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Among many ideas from W, this: 'I noted Bazin's affection for continuity as a token of realism. A film in which we dart back and forth through time is not necessarily realistic from the common sense point of view (we understand time as linear and chronological).... This and other remarks about Russian history remind me of a wonderful shot in Tarkovsky's Mirror. From bad memory, it begins in the 20th century with a boy (the main character's son) reading to a 19th century woman from a letter by Pushkin about Russia's historical predicament caught between Europe and Asia, past and present. The boy then goes to answer a ring at the door and the shot follows him. It is the cleaner but she seems not to recognise the apartment, and when the boy returns the woman has disappeared and has left no trace but a vanishing circle of condensation from her cup. (How do you translate a shot into words? Wrongly.) Within the shot time has moved back and forth over more than a hundred years and at the end the trace of the past evaporates. As for Bazin & realism...a (photographed but not an animated?) shot is an index of what is shot - hence its evidentiary use and its value for inferring truth from. Where there is such a cunning device there are functions aplenty so such a trait makes it great for telling lies as well. It is also as an index of the events shot that Bazin & Tarkovsky were particularly taken by film. T uses this to 'sculpt time'. Still, I would say that a cut need be no less conducive to realism than a continuous shot - expecially a blink-timed shot for a blinking viewer. Ross * * Film-Philosophy salon After hitting 'reply' please always delete the text of the message you are replying to. To leave, send the message: leave film-philosophy to: [log in to unmask] Or visit: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/film-philosophy.html For help email: [log in to unmask], not the salon. * Film-Philosophy journal: http://www.film-philosophy.com Contact: [log in to unmask] **