Friday, April 01, 2011

The credo of Cinematic space and silence for video





Two very different videos; one a true event, the other fiction. but the cinematicness overlap.

Kubrick was the director par excellence and this sculpted this scene in camera (spatiality), sound, scene ( luminosity) subject combine to reach into that place where demons lurk - the sub conscious.

David Couzins, the train passenger who took this video from London Undergrounds 7/7 terrorist attack, couldn't have known, or perhaps he did, but what emerges from his camera is Kubriesque. 

I apologise of I have offended any Kubrik fans and I in no way seek to diminish the events of 911 by comparing it to a film.

But the point, whether by default or design is how the mesmeric effect of Couzin's video, the context, solemnity, are housed in the world of cinema ( spatial immersion).

Without denigrating the professional, if you were to emerge from a scene marked by tragedy, how forceful would be the need to speak over and to the camera. I figure I might be sorely driven to enunciate and capture the ambience. The two indeed might have worked, but......

Perhaps a mark of respect or the sheer ocassion in itself yielded what you see, but if anything this video and its psychosis points to something we could all pay attention to; the power of silence.

It is journalism, that can't be taught because it negates what we need to learn about providing information. Couzin's non-professional training, or not has produced something we return to in capturing the moment and not just physically.  And silence has a currency in other more recognisable areas.

A nod to videojournalismweb for sparking this post