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Film English 400 :, Function of Film - Coggle Diagram

- - - - Sullivan's travel's is a great example of Kracauer in that the high class ideals (Hollywood elite and directors) shape the film industry -what is 'good'/ 'masterpiece', yet the masses still dictate what is popular (the silly gag filled Disney cartoon that made Sullivan laugh unwillingly)
        it also is a nice example of the culture industry, Adorno, that culture is a sameness, or a kind of shared beliefs, trends, and ideas that often are marketed to the public as true and accepted. Sullivan's travels shows this in a shared image of Hollywood, the homeless, and what film executives and directors look like (rich, out of touch, big mansions, etc.)
    - - Comparison to film:
        The Trueman Show
        In the movie the Trueman Show, a man is raised inside a reality t.v. show to ensure that everything that happens on the show is 100% real. It takes place in America, the 'land of the free' and yet the hypocrisy of trapping a man inside of a t.v. show surrounded by fake actors isn't questioned, because society values the entertainment and 'truth' of the show. (and the corporation running the show appreciates profit
  - - - Example:
        
        While Mulvey attempts to emphasize that women are subjugated to men's desires and gaze, the proposed 'phallocentric order' the barbie movie attempts to meta-criticize the patriarchal views in films, and put the woman above the man, as shown in the movie poster. The film is also a critique of toxic masculinity
      - "In other words, even when the pleasure of viewing has traditionally been constructed for masculine spectators, as is the case in most traditional heterosexual pornography, it is the female body in the grips of an out-of-control ecstasy that has offered the most sensational sight." (Williams, 4)
        I think that this is trying to say that even though something might be aimed at a particular group of people (views of women that are attractive are 'aimed' at men) these images might actually end up appealing to others that weren't in the intended group. Thus any genre of film that is targeted at a specific group of people could end up appealing to a completely different person for a completely different reason. What comes to mind for me is people who watch Marvel movies not because they liked the comics or original marvel content (the target audience) but because they like the action or the actors involved
        
        My example film is kinda the MCU in its' entirety, which was originally aimed at comic book fans (who were mostly middle aged/ young men) and thus targeted a very specific fan demographic. Little did marvel know, it would end up appealing to women, children, and numerous kinds of fans around the world. Female superheroes with scantily clad costumes/ bad female portrayals were even eventually phased out to accommodate more female fans, and characters like captain marvel were added in
      - Born in Flames is a perfect example of Laura Mulvey's need for change in film. It rejects Scopophilia (the pleasure of looking at) in favor of a film that focuses on content, and her idea that the viewer should not be taking any visual pleasure from the viewing
      - scream is a good example of voyeuristic scopophilia, as we are intrusively looking at the female character on screen, but so is the killer, which gives it a narrative purpose. This type of scopophilia must advance the plot of the film in some way, and while it can contain pleasure, can't be solely used for the pleasure of the viewer
      - "That all attempts to repress our/black peoples' right to gaze had produced in us an overwhelming longing to look, a rebellious desire, an oppositional gaze. By courageously looking, we defiantly declared: 'Not only will i stare, i want my look to change reality.'
        The point that Bellhooks is trying to make here is that black women deserve to be represented in film, not as just as a caricature, but in a strong and powerful way. this is represented well by movies that have diverse, well-rounded black characters
        
