What is filmmaking

[I.ce Bergman]

"FILM-MAKING" is for me a necessity of nature, a need comparable to hunger and thirst.  For some, self-expression involves writing books, climbing mountains, beating one's children or dancing the samba. In my case, I express myself in making films.
   In The Blood of a Poet, the great Jean Cocteau shows us his alter ego stumbling down the corridors of a nightmare hotel and gives us a glimpse, behind each one of the doors, of one of the factors of which he is composed and which form his ego.
   Without attempting here to equate my personality with Cocteau's, I thought I would take you on a guided tour of my internal studios where, invisibly, my films take form.  This visit, I am afraid, will disappoint you; the equipment is always in disorder because the owner is too absorbed in his affairs to have time to straighten it up.  Furthermore, the lighting is rather bad in certain spots, and on the door of certain rooms, you will find the word "Private" written in large letters.  Finally, the guide himself is not always sure of what is worth the trouble of showing.
   Whatever the case may be, we will open a few doors a crack.  I won't guarantee that you will find precisely the answer to the questions you are wondering about, but perhaps, in spite of everything, you will be able to put together a few pieces of the complicated puzzle that the forming of a film represents.
   If we consider the most fundamental element of the cinematographic art, the perforated film, we note that it is composed of a number of small, rectangular images – fifty-two per meter – each of which is separated from the other by a thick, black line.  Looking more closely, we discover that these tiny rectangles, which at first glance seem to contain exactly the same picture, differ from each other by an almost imperceptible modification of this picture.  And when the feeding mechanism of the projector causes the images in question to succeed each other on the screen so that each one is seen only for a twentieth of a second, we have the illusion of movement.
   Between each of these small rectangles the shutter closes and plunges us into total darkness, only to return us to full light with the next rectangle.  When I was ten years old and working with my first apparatus, a shaky lantern made of sheet metal – with its chimney, its gas lamp and its perpetual films which repeated themselves indefinitely – I used to find the above-mentioned phenomenon exciting and full of mystery.  Even today, I feel myself quiver as I did when I was a child when I think of the fact that, in reality, I am creating illusion; for the cinema would not exist but for an imperfection of the human eye, namely it's inability to perceive separately a series of images which follow each other rapidly and which are essentially identical.
   I have calculated that if I see a film that lasts an hour, I am in fact plunged for twenty minutes in total darkness.  In making a film, therefore, I am making myself guilty of a fraud; I am using a device designed to take advantage of a physical imperfection of man, a device by means of which I can transport my audience from a given feeling to the feeling that is diametrically opposed to it, as if each spectator were on a pendulum; I can make an audience laugh, scream with terror, smile, believe in legends, become indignant, take offense, become enthusiastic, lower itself or yawn from boredom.  I am, then, either a deceiver or – when the audience is aware of the fraud – and illusionist.  I am able to mystify, and I have at my disposal the most precious and the most astounding magical device that has ever, since history began, been put into the hands of a juggler.
   There is in all this, or at least there should be, the source of an insoluble moral conflict for all those who create films or work on them.
   As for our commercial partner, this is not the place to bring out the mistakes they have made from year to year, but it would certainly be worthwhile someday for a scientist to discover some unit of weight or measure which one could use to "calculate" the quantity of natural gifts, initiatives, genius and creative forces that the film industry has ground through its formidable mills.  Obviously, anyone entering into the game must accept the rules in advance, and there is no reason why working in the cinematographic branch should be more respected than anywhere else.  The difference is due to the fact that, in our specialty, brutality is manifested more overtly, but this is actually rather an advantage.

...to be continued

[modage]

have you seen Dude, Wheres My Car?  haha, that movie rocks.

[pete]

please continue, I love skipping long paragraphs.

[Duck Sauce]

The role of pretentious XIXAX member is already filled (godardian).... Maybe get in line for bully?



Btw Go, Im kidding I got <3 for you

[Pubrick]

moved to where ppl can be as boring as they want..

[phil marlowe]

hahaha

[Chest Rockwell]

Maybe get in line for bully?

That position's already filled, too. He can be the boring member no one listens to.

Just kidding, Bergman, but I don't understand the point of your post.

[xerxes]

Maybe get in line for bully?

That position's already filled, too. He can be the boring member no one listens to.
Just kidding, Bergman, but I don't understand the point of your post.

damn i thought that was my spot

[I.ce Bergman]

Loss of balance offers consequences that are even more grave for the film-maker than for a tightrope walker or an acrobat who performs his trick beneath a circus tent and without a net.  For the film-maker as well as for the equilibrist, the danger is of the same order: falling and being killed.  No doubt you think I am exaggerating; making a film isn't as dangerous as all that! I maintain my point, however; the risk is the same.  Even if, as I mentioned, one is a bit of a magician, no one can mystify the producers, the bank directors, the movie-theatre owners or the critics when the public abstains from going to see a film and from paying out the obol from which producers, bank directors, movie-theatre owners, critics and magicians must draw their subsistence!

