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    Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....

    mdubuque Community Member

      Hello, now it's on to the director's cut to explain why the jump cut and a few instances of letterboxing actually support the narrative of exponentially increasing information overloads (Kurzweil's singularity).

       

      This version is far better than the assembly edit previously posted here.

       

      I look forward to your thoughts about what the WORST thing about this short 10 minute film is.

       

      That seems to be the quickest path to learning how to learn how to improve.

       

      http://www.youtube.com/user/Plant100Trees?feature=mhum

       

      Here is the "Netflix sleeve" description of the film:

       

      In "The Singularity is Near" Raymond Kurzweil celebrates the EXPONENTIAL acceleration of human experience.


      By dramatic contrast, Mahatma Gandhi once said that there is more to life than merely increasing its speed.


      Expanding upon that theme of collapsing time horizons, one rapper recently asked, "In this age of Twitter Twitter, no one has time for sound bites any more. What comes after Twitter?"


      This musical documentary explores the EXPONENTIAL acceleration of our experience and one possible way to change the meaning of time and the timing of our meaning through the creation of beauty.


      Matt

        • 1. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
          JSS1138 CommunityMVP

          The first thing that jumps out at me is that if you have to tell the audience ahead of time why something you did makes sense, then you didn't do it well enough to actually make sense.  One caveat on that comment later.

           

          I notice the opening music and visuals remain unchanged.  I just couldn't sit through that again, so I got out about 20 seconds in.

           

          So here's my caveat.  I never actually got to the part with the letterboxing and the jump cut (now that right there says something), so I can't comment on just how well it was done.  But the warning ahead of time, however humorous it was, makes me wonder why you had to say that up front.  The only reason I can think of is that it really doesn't make sense when you watch it.

          • 2. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
            shooternz Community Member

            This musical documentary explores the EXPONENTIAL acceleration of our experience and one possible way to change the meaning of time and the timing of our meaning through the creation of beauty.

             

             

            Singularly unfathomable to me ...but it sure did make time go very slowly.

             

            Sorry.

            • 3. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
              mdubuque Community Member

              Hi Jim,

               

              Re: the letterboxing proviso.....

               

              Here was my thinking, FWIW, which could be a mistake.

               

              I must note that the MOST helpful way for me to proceed lately is to ask people what the WORST part of the film is and that surely helps me improve my work.

               

              So thank you!

               

              This is my first film and the jury for the festival, which includes an Oscar winner for best cinematographer and another multiple Oscar nominee seemed to me bound to notice the letterboxing later in the film, which does stand out like a hammered thumb.

               

              My thinking was that if Kubrick had included letterboxing in one of his later films, other critics would have given it great significance.

               

              But coming from a first time filmmaker, I thought it could very well insult and offend serious professionals, along with the hard drastic jump cut to fog at 3:03.  In a very real sense, both look amateurish.

               

              But the film is about the EXPONENTIAL acceleration of time referred to in The Singularity is Near by Ray Kurzweil, an NYT bestseller about the collapse of attention spans and the like.  That book discusses how just five short years ago, we used to think sound bites were really fast and a shorthand manner of communicating.

               

              But now, nobody, in this age of Twitter Twitter, has time for sound bites anymore.

               

              Indeed, I'm convinced that our  upcoming Presidential campaign will be HEAVILY influenced on key Tweets at important times that major candidates make.

              THAT will be the focus of endless media gibberish spewing over the networks, the same trend we saw in Natural Born Killers and the OJ Simpson case, Michael Jackson and the deification of trivia over competence.

               

              So that's what the film is about.

               

              It addresses this EXPONENTIAL acceleration of time, where EVERYTHING in society speeds up and meaning is corrupted by trivia.

               

              A big part of the problem comes from the continual communication via text based forms, such as Twitter and emails, very narrow channels indeed.  So much subtlety and nuance and gesture is lost when communicating through these little straws.

               

              After that, still images have a little more bandwidth and finally film. 

               

              BUT ALL THREE (text, photos and film) are derivative, proxy ways of experiencing the world, divorced from the reality of making friends, making love, having a garden, a walk in the woods, a nice dinner, etc.  Being with people, being with nature and the like.

               

              So even though the viewer is in a film space watching my film, I want to emphasize that the medium IS the message.

               

              The fourth wall as it were.

               

              So although film is more descriptive than letterboxed still fotos, which are themselves nested in a broader bandwidth than text messages, it is still false and more susceptible to EXPONENTIAL acceleration of experience through the film editing process.

               

              I'm not convinced these subjects are trivial and unimportant.  Even Sarah Palin's supporters long for a leader with lots of "common sense".  The EXPONENTIAL acceleration of experience can lead to prompt, hasty and poorly thought out decisions which are not necessarily beneficial for our grandchildren.  The recent financial collapse is just one case in point, where the gains from short term subprime loans were allowed to dominate our financial system through derivative instruments and massive securitization, to the long term detriment of us all.

               

              So I decided rather than getting knocked out of the box in the beginning because of offending serious people whom I respect deeply, I wanted to acknowledge their craft and art and tell them in advance that my "crimes" of letterboxing and a harsh jump cut at 3:01 were not pure acts of someone who doesn't care or had no serious intent to learn the history of the medium.

