yesterday (Sat 30th march) i watched Alfred Hitchcocks 'The Birds' on reflection the film displayed many hidden meanings, that I have since followed up further by reading robin woods (Hitchcocks films revisited faber faber 1989) review on the film. my first thoughts was why the birds actually attacked people?? apperantly there is none, woods suggests (p153) that the film is insistent that either the birds cant be explained or that the explanation is unknown' and refers to the murder in Psycho it being of no dramatic, symbolic or thematic justification. The importance of the film then is quite simply the fragility of human relationships, that is between melanie (who spends the whole 3/4 days in the same clothes and heels...) and mitch, the mother (who seems possessive almost incestuous relationship with her son), mitches ex girlfriend (the school teacher who lives close by to stay near to mitch, because she still loves him) and cathy, mitches sister (who accepts melanie immediatly). What interests about this film is the dramatic landscape of Bodega Bay, the scretching of the car as melanie makes her journey from san fransico to see mitch, the comical close up that show the back view of the love birds (in a cage placed on passenger floor) moving side to side as the car moves quickly around bends. the close up shots of their faces as melanie looks at mitch and vica - versa (we are caught up in the act the camera seems to go directly from one to the other as they look straight out of the screen to us the spectator and beyound). there is a strange scene in which melanie stands over mitches mother whilst she picks up the broken crockery (after a bird attack in the house) the camera seems to stay there watching melanie watching the mother almost as if its forgotton to move away, the camera, or we are for that moment fixated with her stare, what was she thinking about? woods describes this as a (p163) resemblance between them (in the beginning of the chapter woods likens melanie to mitches mother in 30 yrs time) and states that 'the scene is the clearest possible visual communication of the unspoken questions'; 'has life any purpose?' for her for the mother...the film ends with i guess, no real ending, only open to questions to what happens next, the whole family leaves the house surrounded by birds who seem to let them through, thus signifying a sense of hope? woods describes the carrying of the lovebirds by cathy (out to the car) as a continuing act of faith, despite all that has happened, or a refusal to face reality, whatever the answer, Hitchcock leaves us to work it out ourselves...i believe their is a sequal to this film, but I think Id rather stay with this film where there is no ending only possibilities.
...and today Alfred Hitchcocks 'Rope' (1929). this film is of particular interest to me firstly I read that it was filmed using real time (wikipedia-realtime:For example, if a movie told in real-time is two hours long, then the plot of that movie covers two hours of fictional time) and being edited so as to appear as a single continuous shot through the use of long takes. The walls of the set were on rollers and could silently be moved out of the way to make way for the camera and then replaced when they were to come back into shot. Prop men constantly had to move the furniture and other props out of the way of the large Technicolor camera, and then ensure they were replaced in the correct location. A team of soundmen and camera operators kept the camera and microphones in constant motion, as the actors kept to a carefully choreographed set of cues. This relates clearly to bismuth 'the all seeing eye' in which as the camera rotated (360%) around the room, people came silently and at speed to remove the furniture, so by the end of the film there was nothing left for the viewer to see, all had been erased. watching the film I felt was like being at the theatre, that is, we only see the story being played from the outset in the confines of the living room. at the start of the film we see brandon and philip (the film is based on their earlier influences of looking to prove their superiority over intellectuals) thereby they murder david (a college friend) by strangluation using a rope. (at this point the blinds are closed), they are opened again once david is placed into a chest by which they have give a party and use the chest to entertain from. their guests are made up of davids girlfriend, his father, aunt and their old prep schoolmaster (james stewart). as the story infolds the backdrop (cyclorama) shows a brilliant skyline of the chrysler building, empire state building, apartments and chimney smoke. what is interesting is the light changing from day to night, (clearly links to warhols unedited 8hr film of the 'empire state building' where we see that transition of light to dark played in realtime) lights start to appear in building as it gets darker outside (very clever), the neon light in the next building comes on though a smaller window to the right side of the living room, you feel that the room is very exposed to the rest of the world due to the openness and transparency of the windows. brandon and philip are also a guess to whether the two are lovers, this becomes clearer when philip breaks down and brandon tells him that he is not his carer (not the right word) the two come clear on the murder when realised by stewart who opens up the chest to find davids body there, he fires a gunout of the window, we then hear sound of people, police sirens etc...on both realising their fate, brandon very calmly gets himself a drink and philip plays on the piano...
thinking in terms of how I want to display my work for the PP module and using influences of bismusth, (im thinking here of the text typing) and watching the hitchcocks films which have been revelant to research undertaken currently. I want to write my report using (realtime) text typing to show the 'openness' of writing a document, refers to gabriel orozco using openness in 'empty club' 1998, discussed in last posting. but also to show the process unfolding as I write up evidence of research made to todate...the key thing here is there no 'the end', I want to start with current research and then tranfer back to the beginning with the conclusion feeding back to now. Zizek (looking awry 1991 an introduction to jacques lacan through popoulation culture) chapter 4 'how the non-duped err' states by presenting events in a reverse way, from end to beginning is a version of fetishistic split, 'I know what will follow (because i know in advance the end of story) but i will still watch anyway) the reversal of temporal order (p70) is at every turning point things may have taken another direction. this is perhaps true of the creative process, that fact that we see always the final product (the end) thats it? in most cases (im referring here to education) if a creative process could be laid out in the same way a script is, would the viewer/participate learn from those turning points? the accidents, the incidents, and challenge it as the work is conceived and so on, furthermore taking it as a point of departure for own use?? this is what i want to attempt with the report in the last 6-8 months I have looked at warhol, hilary lloyd, pierre bismuth, john smith, hitchcock, gabriel orozco...all have had a huge influence on my research with some significant links thereby I will look to convey a 'unmediated (strange 2005 p124) translation of train of thought, a bluntness to reveal the process for what it really is'. I will also attempt to add sound as I write, i have made recordings of bismuth in conversation (BFI) hitchcocks 'the birds', 'rope', 'rear window' I also have conversations with SE and EL. im not sure if this will work and what I plan to test today when finished up here. I may look at using radio 4 as a background noise (with other noises that will no doubt come into play during the day/evening writeups) and as a method of recording of time, (radio 4 present time on a regular basis) the date I will record by means of a journalistc approach.
