilities or may be even fully dissociated from that. An honest introspection illuminates the cold fact that you may get nowhere in film art if you put all your money on literature. Film is so abundantly influenced by other art forms like visuals, sound, music that one could invest oneself fully in these, forget about literature and yet emerge a potent film force. It's just the way it is.
What is the most prudent question one must answer oneself before throwing oneself into films? Whether you want to be a passive lover or an active one. There is plenty of room for passive lovers even experts. It's quite another thing to be an active one. And if you want to excel in the process by satisfying your artistic thrust, then one must choose the art form closest to ones abilities and work their way into the films riding on that.
Films are a moving force of the society. A film moment, once passed, cannot be experienced the same way ever. So what you are living is one of its own kind of moment. And one historian rightly puts, film is not an art form of 20th century, it is the art form of the century. I should not be accused of stealing somebody else's thunder here because the thought is so universally felt across. It would be like blaming you to breath the same air as Frank Sinatra.
I personally do not believe one could do everything by themselves in a certain amount of time in which a film must complete itself. You will always be evolving continuously. A film must complete in a certain time and always belong there.
I associated all good art to stem from developing an intellect. I mean how could one serve the higher purpose of creativity if one doesn't realize his own power, his intellectual prowess to mock at the ordinariness of people around him.
But this new-found knowledge is vastly devastating. It puts into perspective a lot of unnecessary questions I had about the film art and film language. My beliefs are changing. Reading and writing have their own virtues but filmmaking may not entirely lean on these capabilities or may be even fully dissociated from that. An honest introspection illuminates the cold fact that you may get nowhere in film art if you put all your money on literature. Film is so abundantly influenced by other art forms like visuals, sound, music that one could invest oneself fully in these, forget about literature and yet emerge a potent film force. It's just the way it is.
What is the most prudent question one must answer oneself before throwing oneself into films? Whether you want to be a passive lover or an active one. There is plenty of room for passive lovers even experts. It's quite another thing to be an active one. And if you want to excel in the process by satisfying your artistic thrust, then one must choose the art form closest to ones abilities and work their way into the films riding on that.
Films are a moving force of the society. A film moment, once passed, cannot be experienced the same way ever. So what you are living is one of its own kind of moment. And one historian rightly puts, film is not an art form of 20th century, it is the art form of the century. I should not be accused of stealing somebody else's thunder here because the thought is so universally felt across. It would be like blaming you to breath the same air as Frank Sinatra.
I personally do not believe one could do everything by themselves in a certain amount of time in which a film must complete itself. You will always be evolving continuously. A film must complete in a certain time and always belong there.