               

              Hence the judgment call to put this advisory in at the beginning.  I wanted to make the first cut so that my film would be shown at the festival.

               

              Was it a mistake?

               

              Perhaps. 

               

              People like yourself make a pretty decent case that it was.

               

              And I appreciate that!

               

              Matt Dubuque

              • 4. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                mdubuque Community Member

                Hi Shooternz, the EXPONENTIAL acceleration of experience refers to, for example, Alice in Wonderland saying you have to run twice as fast, just to stay in the same place.

                 

                Ever more spam, tweets, email messages, inboxes exploding in size, can you finish this project YESTERDAY please, the client has big money, increasing at an ever faster rate, where squaring your rate of speed just won't cut it buddy, way too slow, whoa, drop what you're doing, got another interruption for you, hope you don't mind, wait a minute I changed my mind kind of life we are being asked to celebrate, without reservation.

                 

                I object to that.

                 

                hence the film

                 

                Matt

                PS: Thanks for your help in producing this interminably slow project!  He he.

                • 5. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                  mdubuque Community Member

                  And one way to short circuit all that bs is to have a child, plant a tree, play some music, etc., getting away from text feeds, emails and the great idiot box in the sky.

                   

                  Matt

                  • 6. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                    JSS1138 CommunityMVP
                    I thought it could very well insult and offend serious professionals, along with the hard drastic jump cut to fog at 3:03.  In a very real sense, both look amateurish.

                     

                    Done well, the viewer (especially the informed viewer) will get why it was done, no explanation necessary.  Work towards that end.

                    • 7. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                      mdubuque Community Member

                      Thanks, well said!

                       

                      Matt

                      • 8. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                        mdubuque Community Member

                        @Jim, I did actually change the opening textual sequence by adding subtitles to the final half of it, which I think was an improvement.

                         

                         

                        Matt

                        • 9. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                          JSS1138 CommunityMVP

                          For me, the opening just dies because of the music.  It goes nowhere, and takes forever to get there.  And of course, you try and add enough video to fill that 2 minutes of nowhere.

                           

                          Lose the music.  Shorten the opening segment to less than 30 seconds.

                          • 10. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                            mdubuque Community Member

                            Very well said.  It takes forever to go nowhere!

                             

                            The film is about slowing down.  And I was schooled on Ozu (who won more Best Film awards in Japan than Kurosawa) and the Oriental style of narrative.

                             

                            If you'd grace me with a comment on the following observation of Brian Eno in his liner notes to Thursday Afternoon, I'd appreciate it.

                             

                            These pieces represent a response to what is presently the most interesting challenge of video: how does one make something that can be seen again and again in the way that a gramophone record can be listened to repeatedly? I feel that video makers have generally addressed this issue with very little success: their work has been conceived within the aesthetic frame of cinema and television (an aesthetic that presupposes a very limited number of viewings) but then packaged and presented in a format that clearly intends multiple viewings, the tape or disc ... Unfortunately, the cinematic heritage seems inimical to the idea of multiple-view video tapes or discs. It relies heavily for its impact on a dramatic momentum which is sustained by frequent scene changes, fast editing and the narrative development of the plot. As a result, being in some way a function of surprise, this impact is eroded by repeated viewings. The usual response to this problem has been to load the video with more scene-changes, faster edits, stranger camera angles and more exotic special effects, in short, more surprises - presumably, in the hope of delaying the inevitable decline in interest in the work as it becomes more familiar. This is the condition of pop-video, and it has almost nowhere left to go in this direction.

                             

                            So long as video is regarded only as an extension of film or television, increasing hysteria and exoticism is its most likely future. Our background as television viewers has conditioned us to expect that things on screens change dramatically and in a significant temporal sequence, and has therefore reinforced a rigid relationship between viewer and screen - you sit still and it moves.

                             

                             

                            I am interested in a type of work which does not necessarily suggest this relationship: a more steady-state image-based work which one can look at and walk away from as one would a painting: it sits still and you move.

                             

                            Matt

                            • 11. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                              mdubuque Community Member

                              @Jim, I wanted to share with you a short anecdote.  I posted my film on Facebook and today a cyber friend posted it on HER face book page, which is fine and a compliment.

                               

                              So I thanked her and she posted this:

                               

                              "I have never seen anything so tender and inspiring. Loved this."

                               

                              I've never met this person and we have barely corresponded.  We met on a BBC website and have become facebook "friends".

                               

                              But it does go to show that it can be difficult to predict how people will react to your work, as I am learning.

                               

                              At any rate, I wanted to share that.  Kind of a diversity of opinion type thing.

                               

                              Matt

                              • 12. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                mdubuque Community Member

                                The clock of the long now in Fort Mason, California, cited at the end of the film, is the world's slowest computer.

                                 

                                It ticks once a day, chimes once a century and once every thousand years the cuckoo comes out to announce the arrival of a glorious new millenium.

                                 

                                Watching it, like watching the first two minutes of my film, can be described by some as "boring" and "slow".

                                 

                                But not necessarily a complete waste of time.  Views vary on that.

                                 

                                The subject matter of each is that there are hidden costs associated with complete immersion in the EXPONENTIALLY accelerating time frames caused by the uncritical worship of text based processing systems such as email, message boards and Twitter.

