James Wallace wrote:
> How does this explain the legendary early film audiences who fled the
> theatre when confronted by a speeding locomotive on the screen?
Did they? It has been suggested that these stories are apocryphal, more like
advertising and jokes on supposedly stupid country bumpkins who can't
distinguish between screen events and reality than reports of actual reactions.
There is an early Méliès films, called "Country Bumpkin" which plays on this
joke. Perhaps a few people did react like that, others didn't. Anyway, I don't
quite see the relevance of this to the argument on our reaction to screen
violence.
> Ever had to remind your kids that "it's only a movie"?
> The knowledge that it is 'faked' seems to be aquired through experience, and
> not innate.
Again, I find this to be a somewhat different issue. But lets discuss it by all
means. I'm a bit fed up with violence anyway. I suspect that assuming there's a
clear distinction between innate and acquired capacities blurs the issue. We are
able to make sense and enjoy things such as film because we have certain
cognitive and perceltual capacities. On one level these are the result of the
ecological development of mankind, on another they are given a certain more or
less personal tuning during the development of each and every individual. So the
said capacities can be said to be fundamental even though they are not simply
there in a fully developed form right from the beginning.
The ability to distinguish between what is "real" and what is "play" or
"deception" appears to come about quite early on and is apparently connected
with the childs ability to learn to handle narratives. But his/her sense of this
distinction can easily become blurred such as when they are overwhelmed by play
or when they happen to lie so well that they start believing their own stories
or when wathcing television. And of course this happens to adults too. Our
consciosness seems to work on more than one level simultaneously. Our attention
may be focused on one only but the others are there and constantly modify our
reations and behaviour. Wihtout this capacity we wouldn't be able to go about
our daily activites as we couldn't possibly focus fully on everything that
happens round us or even what we ourselves do (like when driving a car).
Similarly in the cinema I might be really excited about the story events,
appreciate the brilliance of its technical exectution and deplore its
ideological premises. The interplay of these on many other factors guide my
reactions as I watch the film. At a certain point one might dominate at the
expense of others but there's a lot of them there all the time.
> I agree that our ability to remind ourselves that representations of
> violence are just that is key to being able to witness them with any degree
> of comfort--however it is the act of reminding that seems to indicate a lag
> or gap, a point where the viewer's consciousness is truly submerged (or at
> least positioned) in the narrative flow and therefore witnesses without
> distanciation.
I almost agree with this. But I do believe we should say "almost" or "as if
without distanciation". That basic distinction between representation and
reality is still there and conditions the submerging.
Henry Bacon
Finnish Film Archive
|