        A movie that I think did a good job to reclaim black women's strong roles in popular films (as well as in history) was hidden figures. This film tells the perspective of an important NASA mission, not from the prospectives of the white astronauts or computers, job not thing, it told the story of a female black computer who was instrumental to doing the math to make the mission a complete suceess
- - - - new question: Why is it so hard for some to perceive new knowledge about reality, yet so easy for others? It seems that some characters in film are eager to accept new realities, whereas others find bliss in ignorance.
      - Connection of theory to a film:
        the matrix and reality
        in the film the Matrix, the main character Neo was able to come to terms with a new sense of reality (much like Plato's example of the man who was led outside of the cave) He gained new knowledge of how the world he lives in functions. Though shocked at first, he was grateful for the knowledge, and pitied those who were still stuck in the matrix (like Plato explained the escaped captive might come to pity his former fellows)
      - In both Plato's allegory of the cave and apparatus theory, we are dealing with a perception of reality. While Plato's theory dwells on a perception of a false reality due to a fundamental misunderstanding, and the reaction to a realization of actual reality (rejection) Bauldry focuses on our perception of film as a 'special kind of real' and the relationship between the spectator and the screen/camera (a kind of reality in it's own right) created by the apparatus (spectator, camera, screen)
    - - question? I'm honestly having a very long day, and there's a high possibility that I completely misread/didn't understand this reading. I'm very tired. If there's anything you need to clarify, or correct me on, please do so.
        put more succinctly, did I completely miss the point on this reading?
      - Videodrome made use of apparatus theory in that it used dark spaces, a relationship with reality that is warped, and a strange representation of reality
        
        Fetishistic Scopophilia or the idea of the pleasure of looking simply for erotic or pleasurable (purely, without narrative function) looking.
      - "Positing cinematic vision as merely a mode of objective symbolic representation, and reductively abstracting--'disincarnating'- the spectators subjective and full-bodied vision to posit it only as a 'distance sense,' contemporary film theory has had major difficulties in comprehending how it is possible for human bodies to be, in fact really 'touched' and 'moved' by the movies." (50, Sobchack)
        In accordance with affect theory, it is difficult to both think of the body as an idea and as a physical piece of matter. It is a physical matter object with abstract potential, the hand in the video. Thus, the film viewer is both given a 'mode of objective symbolic representation' by a film, (a way to feel and think) As well as given an out of body experience that is quite strange. as this representational meaning doesn't rely on their connection to their own bodies to create an emotional response, viewers are both 'touched' and physically left unaffected
        
        I am a little bit confused about this theory. I understand affect theory pretty well (at least I think I can) but the article by Sobchak is a bit hard to put into words currently. Any advice on the nuances of his work? Or the difference between 'objective symbolic representation' and a representation of the viewer? Thank you for helping!
        
        "...Even with an emotion as readily evoked as disgust, the matter is not... simple. Just because it can be achieved easily does not mean that more nuanced methods of presentation are inexistent or indeed less effective - in the movie theatre disgust... solicits a range of spectatorial responses. As a cinematic emotion disgust is an effect of the viewer's aesthetic involvement with the movie... Filmmakers are required to make decisions in order to evoke disgust." (Hanich, 2011)
        This quote seems to show how disgust is a direct emotion, that requires a substantial connection to the viewer in order to be effective. The connection can then ensure that the viewer experiences the desired effect. Which images filmmakers choose to evoke disgust is as such directly linked to the viewer's experience, and what the filmmaker thinks their particular viewer will find disgusting (for example, a slasher fan might not find a brutalized body as disturbing as say, someone watching a fantasy film might. Therefore, while finding a body with violent wounds might not disgust a horror fan, it could disgust a fantasy inclined viewer much more)
        
        I think that while horror fans are used to violence, they are not used to more disturbingly visceral horror, such as unsettling sounds or 'unpleasant' images. These images aren't exactly violent (as they might be used to anyway) but a more off-putting form of disgusting
        
        The best comparison of this I could think of is the horror anime 'Tokyo ghoul'. In this series, blood and gore violence is all too common. So, an image of such a thing would likely not disgust the viewers easily. The scene in the photo attempts to evoke viewer disgust through sound and physical discomfort. We can hear a centipede crawling, just as the villain holds a live centipede up to the protagonist's ear and threatens to let the creature crawl in. The viewer instantly becomes disgusted by the very uncomfortable depiction, and even more so when the threat is followed through
        
        "Pink Flamingos, on the other hand, goes to great lengths to thwart empathetic spectatorial relations with its culturally despised characters. Perverse, aversive, immoral, abject, united only in that they all defy the conditions necessary for recognition within the category of the human, they exceed empathy's capaciousness. Accordingly, where empathy has reigned supreme as the ethical relation par excellence in its capacity to advance inclusion, Pink Flamingos offers, in its place, a political mode of relationality based on disgust." (Breckon)
        
        Disgust in this way can also be caused by a lack of empathy for the protagonist, or a blatant hatred for their often disgusting (morally or in a literal sense) actions which causes a clear disconnect. This disconnect often turns the protagonist a villain or an anti-hero type: one whom the viewer doesn't want to root for anymore, and often can't see from their perspective to feel their emotions.
        This can be seen in films like 'Death Note' or Amewrican Psycho, wherein the protagonist is an unforgivable murderer who takes things way too far.
        