                                 

                                Matt

                                • 13. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                  JSS1138 CommunityMVP

                                  If you'd grace me with a comment on the following observation of Brian Eno in his liner notes to Thursday Afternoon, I'd appreciate it.

                                   

                                  I get what he's talking about.  I've seen the editing style of certain pieces change with the advent of MTV and the music video.  It's a style I don't appreciate very much.  I'd like to have more than 4 or 5 frames to look at before you cut to another scene also lasting only 4 or 5 frames.  This is even more true when talking about certain music videos.  Shania Twain for example.  Her last CD came with both a country version and a pop version of the songs.  Her videos, as well, were editing for both audiences.  While I preferred the pop version of the songs, I definitely preferred the edited pace of the country versions, whose audience isn't generally hopped up on Ritalin.  Shania is such an incredibly beautiful woman, I actually want to see her in the video, not just catch a glimpse of her.

                                   

                                  The second in the Bourne franchise is another example.  The editing was so quick during the action scenes, the viewer just couldn't 'see' what was going on, couldn't follow along with the story.  At the end of the scene, the bad guy is dead and Jason alive, but we have no idea what the hell just happened!  (I blame Paul Greengrass for this.  Doug Liman should have stayed on as director for all three films.  He would have done an infinitely better job.)

                                   

                                  I was watching a short interview with the late John Ford talking about "The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance".  Mr. Ford explained his style of getting only what he needs, rather than an overabundance of coverage that can sometimes overwhelm editors with too much choice.  I agree with him.

                                   

                                  Having said that, there is a large difference between slowing down the pace and stopping it entirely.  Even a tortoise will eventually end up somewhere.  (Of course, no one will want to watch - or listen - to every step he takes.  Cut to the chase already...)

                                  • 14. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                    JSS1138 CommunityMVP
                                    Watching it, like watching the first two minutes of my film, can be described by some as "boring" and "slow".

                                     

                                    Well, there the rub.  I never got past the first two minutes.  (And that's coming from someone who prefers the slower editing pace of classic cinema.)

                                    • 15. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                      mdubuque Community Member

                                      Thanks Jim, points very well stated!

                                       

                                      So THAT'S why I preferred the first Bourne film to all the others, and decisively so.

                                       

                                      Now that you frame it that way, your stated reason is the EXACT reason why the first one was so much better in my eyes.


                                      And your points about the pace of music editing in general and Shania Twain in particular are also very well put.

                                       

                                      And yet on the other hand, we have that 1920s masterpiece by Vertov, The Man With a Movie Camera with over 1000 scenes, a few of them only one frame long.  I very much treasure that film.

                                       

                                      One thing I like very much about that film was the syncopation of the edits, especially if you watch it accompanied by Vertov's immaculate original score for that film, which is now available.

                                       

                                      Another great for syncopation of the edits is James Longley and Iraq in Fragments.  James scores his own films and this helps.

                                       

                                      As a percussionist, I am pleased that I also syncopated some of my edits in Twitter Time, especially in the second segment.  This is not typical and I was pleased I was able to accomplish it in my first film.  It's an editing technique that deserves more development, in my view.  The syncopated rhythm of the cuts.

                                       

                                      I believe it was Hitchcock who asserted that the length of screen time for a given shot in a film indicates the importance of the subject matter.

                                       

                                      My personal view is that the EXPONENTIAL acceleration of human experience provoked by technological gadgets is an important subject.  I'm convinced it has some role to play as to why most Americans don't recall basic facts of history very long and have collapsed attention spans.

                                       

                                      By contrast, the Chinese, with hundred year plans and the like, do seem to be succeeding in many arenas.  I believe their longer time horizons play a non-trivial role in their success.

                                       

                                      The text messages in the beginning of Twitter Time are framed within that longer time horizon.  I realize it is a contradiction of sorts.  But in my view, these are important concepts and I do want to be disruptive to some extent.

                                       

                                      But there IS an intentional contradiction here.  I have nested the entire film within a 7 minute "short film" frame.  As such, while to some the initial 2 minutes may seem interminably long, I did so because I felt the message was important and wanted to disrupt the accelerated perceptual frames people bring to the theatre AND I also contradicted that message by making it a short film, rather than an extended rant about the problem.

                                       

                                      So my hope was that the viewer would wrestle with this contradiction; thinking they had been clever in choosing to ONLY watch a short film and thus "saving" time while being "trapped" in a two minute Orwellian sequence that commands them to do a certain thing, in a fascist way so central to text-based IBM HAL type frameworks.  (except I chose my font from The Prisoner to undermine this message from within).

                                       

                                      The idea being that through this process of cognitive dissonance, the viewer would arrive at embrace a new synthesis of understanding the textual material, while being subliminally prepared for the dream sequence about reality which constitutes the second segment of this very, very, some say interminably long, seven minute short film about the beneficial manipulation of temporal frameworks.

                                      • 16. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                        mdubuque Community Member

                                        ShooterNZ, you stated that my Netflix sleeve language was unfathomable. Here is what I was thinking when I wrote it.

