Let's Get Ready to Play!

Today’s screening provided an interesting perspective on the different things people consider entertaining. It fascinates me that the more technology we acquire, the more simplistic things become. The wii, for example, is so amazingly advanced. It is a videogame capable of sensing the player’s movements and coordinating that with what is on the screen. Yet, we are playing games where we need to shake the ants off of a banana, or blow up a balloon. We have of these possibilities set before us (open to our imagination) and we choose to play things that happen in everyday life anyway. I would have to agree with Shane’s assumption that Wario Ware was only intended to display all the capabilities of the new system. There was nothing jarring or intriguing about the games other than the tutorials showing the various ways to manipulate the controller and the possibility of something greater. If we start to have videogames that can sense our very movements, there might be other innovations created to anticipate our every need (our televisions, our beds, etc.).

The time aspect of the screening was also quite interesting. I really like to play videogames. I often use my younger cousin as an excuse to play any chance I get. Usually, when the two of us play, it is only the two of us. We have two controllers and an ample supply of two-player games. I can spend the whole day playing games with him and not realize just how much time has passed. As much as I love spending time with my family, I think the desire to win is what keeps me from realizing how much time I wasted. Every time I play, I get closer and closer to either completing the level or finishing the game. So, in adventure games I don’t measure how much time has gone by, instead I measure how many lives I’ve played. That is a slightly more manageable number.

With the screening today, there was a lot of waiting around. Though I cheered for the success of my peers, I didn’t get emotionally attached or involved with the progress of the games. As a result, I was very aware of the time that was passing. My reaction to this screening is quite similar to my reaction to television shows. If I get emotionally connected to or attached to characters, I find myself anticipating the coming of next week’s episode. If I watch the show only in passing, I am more aware of my surroundings than I am of the show itself. Even though trying the games were quite fun, it was extremely difficult to get too ‘into’ the game seeing that we would have to take turns and then switch twenty minutes or so later.

Real-Time Mayhem

When the movie first started, I was a little confused as to why the picture was only a small part of the upper left-hand of the screen. The frame placement took some of the focus away from what was happening in the story. The flashing red counters around the first frame were quite distracting in an already confusing scene. When the other four frames were introduced to the audience, the amount of confusion became overwhelming. It was hard to focus on what was happening with the various characters and, at times, it was hard to distinguish one conversation from another. But when analyzed from a different perspective, Mike Figgis (the director) epitomized Vertov’s ideal that the camera shows the human eye what to observe and in what order to observe things in. The imperfect human eye, which takes in all the details (whether it needs to or not), must be directed and shown what to see/appreciate. By highlighting certain conversations and frames, Mike was showing the viewer the importance of the work.

The only other form of multimedia that I have seen show events in “real-time” is the television show 24. With that series, however, every moment is breathtaking and each episode feels as if mere seconds have passed instead of a full hour. With Time Code, the events were shown in “real-time” as we know it in our everyday existence. Life is never a constant shift from one heart-pounding event to another. There are often times moments of nothing; little moments where we put on our make-up or give someone a hug. In that sense, the movie was more real than anything that I have seen as a motion picture in a really long time. As argued in “The Third Interval,” modern technologies have caused today’s society to ignore the “concrete presence” (10). We are so involved with making things go faster and more convenient, that watching a film that actually mimics the pace of real life is quite jarring.

The four synchronized frames in one scene of the film was a unique and interesting viewing experience. Yes, it was a bit impossible to follow all four frames perfectly throughout the film, but isn’t that what real life is like? We all have our own issues that we have to deal with, and we all have people who we meet in a day-to-day basis. Yet, no one really pays attention as to just how similar and intertwined all of our lives really are. Like Alex’s blog below, I also thought that the scene where the woman was trying to explain her movie idea to the board of directors was the most interesting out of all the scenes. She is basically explaining the premise of the movie, but she is adding a twist on it that probably could not be visually achieved. Perhaps Mike Figgis did intend for all the characters to be the same, only at different points in their lives, but it was a hard concept to put onto film. No matter how similar we are with our problems and life experiences; in the end, it is the decisions we choose to make that set us apart from each other.

I must say, having learned the film was taken in one continuous shot has really impressed me. The actors really got into the characters that they played; really understood their motivations and limitations to have been able to carry through without outtakes or edits. The earthquake scene gave the first impression that the film quality was going to be horrific and the acting was going to be just as bad, but I was pleasantly mistaken!

