Perhaps, “Mission to Earth” is one of the boring films and I will watch again if I suffer from insomnia. Still, there are some interesting points worth discussing!
1) Using “Mission to Earth” as an example, note what is new or different about digital cinema compared to traditional filmmaking? Consider the story and appearance of the film.
A. The Story of the Film
If not Carol told us the narrative of the film, I am afraid I do not know what the film is talking about since there is no dialogue of the character and the action of the character does not that match to the voice over. The story is actually moved by the voice over. Although this kind of effect is greatly different from the commercial movie, the story line is still similar to the traditional one. The equilibrium 1, dis-equilibrium and new equilibrium can be still found in the narrative but it is not as obvious as the traditional one. The film has plot in the conventional sense of the word through the voice over.
However, when we compare the ‘Mission to Earth’ and ‘An Andalusian Dog’ which is directed by Luis Buñuel and artist Salvador Dalí, ‘Mission to Earth’ is absolutely more ‘realistic’ and easier to be understood.
The above discussion is mainly focused on the voice over, if we take away the voice over, the view will be totally different. Because the footages are selected from the database randomly, as mentioned before, it is driven by the voice over. Therefore, if the audience only watches the movie without the voice over, the narrative is discrete. The timeline will be disconnected and the footages become meaningless as well. Still, some people may think this kind of randomness implied the chapter selection of DVDs which can generalize as the ‘digital age’.
B. The Appearance of the Film
The arrangement of the composition of the film is quite different from the traditional film. For the traditional film, the split screen is usually used for indicating the sense of simultaneous[1]. However, the visible division of the screen in the ‘Mission to Earth’ does not aim at this goal. This kind of composition is a little bit distracting for me (the little screen is even moving around), my eyes are so busy and do not know which screen I should watch. Unlike the traditional one, the audience could not merely concentrate on the characters in the digital cinema. I am impressed the kaleidoscope-liked computer animation deeply and it is beautiful aesthecially. (But I do not know the exact connection between the film.)
2) What other art forms (eg film, digital art, painting, websites etc) does this film remind you of? Explain the similarity.
‘Mission to Earth’ makes me remind two artworks that are ‘Composition II in Red, Blue and Yellow’ by are Piet Mondrian in 1930 and ‘La jetée’ by Chris Maker in 1962.
For the ‘Composition II’, as the name shown, the composition of the film remind me this painting. Both of them have the patchwork style.
For the ‘La jetée’, this movie is composed by still images and voice over. The story is also driven by the voice over and there is no dialogue of the charater as well. Although the images are not selected randomly, the alienation effect achieved is similar to that of ‘Mission to Earth’. If I make a classification, I will put both film in the science-fiction genre because ‘Mission to Earth’ is about a woman from other planet whereas ‘La jetée’ is about a experiment in time travel. Finally, I think ‘La jetée’ and ‘Mission to Earth’ are similar to each other because their idea and concept are both creative and innovative.
 |
| Composition II in Red, Blue and Yellow’ by are Piet Mondrian |
Bibliography:
沒有留言:
張貼留言