                                        As our reliance on email and twitter and text based messaging increases at a faster and faster rate, it collapes our attention spans and disrupts long term thinking and planning.

                                         

                                        Specifically it disrupts the "meaning of time" insofar as what was previously trivial (short time intervals such as microseconds) now become interminable waits. No longer do we have Presidential debates where Lincoln spoke without notes for 90 minutes followed by Douglas speaking without notes for 90 minutes, followed by 45 minute uninterrupted rebuttals for each.

                                        We have lost our respect for long term planning. The 20th century is now in the "distant past". Who remembers it?  That was 300 web years ago.

                                         

                                        Similarly, the "timing of our meaning" has been disrupted by Twitter Time. We now decide within 30 seconds whether a film is worth watching. Our "thumbs up, thumbs down" type decisions must be instantenous in an accelerating world.

                                        However, nature encodes her beauty on larger time scales than nanoseconds alone. The still photographs of the trees in the film were taken one full year after I first planted them. My wife is still incredibly beautiful after 10 years of marriage, etc.


                                        Longer time frames can provide richer meaning. Hence Twitter Time has disrupted the "TIMING" of our "MEANING".

                                         

                                        HTH (I didn't have time to write "hope this helps".)

                                         

                                        IMHO

                                         

                                        : < )

                                         

                                        FWIW

                                         

                                        Matt

                                        • 17. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                          JSS1138 CommunityMVP
                                          while to some the initial 2 minutes may seem interminably long, I did so because I felt the message was important and wanted to disrupt the accelerated perceptual frames people bring to the theatre AND I also contradicted that message by making it a short film, rather than an extended rant about the problem.

                                           

                                          I get the idea.  But it only succeeds if the viewer makes it past that initial two minutes.

                                           

                                          I did not.

                                          • 18. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                            JSS1138 CommunityMVP

                                             

                                            We now decide within 30 seconds whether a film is worth watching.

                                             

                                            I actually think that's always been true.  Most consumers of media, be it a book, a movie, a TV show or a song, can tell fairly quickly if the piece has captured their interest.  (Or at least, if there is some hint that it might do so soon.)  Teachers of storytelling, whatever the medium, have been stressing the point of capturing the consumer's attention as quickly as possible for a very long time.

                                             

                                            Just look at some of Dicken's opening lines.  (Of course, he spoils it by continuing to blather on and on and on and on and on once he has captured your attention.)

                                            • 19. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                              mdubuque Community Member

                                              Sure, this is the basis of constructivism in both film and literature.

                                               

                                              Nobel Laureate Gabriel Garcia Marquez always asserted that the first line of his novels was by far the most important and that indeed, his work was no different than carpentry.

                                               

                                              For example, we have the opening line of One Hundred Years of Solitude:

                                               

                                              "As Colonel Buendia stood before the firing squad, he recalled the first time his father took him to see ice."  (paraphrased from my memory).

                                               

                                              Much of the work of Dickens is best viewed through the prism that it was often serialized weekly and monthly in British magazines.  David Copperfield is the prime example of that.  Therefore each chapter tends to resemble a daily episode of a novella or soap opera than traditional Western narrative structures.

                                               

                                              All this of course assumes the supremacy of Western frameworks of narration, plot, tension, character development and the like.

                                               

                                              If you bring that framework to the films of Yasujiro Ozu, who has won more "Best Film" awards in Japan than Kurosawa, you will NEVER understand what he is trying to say.

                                               

                                              Westerners continually assert "nothing ever happens" in an Ozu film.  Ozu always insisted that his films must have "no drama" in them.

                                               

                                              That's precisely the point.  There is no beginning.  There is no tension.  There is no end.

                                               

                                              Because punctuation is an artifact of consciousness, and consciousness is but a tiny subset of your total experience, which is a miniscule portion of the entire world.

                                               

                                              That is the point of Buddhism after all.

                                               

                                              But BY NO MEANS are his films random, any more than an enormous mandala painted in sand by 50 monks and subsequently obliterated by the Zen master is a pointless exercise.


                                              For example, his masterpiece Autumn Afternoon, is about the color red and where it appears in the frame throughout the film. Ebert called it one of his favorite films, the kind you can watch over and over again.

                                               

                                              http://movies.netflix.com/Movie/An-Autumn-Afternoon/70104401?trkid=1660#height2027

                                               

                                              Today an experienced filmmaker who has won several "best film" awards at various festivals for her most recent film, commented that:

                                               

                                              "I finally got a chance to see your movie... it is wonderful....Really... very sweet film, the timing is beautiful and deeply thoughtful."

                                               

                                              So professional filmgoers and filmmakers can reasonably disagree as to whether my film is worth watching, and state their views in wonderfully informed ways.

                                               

                                              This is why I sincerely thank you for taking the time to discuss my small film and look forward to learning from your art and work, should you ever find that appropriate.

                                               

                                              Matt

                                              • 20. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                mdubuque Community Member

                                                Indeed, the plot of my film is that the limitations of a black and white text based Twitter world is demonstrated, followed by green with a little gold (the Buddhas) and orange encountering another green, then some blue and yellow and finally meeting up with a broad palette of colors.

                                                 

                                                The film then resolves itself in a colored textual space, undermining the narrow, original black and white textual framework.

