I

viewer's own ability to fantasize. We have all read how children have substituted television programming and video games for make-believe situations of their own invention. With adults too, Negt and Kluge insist, fantasy creation is necessary for mental well-being. Playacting operates as "the organizer of mediation. It is the specific work process whereby libidinal structure, consciousness, and the outside world are connected with one another." 22 Seen in this light, personal daydreaming or fantasizing during or after a film is one means through which we help ourselves survive the daily grind and play out various scenarios for the future. Just as with children then, the products of the culture industry fill up the space that could be used for personal rejuvenation. Indeed, Negt and Kluge conclude, "the libidinal fantasies of human beings, their hopes, wishes, needs, are no longer set free, are no longer capable of developing themselves in accordance with random interests. . . ."23 The "better'' the film, the less chance there is that the viewer will daydream (hence the highly controlled, dynamically sustained, closed-end narratives which leave little room for personal intervention). From all of this, it can be inferred that entertainment is not a neutral arrangement. Like magnets, the commodified spectacles capture the gaze of spectators. For Hollywood certainly, a good film is one where all eyes are riveted on the screen at all times. And a good show is one which leaves the real world behind and makes reverie difficult for the audience. Like vacuums, the packages of the culture industry suck up leftover aspirations and desires. Like roller coasters, they exhaust the riders, dissipating their surplus energy. Through the years, generation after generation of filmmakers have made the trip to Hollywood with the idea of changing all of that. The system has defeated them all.24 Each time, the ideological premise at the core of entertainment prevented them from implementing story elements or techniques that could possibly awake defiant personal fantasies in viewers, possibly even usher in notions of social resistance.
V
In opposition to entertainment stands the work of art. It is not my intention here to recall the many interpretations that art has evoked through history. Let us just say that, regardless of whether the connection involves God, a Platonic world, nature, beauty, truth, a fierce geniality, or sublime emotions, art opens a space away from the ordinariness of daily life. The

 



Film Production Theory2000
Film Production Theory2000
ISBN: N/A
EAN: N/A
Year: 2004
Pages: 126

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