I can give you as an example a very recent experience, the memory of which still makes me shudder – an experience in which I myself risked losing my balance.  A singularly bold producer invested money in one of my films which, after a year of intense activity premiered.  The reviews were, in general, destructive, the public stayed away, the producer added up his losses, and I had to wait several years before trying again.

If I make two or three more films which fail financially, the producer will quite justifiably consider it a good idea not to bet on my talents.

At that point, I will become, suddenly, a suspect individual, a squanderer, and I will be able to reflect at my leisure on the usefulness of my artistic gifts, for the magician will be deprived of his apparatus.

When I was younger, I didn't have these fears.  Work for me was an exciting game and, whether the results succeeded or failed, I was delighted with my work like a child with his castles of sand or clay.  The equilibrist was dancing on his rope, oblivious and therefore unconcerned about the abyss beneath him and the hardness of the ground of the circus-ring.

The game has changed into a bitter combat.  The walk on the rope is now performed in full awareness of the danger, and the two points where the rope is attached are now called "fear" and "incertitude."  Each work to be materialized mobilizes all of the resources of one's energy.  The act of creation has become, under the effect of causes that are as much interior as they are exterior and economic, an exacting duty.  Failure, criticism, coldness on the part of the pubic today cause more sensitive wounds.  These wounds take longer to heal and their scars are deeper and more lasting.

Before undertaking a work or after having begun it,  Jean  Anouilh has the habit of playing a little mental game in border to exorcise his fear.  He says to himself, "My father is a tailor.  He intimately enjoys creating with his hands, and the result is a beautiful pair of pants or an elegant overcoat.  This is the joy and the satisfaction of the artisan, the pride of a man who knows his profession."

This is the same practice I follow.  I recognize the game,  I play it often and I succeed in duping myself – and a few others – even if this game is in fact nothing but a rather poor sedative: "My films are fine pieces of work, I am enthusiastic, conscientious and extremely attentive of details.  I create for my contemporaries and not for eternity; my pride is the pride of an artisan."

I know however that, if I speak this way, it is in order to deceive myself, and an irrepressible anxiety cries out to me, "What have you done that can last? Is there in any of your movies a single foot of film worthy of being passed on to posterity, a single line of dialogue, a single situation which is really and indisputably true?"

And to this question I am forced to answer – perhaps still under effect of a disloyalty which his ineradicable even in the most sincere people  - "I don't know, I hope so."

You must excuse me for having described at such length and with so much commentary the dilemma which those who create films are forced to confront.  I wanted to try to explain to you why so many of those who are devoted to the realization of cinematographic woks give in to a temptation which cannot really be expressed and which is invisible; why we are afraid; why we sometimes lose our enthusiasm for  the works we are doing; why  we become fools and allow ourselves to be annihilated by colorless and vile compromises.

[SoNowThen]

have you seen Dude, Wheres My Car?  haha, that movie rocks.

These chicks look pretty cute. Maybe the movie's worth watching after all...

[matt35mm]

Oh that movie is hi-fuggin-larious!

[I.ce Bergman]

Well, obviously this isn't working.  The above statements I transcribed are pieces of an artical written by one of the greatest filmmakers of our time, Ingmar Bergman (originally published in Cashiers du Cinema, XI, no. 61, July 1956.)  I was hoping to draw the interest of some filmmakers willing to have an intelligent discussion.  I understand the need for sarcasm, but there are hundreds of strands where people can smart off.  Can't there be at least one legitimate strand where people can speak on film philosophy and the emotional resonance of film poetry.  If the indignant replies I recieved are any indication of the sincerity towards film as art I'm afraid I can't see any reason to waste my time here.

[The Disco Kid]

The above statements I transcribed are pieces of an artical written by one of the greatest filmmakers of our time, Ingmar Bergman

Reads like The Uni-Bomber's Manifesto.

[Pubrick]

Well, obviously this isn't working.  The above statements I transcribed are pieces of an artical written by one of the greatest filmmakers of our time, Ingmar Bergman (originally published in Cashiers du Cinema, XI, no. 61, July 1956.)

hey, good job not mentioning that at all until now.

[I.ce Bergman]

hey, good job not mentioning that at all until now.

Well, that was kind of the point. To see if anyone would respond to an anonymous filmmakers plea to discuss the topic.  I wanted to see if anyone on this board would take it seriously.