                                                 

                                                Matt

                                                • 21. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                  JSS1138 CommunityMVP

                                                  All this of course assumes the supremacy of Western frameworks of narration, plot, tension, character development and the like.

                                                   

                                                  As a student (and fan) of Aristotle's Poetics, I must confess such as assumption.

                                                  • 22. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                    mdubuque Community Member

                                                    Absolutely, and Greek tragedies are the apotheosis of that school.  It's been downhill ever since.

                                                     

                                                    But, as Deng Xiao Peng pointed out, "the French Revolution was an experiment" and 5000 years of Oriental culture is nested within an entirely different framework, with different goals other than narrative development and dynamic tension.  Chinese opera is a case in point.

                                                     

                                                    Yasujiro Ozu was the fellow who kicked open the door for me, so that now I truly understand that there IS a coherent and profound alternative to that Greek structure and its associated Roman proscenium frameworks that constitute narrative form in Westerm classical art and the Orthodoxy that was absolute in Western film schools until 10 short years ago.

                                                     

                                                    But Buddhism, with its emphasis on codependent origination rather than blind adherence to the subject/object, figure/ground distinctions, is fundamentally different from this perceptual frame in every major way; Kurosawa explored it most deeply in his classic Noh sequences, but a pale shadow of Ozu's treatment of the religious nature of Noh theatre.

                                                     

                                                    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noh

                                                     

                                                    It was film scholar Daniel Bordwell, whose classic film school textbook "Film Art" that is now in its 9th edition who first brought Ozu to a broader Western audience, followed by Ebert.

                                                     

                                                    And it was only upon seeing the extremely tight, formalistic calligraphic style of his film, coupled with a complete absence of narrative structure that I began to "grok" this coherent alternative to classical forms.

                                                     

                                                    Ozu was a consummate perfectionist.  He insisted that none other than Setsuko Hara, one of the most refined and disciplined Japanese actresses in history, perform over 60 takes on one short scene in Late Spring where she draws a tea cup to her mouth.

                                                     

                                                    When later asked why there so many takes required for such a "simple" shot performed by this great actress, he responded by saying that only on the 60th take did she finally understand HOW to lift the cup to her lips.

                                                     

                                                    His movies are a profound alternative to temporal frameworks and "plot tension" that Western viewers hold so dear.  Kurosawa was always in Ozu's shadow and he admitted as much.  In a sense, Kurosawa responded within his samurai family tradition to the shadow of Ozu by focusing far more on the Tokugawa era than the trendy Mejii restoration, as his American audiences thought he was doing.

                                                     

                                                    And Ozu's immanent (NOT transcendental) motif also informs my film and my pacing. 

                                                     

                                                    If I could be so bold, I would hope that it informs my film in a non-trivial manner.

                                                     

                                                    I recommend you view any of Ozu's films except Tokyo Story.

                                                     

                                                    But that of course is up to you.

                                                     

                                                    Matt

                                                    • 23. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                      JSS1138 CommunityMVP

                                                      Maybe someday.  I still haven't gotten around to seeing Seven Samurai yet.

                                                      • 24. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                        mdubuque Community Member

                                                        Neither have I.  I have seen 16 different Kurosawa films, three times each, but have scrupulously avoided seeing that one to avoid falling into the common Mejii-centric analytical traps of Westerners and, instead, immersed myself rather deeply in a very broad cross section of his entire opus.

                                                         

                                                        I shall see it some day.

                                                         

                                                        In the meantime, here is a 3-minute clip from Ozu's masterpiece Late Spring, starring the immortal Chishu Ryu.  It concludes that magnificent movie starring Setsuko Hara, the Audrey Hepburn of Japanese cinema.  It describes how Chishu Ryu felt when Setsuko Hara, his beautiful daughter, finally decided to leave the house and become married.

                                                         

                                                        http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HdSp5kP8Edg

                                                         

                                                        Several prominent people have called it one of the most beautiful pieces of cinema ever filmed.

                                                         

                                                        If you don't have time to watch the entire clip, you might take a moment just to read a few of the comments.

                                                         

                                                        Films that matter.

                                                         

                                                        Matt

                                                        • 25. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                          Community Member

                                                          Matt,

                                                          ---------------

                                                          Indeed, the plot of my film is  that the limitations of a black and white text based Twitter world is  demonstrated, followed by green with a little gold (the Buddhas) and  orange encountering another green, then some blue and yellow and finally  meeting up with a broad palette of colors.

                                                           

                                                          The film then  resolves itself in a colored textual space, undermining the narrow,  original black and white textual framework.

                                                          -----------------

                                                          It might be interesting to note ....if a thing can be expressed another way, better than the way it has been, then it is best to express it that way.

                                                          For example...I feel a certain way, and decide to express that in song. I discover later that it is better expressed as dance... it is my obligation to recognize the song didn't work as well as the dance. So, I now have a dance instead of a song.

                                                          If I decide to express the way I feel as a painting, and discover it's better as an opera....  once again I'm obligated to chuck out the painting and do the opera.