Is Technology That Beneficial?

“The Third Interval” portrays two vantage points to technology as it affects everyday society. On the one level, there is appreciation for all the benefits that society reaps from innovation. People are able to communicate long distances in a shorter amount of time. People can cover great distances in a fraction of the time as well. Yet, on the other level, there is contempt for all the things that technology is taking away. With transcontinental communication, it is difficult for people to have one-on-one physical contact. The intimacy of staring someone in the face when they talk to you is removed in exchange for the distant glare of the computer monitor. Yes, people can travel across countries to meet those who are far away, but “the paradoxes of acceleration are indeed numerous and disconcerting, in particular, the foremost among them: getting closer to the ‘distant’ takes you away proportionally from the ‘near’ (and dear) --- the friend, the relative, the neighbor --- thus making strangers, if not actual enemies, of all who are close at hand…” (20) That reasoning is quite interesting because it is a behavior that most of us are guilty of, but never really realize. When we struggle to make a connection with people from distant areas, we tend to ignore those closest to us. In a sense, the technology is separating us from those we could have a strong connection with. It is quite nice to make friends with people from around the world, but the relationship that is formed cannot possibly be as strong or lasting as relationships formed with people we see everyday. Like it or not, we can make better relationships with those around us because we have access to them. We can better judge their personality because we can observe how they react in particular situations. We know those particular individuals more intimately than anyone we could possibly meet online or through the telephone.

Not only does technology corrupt the quality of relationships, it also alters our understanding of time. Technology is “killing ‘present’ time by isolating it from its here and now, in favour of a commutative elsewhere that no longer has anything to do with our ‘concrete presense’” (10). We as a society are so concerned with saving time in the future, that we tend to miss out on a lot of things happening in the now. For example, buying an expensive house with lots of neat gadgets built-in is a goal many people share. Those people tend to spend their whole lives working towards that goal of getting their dream home, that they miss out on things they could be enjoying in the present moment. Innovations (especially in today’s society) are constantly improving on one another. It is often hard to keep up with what is new. If one were to be driven only to obtain the newest and latest items, that person would be working their whole lives always looking towards that future.

Another interesting claim this article brings up is the fact that speed is only “a relationship between phenomena…” (12) The entire concept is only plausible as long as there are two events that bind together. Since time is often linked with the concept of speed, does that mean time is only the relationship between two occurrences? In a way, it would make sense to think of time in such a way. Time can really only be measured through the recognition of one event in relation to the next. If the world (and everything in it) stood still, it would be highly likely that time would stand still as well.

Time and Its Power Over Society

When we really think about the concept of time, it seems like something intended to unify the world as a global community. As discussed in “Time Goes Standard”, the standardizing of time made things like conducting business outside of one’s town and creating a train that spanned the distance of many miles possible. Time gives structure and order to a society consisting of many individuals having varying ideas. It is the one thing that ties as together as a community/society. In H.G. Wells’ The Time Machine, this notion of time representing order and structure is displayed throughout the text.

When the Time Traveller initially showed his companions the model version of his time machine, “the little machine suddenly swung round, became indistinct, was seen as a ghost for a second…” as it disappeared into either the past or the future. (Wells 8) This machine is supposed to represent time. As it propels itself into a different space, it loses its shape and distinct look. The imagery painted is one that is slowly blending into the background. As the time machine model is losing its place in time, and defying all the laws that we know about time, it is losing itself. Could it be that the time we decided to standardize has become a comment on who we are as a society?

In the novel, none of the characters have specific names. They are all referred to by their occupation. At first, this seemed like a strange method of character development. But in a sense, the lack of names is quite fitting in the idea of time as a lasting structure that sets the standards in society. The characters are all human. They will live there lives, but then they will eventually die. Humans are not lasting. Time is lasting. Everything that is fleeting in the book is described with less detail than the elements considered permanent. For example, when the narrator is describing the point when the Time Traveller travels through time, the description is very brief and a bit dizzying. The narrator describes the laboratory growing “faint and hazy, then fainter and ever fainter. To-morrow night came black, then day again, night again, day again, faster and faster still.” (16) When the narrator describes something like the moon of the flowers or just nature in general, however, extra care is given to the description of its appearance and its location in relation to the Time Traveller. Perhaps the argument lies in the mentality that nature is eternal and lasting, while civilization can only last as long as we are allowed to by nature and time.