Posted on March 11th, 2017 by Adam-Troy Castro
Originally published on Facebook 16 March 2016.
One of the things we lost when great special effects became possible is audience participation in the illusion.
On stage, a simple wooden frame becomes Willy Loman’s house. The audience builds the space. Two chairs placed side by side can be a car. A man walking with poor posture, sans any other makeup, can be the Elephant Man.
Film is more literal, and because there were once greater limitations to the form, audiences could take an imperfect illusion and build the rest of the effect in their minds. Take Day-For-Night. It was never, ever “realistic;” characters walked around in a relative twilight and pretended that they were in pitch darkness. In some shots you were able to tell that characters were in bright sunlight because the trees in their vicinity cast darker shadows against the slightly-dimmer environs in which the characters interacted. Unless the effects failed in some spectacular way, audiences shrugged and said, “Okay, I can tell that was day, but I understand the story says it’s night. Now tell me what happens on that night.”
I just saw an article complaining that the blue filter used for the night scenes in MAD MAX FURY ROAD didn’t really look like night, but like some weird netherworld that doesn’t reflect nature.
No, it doesn’t.
If the story’s working for you, can’t you participate in the illusion? Even watching old movies that are primitive to your eyes, can’t you say that the model in a studio tank is a tall ship? Can’t you say that the little clay figurine is a giant gorilla, attacking a pretty blonde?
Now, audiences demand a visual perfection that is sometimes beyond the point.
I dunno about you.
But where the artifice is visible, and accounted for, I can still make the leap.
I love Willy Loman’s wood-frame house. I love the impossible blue night in MAD MAX. I love rear-screen projection in movies where characters converse while driving. There’s a place for that, and it’s often where the art sits.
Tags: Death of a Saleman, King Kong, Mad Max Fury Road, Movies, Stage | Category Commentary, Movies
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