                                                          Successful examples of this are known to you. The "Pieta" , by Michelangelo couldn't possibly be "expressed" a better way than the art itself.  You have to actually see it in what we call " real life " to know this is true.  Photos don't do it.  There are a number of things that take our breath away when we experience them, which is often a sign we are experiencing something that cannot be expressed better as some other media or object or melody or whatever.

                                                           

                                                          That said, and if it's agreed that there is truth to this, it may be worth your while to consider "writing" about what your movie is about and what it is doing.... and if the writing expresses your intent, emotion, feeling, thoughts, desires ....better than the movie.... chuck out the movie and do the writing.

                                                           

                                                          I'm not saying this is in fact what should be done.  But you should be aware of it, aware of the choices you have.  Maybe dance would be better to describe ( express ) what you want expressed.

                                                           

                                                          This now leads me to consider another facet of the thread here.  You may be asking about what could be done to the "editing" process to improve your movie. Or you could be asking about the content and overall message of the movie ( the story, characters, plots, etc ).

                                                          As for the latter, I find that impossible because of all the decidedly un-Western ( un-Ancient Greece ) leanings regarding basic structure and intent.  If it's not comedy or tragedy ...or a mix of those... I'm at a loss to be any use as a critic.

                                                          As for the former ( editing changes or additions or suggestions ) I do have a suggestion....but it has to do with content you might not have shot.

                                                          Why not juxtapose footage of the fast paced world of daily life with the tree planting that exemplifies the slowing of that world to a more meaningful appreciation of life ( at least when there's time to do that particular action ).  So I imagine slightly speeded up ( undercranked ) footage of city streets teeming with traffic and crowds and the hands of a clock racing around the face, stock ticker tapes racing across some marque, planes taking off and landing at a frantic pace at the airport... and then trees.

                                                           

                                                          In other words, say with images what your words said, and speak to the visual memory of your audience and let them make their own "connections" through the juxtapositions.  Subtle might be better than bashing them over the head with the obvious...but that's a matter of pacing and how you deal with the lengths of clips etc etc.  I find that when someone bashes me over the head with something obvious it makes me angry.

                                                           

                                                          Or write an essay is another suggestion... but write your own and don't drag a lot of people into it ( quotes from others you admire etc ).  Your work is yours... and influence and heros are nice, but let your work stand on its own merit first....  then say " thanks" to your mentors and influences.

                                                           

                                                           

                                                           

                                                          ps. If I presume you do think about the choices you have, I hope you don't forget that a movie can express for you what you want to say even if this particular time is not the solution. In other words, there is no failure in expressing things well in some form, and use all the forms at your disposal as well as you can to keep doing that...  If my photo of something says something better than my painting, I don't give up painting.... I just have choices to make.

                                                          • 26. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                            Community Member

                                                            Having spent a few more minutes thinking about your movie and what I wrote above....I have to admit that I think its your use of words in the beginning that led me to feel a certain way about the movie.

                                                             

                                                            You have a love for words and use them well to express yourself. I don't think words that are animated with motion on screen really constitute the same thing as images shot with a motion camera.  Not the same sort of element.  Animated words are, to me, still words.

                                                             

                                                            These words, for example, are beautiful....how they are lined up and what they mean.

                                                            -----------

                                                            It sails me on the ocean.  Carry warm  singing blue.

                                                            -----------------------

                                                             

                                                            So you see, you have choices re: movies with images (and sound) and text with words....I'm not sure the words in a movie don't imply a love for the message of words in their own right , rather than being some visual element that impresses me with font, design, shape etc.  Unlike notes that might implicate a cadence or rythm akin to a pentameter, words tend to stay words for me.

                                                             

                                                            Andy Warhol did a movie starring the shadow of the Empire State Building. It's a little like watching paint dry, watching that movie. I would rather have a sharp stick in my eye than take a date to that movie.

                                                             

                                                            ART movies do tend to drift in all sorts of unorthodox ways, but it's usually a mistake to justify one that isn't expressing its unorthodox message by its own existence.

                                                            • 27. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                              joe bloe premiere Community Member

                                                              A thoughtful and constructive critique.
                                                              Bravo!

                                                              • 28. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                                JSS1138 CommunityMVP
                                                                If you don't have time to watch the entire clip

                                                                 

                                                                Time is the lesser issue.  Interest is the primary.  The clip help my interest.

                                                                • 29. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                                  mdubuque Community Member

                                                                  Robodog, I really can't say it any better than joebloepremiere.

                                                                   

                                                                  Thanks for taking the time for such a thoughtful and constructive critique!

                                                                   

                                                                  Sincerely,

                                                                   

                                                                  Matt

                                                                  • 30. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                                    mdubuque Community Member

                                                                    @Jim, cool, glad to hear it.  Some real nice stuff there.  The guy knows how to frame an image, to a dazzling degree.   For his last 40 movies, Ozu's camera was always at knee height, like a child.

                                                                     

                                                                    Matt

                                                                    • 31. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                                      mdubuque Community Member

                                                                      I think one of my favorite things about Robodog's comments was his suggestion to intercut the images of tree planting with the images of those living on Twitter Time.  I like that a lot.

                                                                       

                                                                      I guess my overarching frame and goal of the project was to create a film with two different parts, representing two different worlds and two different approaches to life.

                                                                       

                                                                      And this helped cause me to not intercut footage of urban life with tree planting footage.

