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Oct. 3rd, 2012 10:40 amThis past week I finally watched Koyaanisqatsi in one sitting!!!
As I mentioned before, I'd already seen the vast majority of the movie. I've watched the first thirty minutes a few times, I've watched the excerpted traffic scenes on youtube, and a few other pieces. But I'd never sat through it all at once, because every time I tried I ended up drifting off into a reverie of imagination, so hopelessly distracted by tangents that I forgot there was a movie happening.
But I managed finally! Hulu helped- the commercials every ten or fifteen minutes were a bit annoying and disruptive, especially when they didn't come at a musical transition, but they also changed it from an immense and immersive musical/video object into something more digestible. Commercial breaks gave me a chance to mentally make sense of what I'd seen and prepare for the next segment. So maybe technically I didn't watch it in one sitting.
But I loved it, is what really matters. I loved it as a musical essay on technology and humanity. One of the coolest sensations in the early-going was as we got moving views of these amazing, vast natural vistas that didn't feature the tiniest evidence of life anywhere in them... and realizing that they were being filmed from helicopters or airplanes. I realized that these natural spaces were being delivered to me after intermediation by several machines, unseen and yet with fingerprints unmistakably apparent in the final product.
And yet it wasn't the intermediation that mattered. These machines weren't what was of interest. It was the brilliant composition of those shots, the decisions the filmmakers made about how to use their tools. It was the conversation between the audience and the filmmaker that had meaning, because only humans can impose meaning on a rock structure. And in the context of that metatheoric point made through the unseen but not undetected presence of Reggio's elaborate filmmaking apparatus, the film's later visuals hold a different meaning than the most obvious level.
Reggio again and again shows his fascination with explosions. Earlier on, it is the demolition of natural features- miners blasting, atom bombs in the desert. Later, it is buildings being demolished, shot with phenomenal clarity and composition. At first glance, one might be tempted to read some clear message about the destructive power of technology into this, but it's not where Koyaanisqatsi is going. Rather, the film is speaking about the destructive ability of humanity when using technology. Again and again we move from colossally scaled explosions and colossally scaled objects generally to the microscale of people walking, moving around, having feelings. Koyaanisqatsi is almost telling the same story as some Japanese mecha anime- tiny people amplified by their technology.
As I mentioned before, I'd already seen the vast majority of the movie. I've watched the first thirty minutes a few times, I've watched the excerpted traffic scenes on youtube, and a few other pieces. But I'd never sat through it all at once, because every time I tried I ended up drifting off into a reverie of imagination, so hopelessly distracted by tangents that I forgot there was a movie happening.
But I managed finally! Hulu helped- the commercials every ten or fifteen minutes were a bit annoying and disruptive, especially when they didn't come at a musical transition, but they also changed it from an immense and immersive musical/video object into something more digestible. Commercial breaks gave me a chance to mentally make sense of what I'd seen and prepare for the next segment. So maybe technically I didn't watch it in one sitting.
But I loved it, is what really matters. I loved it as a musical essay on technology and humanity. One of the coolest sensations in the early-going was as we got moving views of these amazing, vast natural vistas that didn't feature the tiniest evidence of life anywhere in them... and realizing that they were being filmed from helicopters or airplanes. I realized that these natural spaces were being delivered to me after intermediation by several machines, unseen and yet with fingerprints unmistakably apparent in the final product.
And yet it wasn't the intermediation that mattered. These machines weren't what was of interest. It was the brilliant composition of those shots, the decisions the filmmakers made about how to use their tools. It was the conversation between the audience and the filmmaker that had meaning, because only humans can impose meaning on a rock structure. And in the context of that metatheoric point made through the unseen but not undetected presence of Reggio's elaborate filmmaking apparatus, the film's later visuals hold a different meaning than the most obvious level.
Reggio again and again shows his fascination with explosions. Earlier on, it is the demolition of natural features- miners blasting, atom bombs in the desert. Later, it is buildings being demolished, shot with phenomenal clarity and composition. At first glance, one might be tempted to read some clear message about the destructive power of technology into this, but it's not where Koyaanisqatsi is going. Rather, the film is speaking about the destructive ability of humanity when using technology. Again and again we move from colossally scaled explosions and colossally scaled objects generally to the microscale of people walking, moving around, having feelings. Koyaanisqatsi is almost telling the same story as some Japanese mecha anime- tiny people amplified by their technology.