        Concerning,
        "Virtual reality (VR) short films designed to produce visceral experiences... we call into question claims that assign normative value and even transformative power to the VR medium – imagined as so-called ‘empathy machines’. Drawing on a growing body of literature that seeks to contest such claims, we point to and problematise both the manipulative intent of such projects and the liberal-humanitarian logic, which underpins them. Based on such a logic, advocacy through immersive technologies supposes that if only individuals can be made to ‘feel’ something they will be changed by it and so will their behaviour. Whatever progressive motivations of the content producers, the emphasis on empathetic identification threatens to by-pass critical engagement and raises wider questions." (Schlembach/ Clewer)
        
        "Real-life apocalypse is more ambiguous. It happens slowly, and there’s no way of knowing when the Earth is really doomed. To depart our world, under these conditions, is the same as giving up on it. And yet, some of your wealthiest fellow earthlings would like to do exactly that," (bogost)
        
        It turns out we already virtualized reality without the headsets and gloves. The real virtual reality, the one we dreamed of and feared two decades ago, the one we are stuck in without even knowing we’re inside it—is in our hands and our pockets, and in our buzzing brains and our nervous nerves desperate to jack back into it. (bogost)
        
        While bogost seems to be wary of both vr and all technology in general, (likening virtual reality to an apocalypse foreboding tech or insinuating that technology that we already possess has somehow 'trapped' us in a virtual world already Schlembach and Clewer present experiences like the ones we completed as eliciting a false sense of empathy that is problematic due to the capacity of the viewer to not really understand the subject they are meant to 'feel'. The viewers will instead bypass critical thinking and true engagement with the intended topic presented.
        I completely agree with Schlembach and Clewer, and was already thinking something along the lines of what they said (as stated in my experience journal) This fear of VR as a medium is tedious and unwarranted, at least with the technology as it currently is now. The experiences meant to elicit empathy also struck me as inherently flawed and false, and I had trouble connecting with the second in particular due to a lack of understanding with the presented subject. These VR interactives are no substitute for real experience, just as the virtual world is no substitute for the real world completely
    - - Example: Disney movies
        
        for me, most Disney movies have this power to revert my viewpoint to a simpler time, a point where I am much more simplistic in my views of the world, and reality may be bent to accommodate this view. For my example photo, I used the little mermaid, because it has the added meaning of the recent live action remake (which bends the tale's own reality to some degree)
  - - - what new thing have you learned:
        motion pictures were once considered simply a lesser form of theater. They were a form of mass entertainment for the poor and common, so they weren't considered an art form until they proved themselves to have qualities unique to the cinema (like detailed reactions and facial expressions)
- - - - "...An exciting spectacle - a unique event, whether fictional or documentary, that is of interest in itself. The attraction to be displayed may also be of a cinematic nature, such as the early close-ups just described, or trick films in which a cinematic manipulation (slow motion, reverse motion, substitution, multiple exposure) provides the film's novelty"
        
        Question: Is the cinema of attractions then defined as any kind of unique aspect of a film that draws viewer attention? Can it be something that is an unexpected twist on a genre, or does it have to be something that is defined as a film 'trick'? (slow mo, reverse mo, sub, mult exp).
        
        Cinema of attractions: The idea that gags juxtapose the importance of a narrative or plot, and in fact can work to undermine the workings of a plot in film.
        Playtime has a narrative, but not one that really engages with the film/viewer. it is a background device, wherein the main point is the transition from gag to gag and novelty