                                                                       

                                                                      The way Robodog frames it however, substantially increases its appeal.

                                                                       

                                                                      The first part of the film, the Orwellian segment, was specifically designed by me to promote and provoke discomfort in the viewer, to inspire a sense of unease and alienation.  During that segment, the only relief found was present in the black, the freedom from the incessant, limited, one way communication of television, the large screen in Apple's original 1984 Super Bowl Macintosh ad http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYecfV3ubP8  .

                                                                       

                                                                      I wanted this film to throw a small sledgehammer between the millions of people glued to their text messaging devices, oblivious to its inherently flawed structure and design, lacking in reality, in wisdom, in grace, as we hurtle towards extinction while being supremely entertained by tiny, trivial screens.

                                                                       

                                                                      I didn't want it to be as disruptive as Bunuel's Age of Gold, which caused widespread rioting and thousands of people storming out of the theatre, but I definitely wanted to acknowledge my displeasure with the current state of affairs, just as Bunuel brought to the fore the profoundly fascist tendencies of the Spanish Catholic church that was STILL carrying on its Inquisition, and more so after Franco, in that film.

                                                                       

                                                                      This is why I rejected interspersing the textual first part of the film with what I believe to be somewhat habitual and well understood techniques of showing accelerating time through Koyanasaatsqui type imagery progressions.  That approach seemed, not to be insulting, a bit overused, hackneyed and stereotypical.

                                                                       

                                                                      My first pass at the first segment was to just do text only, no music, then the music follows in the second half.

                                                                       

                                                                      I could not personally find a more effective way to communicate the fascist nature of our current media environment (always portrayed as "freedom" and "liberating") than through forcing people to sit through something that was uncomfortable.

                                                                       

                                                                      Over 40% of all boys between the ages of 17-27 in South Florida are functionally sterile.  They can't father a child, according to the peer reviewed literature, because of various phthlates and toxins in their system.  I find this alarming.  What better hot bed of male virility should there be than young studs in South Florida?

                                                                       

                                                                      This is one of seven or eight extreme warning signs that human extinction is a very real possibility, if you know and understand the medical literature.

                                                                       

                                                                      Living in a world full of emails, texting, Twitter and text based systems generally is a very narrow straw, narrower than still images and narrower still than cinema and THAT is a tiny subset of the natural and green world that contains vital information about how we are to survive as a species and flourish as individual, smart, happy and sexy people.

                                                                       

                                                                      Because I am very much an adherent of Marshall McLuhan's "The medium IS the message" conceptual framework, I wanted to use that text based framework in such a way as to communicate its inherent limitations.

                                                                       

                                                                      I chose the music to accentuate this, after that fact.

                                                                       

                                                                      The music is fast, dynamic, lots of drums and percussion and drama and DOESN'T GO ANYWHERE, as was so superbly put by Jim, as I recall, in this thread.

                                                                       

                                                                      And that's exactly what text based systems such as email, twitter, message boards and the like have to offer.  Blind alleys that lead us nowhere and take us from the natural world full of greater and grander connections across color, melody, space, beauty and description.  But they SEEM important and urgent at the time we are swimming in that shallow pond.

                                                                       

                                                                      Then I wanted to immerse the viewer in black and hit them with beautiful green fields in HD and earth tones thereafter, in stark and natural contrast to what went before.

                                                                       

                                                                      There does seem to be a clear consensus here that the text based initial portion of the film is clearly the weakest part of the film.

                                                                       

                                                                      I could clearly make it much shorter or eliminate it entirely, but I do have a belief that a dramatic contrast between immersion in eternal trivia and drivel in a text based world and a beautiful, colorful life that is more careful and contemplative in order to get more chicks and breathe nicer air is a good way to frame my overall message in a cinematic format.

                                                                       

                                                                      I do believe a good director's cut, where I am able to hopefully speak intelligently about some of these issues, would serve me and my political purposes well.

                                                                       

                                                                      This is, after all, a film designed to cause more people to look favorably upon tree planting, which has made me a much better person.  I like to plant 100 trees a year.  Tree planting provides a great big dose of coherence, continuity and beauty that lingers and lasts for decades as you watch them grow, just like having kids.

                                                                       

                                                                      I certainly hope that my post does not come across as rejecting the validity of Robodog's viewpoints.  I will definitely be rereading them more than once.

                                                                       

                                                                      I do like writing and have written some serious material that I think has stood the test of time well.

                                                                       

                                                                      That said, I would like to see things done a little differently, and whereas Charles Dickens and Karl Marx used the written word to great effect during the 1840s to provoke debate and social change, followed by Harriet Beecher Stowe and Upton Sinclair in the USA, baud rates have risen dramatically since then and the success of Michael Moore and Al Gore (Inconvenient Truth) in provoking dramatic social changes through use of the video medium points to what I believe is the diminishing utility of lengthy written tracts to provoke debate.

                                                                       

                                                                      Given that, the short film, done well, seems particularly suited even more so to that goal.

                                                                       

                                                                      People now think, hey, I'm only spending 7 minutes to watch a movie, I will take that "risk" because no one has time, in the age of Twitter, for full length movies anymore.  Or they won't starting the day after tomorrow.

