What can narratives, especially narrative movies, tell us or prove about reality? This is a complex question. Film is more of an emotional than a factual medium. Movies do not necessarily present a set of facts to be reckoned with. All they really do is give us hypothetical scenarios that must be independently verified for plausibility. A well-done ideological movie would be truer to life and not overplay its cards. Lastly, the excessive power of narrative has poisoned American politics.
Narrative, especially in movies, deals primarily with emotion and not facts. Movies are a medium of sympathy and especially empathy. These can be very powerful and positive. I believe the empathetic nature of the medium is a genuine good.
Movies are not a set of material facts to be reckoned with. Ultimately, any filmmaker can contrive any story where any worldview is true within his universe. This obviously does not necessarily make it so in real life. I have read movie reviews where the critic seems to be going out of their way to misinterpret a movie because it doesn't confirm their politics when all they really have to do is admit it's just a movie and say it's wrong. Who cares if it agrees with you?
What does a narrative film give us in regards to the truth? All a movie can really do is place ideas before our mind and get the wheels rolling. Movies can draw light to things we would have never looked at or thought about otherwise. Ultimately, though, a movie gives us a hypothetical scenario, even when based on a true story, and it is up to us, the audience, to independently verify it, either through research or our own reason, intuition and life experiences. A movie can help us to better picture a scenario, but we still must decide for ourselves the plausibility of the images before us.
As another note, I would say that narrative gives us truth in a much different way than non-fiction writing, such as the essays on this blog. Non-fiction writing at its highest form deals directly with truth in a very overt fashion and uses rhetoric and logic as well as possibly empirical evidence to lead to truth. Stories can attempt to say similar things, but they are more subtle, leaving the thesis in the subtext, not the forefront. They also demonstrate truth through action and not through argumentation or rhetoric. A college lecture on video would not traditionally be considered a movie.
What is the mark of a well-done ideological movie? French film theorist Andre Bazin praises the movie The Bicycle Thief, saying "events and people are never introduced in support of a social thesis-- but the thesis emerges fully armed and all the more irrefutable because it is presented as something thrown in into the bargain. It is our intelligence that discerns and shapes it, not the film." The more what we see on the screen conforms to reality, the stronger its truth. On the other hand, real life is not so obviously ideological. If it were, then society wouldn't have the myriad of endless debates that we do. The universe is mysterious. The more realistic a movie is, generally the less overtly ideological it is, so its hard to find the right balance for maximum persuasive effectiveness. An artist attempts to find the middle ground between vagueness and propaganda. Also, as mentioned above, narratives illustrate truth through action. When a movie tries too hard to overtly "say" something, it comes off as pretentious and preachy. My arguments, though, are arguably based on a relatively conscientious viewer that may be giving many people too much credit.
Narrative has poisoned American politics. It has replaced reason with emotion. Anecdote has usurped hard statistics because it is more "gripping." This is especially true in our current around-the-clock news media environment, where they are constantly looking for a breaking "story" and the lines between news and sensational entertainment are becoming increasingly blurred. Broad policies have been created in response to singular, anomalous events. One moving story can carry a disproportionate amount of weight despite hardly reflecting reality. Narratives and singular events can change our perception of an issue while doing little or nothing to actually change the issue itself. Emotion arguably has some place in politics, but a very limited place if any, and it doesn't prove anything material.
Narrative, especially in movies, deals primarily with emotion and not facts. Movies are a medium of sympathy and especially empathy. These can be very powerful and positive. I believe the empathetic nature of the medium is a genuine good.
Movies are not a set of material facts to be reckoned with. Ultimately, any filmmaker can contrive any story where any worldview is true within his universe. This obviously does not necessarily make it so in real life. I have read movie reviews where the critic seems to be going out of their way to misinterpret a movie because it doesn't confirm their politics when all they really have to do is admit it's just a movie and say it's wrong. Who cares if it agrees with you?
What does a narrative film give us in regards to the truth? All a movie can really do is place ideas before our mind and get the wheels rolling. Movies can draw light to things we would have never looked at or thought about otherwise. Ultimately, though, a movie gives us a hypothetical scenario, even when based on a true story, and it is up to us, the audience, to independently verify it, either through research or our own reason, intuition and life experiences. A movie can help us to better picture a scenario, but we still must decide for ourselves the plausibility of the images before us.
As another note, I would say that narrative gives us truth in a much different way than non-fiction writing, such as the essays on this blog. Non-fiction writing at its highest form deals directly with truth in a very overt fashion and uses rhetoric and logic as well as possibly empirical evidence to lead to truth. Stories can attempt to say similar things, but they are more subtle, leaving the thesis in the subtext, not the forefront. They also demonstrate truth through action and not through argumentation or rhetoric. A college lecture on video would not traditionally be considered a movie.
What is the mark of a well-done ideological movie? French film theorist Andre Bazin praises the movie The Bicycle Thief, saying "events and people are never introduced in support of a social thesis-- but the thesis emerges fully armed and all the more irrefutable because it is presented as something thrown in into the bargain. It is our intelligence that discerns and shapes it, not the film." The more what we see on the screen conforms to reality, the stronger its truth. On the other hand, real life is not so obviously ideological. If it were, then society wouldn't have the myriad of endless debates that we do. The universe is mysterious. The more realistic a movie is, generally the less overtly ideological it is, so its hard to find the right balance for maximum persuasive effectiveness. An artist attempts to find the middle ground between vagueness and propaganda. Also, as mentioned above, narratives illustrate truth through action. When a movie tries too hard to overtly "say" something, it comes off as pretentious and preachy. My arguments, though, are arguably based on a relatively conscientious viewer that may be giving many people too much credit.
events and
people are never introduced in support of a social thesis-- but the
thesis emerges fully armed and all the more irrefutable because it is
presented as something thrown in into the bargain. It is our
intelligence that discerns and shapes it, not the film." - See more at:
http://www.whatisgreatcinema.com/2012/09/book-review-what-is-cinema-volume-2.html#sthash.rluDZFvA.dpuf
events and
people are never introduced in support of a social thesis-- but the
thesis emerges fully armed and all the more irrefutable because it is
presented as something thrown in into the bargain. It is our
intelligence that discerns and shapes it, not the film." - See more at:
http://www.whatisgreatcinema.com/2012/09/book-review-what-is-cinema-volume-2.html#sthash.rluDZFvA.dpuf
events and
people are never introduced in support of a social thesis-- but the
thesis emerges fully armed and all the more irrefutable because it is
presented as something thrown in into the bargain. It is our
intelligence that discerns and shapes it, not the film." - See more at:
http://www.whatisgreatcinema.com/2012/09/book-review-what-is-cinema-volume-2.html#sthash.rluDZFvA.dpuf
Narrative has poisoned American politics. It has replaced reason with emotion. Anecdote has usurped hard statistics because it is more "gripping." This is especially true in our current around-the-clock news media environment, where they are constantly looking for a breaking "story" and the lines between news and sensational entertainment are becoming increasingly blurred. Broad policies have been created in response to singular, anomalous events. One moving story can carry a disproportionate amount of weight despite hardly reflecting reality. Narratives and singular events can change our perception of an issue while doing little or nothing to actually change the issue itself. Emotion arguably has some place in politics, but a very limited place if any, and it doesn't prove anything material.
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