                                                                       

                                                                      Whether my films succeeds, given its short length, is quite another matter.  I do seem to have promoted a very wide range of opinion, ALL of it founded in competent analysis and expressed quite well to me.

                                                                       

                                                                      I'm very fortunate in that regard.  This technique of "what's the WORST thing about my film" is the best damn technique I've imagined for learning how to improve my work

                                                                       

                                                                      I should probably study more shorts.  I have a rather well rounded overview of film history and spent quite a bit of time studying silent film, where effective storytelling is paramount, especially before the introduction of intertitles.   But I cannot as effectively discuss the history of short film and important trends within that genre.  That's something I will study and soon.

                                                                       

                                                                      thanks again for taking the time to compose your thoughts so well and I look forward to reviewing it again tomorrow,

                                                                       

                                                                      Matt

                                                                      Living on Skyline Boulevard Time

                                                                      • 32. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                                        mdubuque Community Member

                                                                        It's always good to get a good night's sleep before making a crucial decision.

                                                                         

                                                                        Upon some reflection upon arising this morning, I'm going to try a major revamp on the first textual segment. 

                                                                         

                                                                        I have some skills now in the production suite that I lacked last month and I think I can use those skills to meet competent objections from various reviewers and yet enhance and refine my original visions for the film.

                                                                         

                                                                        Had I been working with Apple products, using Apple forums, I don't think this particular decision would have been possible.

                                                                         

                                                                        Thanks for your help and patience!

                                                                         

                                                                        Matt

                                                                        • 33. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                                          JSS1138 CommunityMVP

                                                                          The music is fast, dynamic, lots of drums and percussion and drama and DOESN'T GO ANYWHERE, as was so superbly put by Jim, as I recall, in this thread.

                                                                           

                                                                          That confuses me.  The music was not fast, but mind-numbingly slow.  It was not very dynamic in the 'lively' sense, it was rather quite dead, the percussion beats languid and interspersed.  There was no drama whatsoever.  It was the very lack of all the things you say it has that caused my comment about it going nowhere.  If it had any of the things you claim it has, it would most definitely have gone somewhere.

                                                                          • 34. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                                            JSS1138 CommunityMVP
                                                                            the success of Michael Moore and Al Gore (Inconvenient Truth) in provoking dramatic social changes through use of the video medium points to what I believe is the diminishing utility of lengthy written tracts to provoke debate.

                                                                             

                                                                            Clearly you have forgotten about The DaVinci Code.  Has there been a louder debate across the globe in modern memory?  All of which happened before the movie was made.

                                                                             

                                                                            Now, however one might judge the importance of that debate in comparison to other social issues is a separate matter.  The point is, ideas are what spark debate, regardless of the medium used to communicate those ideas.  Falling back on Rob's point, different ideas will lend themselves appropriately to different media.  The astute communicator will use whatever form lends itself best to the message.  With due respect to the generally talented Ron Howard, Brown's "message" was very clearly served much, much better in print.

                                                                            • 35. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                                              mdubuque Community Member

                                                                              Jim, an interesting interpretation of the music.  Thanks for clarifying it.

                                                                               

                                                                              When I say fast, I was referring to the wire brush on the snare drum which is going at around 135 or more beats per minute, which is quick by any standard.

                                                                               

                                                                              But your interpretation is valid.  We just had different reference points.  As a percussionist, the snare drum always established the tempo of the music.  That's what I was calibrating to.

                                                                               

                                                                              Matt

                                                                              • 36. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                                                JSS1138 CommunityMVP

                                                                                I guess I would use the downbeats as the tempo guide, whether from snare, bass or other.  Those a few and far between (by Western norms), making the piece feel very slow.

                                                                                • 37. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                                                  mdubuque Community Member

                                                                                  No worries.  Danny's work is always multi-layered.  I was trapped in my particular frame, unaware there were others.

                                                                                   

                                                                                  I'm looking forward to this revamp.

                                                                                   

                                                                                  One thing I've gathered from this discussion is that, for some key members of my audience, my attempt to convey the "information overload" aspect of Twitter Time was a complete failure.

                                                                                   

                                                                                  The majority of posters in this thread seemed to me to be, charitably put, rather bored with the first segment.

                                                                                   

                                                                                  Boredom is the OPPOSITE of information overload.  It is "information UNDERload" for lack of a better term.

                                                                                  Now I have a systematic approach, and a few more necessary technical chops and intermediate levels skills, to cure this problem.

                                                                                  I had previously wanted to do something unheard of before on the screen, to the best of my knowledge, but had been thwarted by my lack of technical capability.  Now I can pull that vison off and it's exciting for me.  It involves using and blending seven different video layers.

                                                                                   

                                                                                  Thanks for your help, all of you!

                                                                                   

                                                                                  Matt

                                                                                   

                                                                                  • 38. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                                                    JSS1138 CommunityMVP

                                                                                    Well hey, now we're getting on the same page.  I may yet see the rest of the piece.

                                                                                    • 39. Re: Final Cut of TWITTER TIME submitted today....
                                                                                      joe bloe premiere Community Member

                                                                                      You must promise to post your new version here!

                                                                                       

                                                                                       

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