Thanks for another thought-provoking post Carlos. My own take on film's anti-utopianness is that our stories and myths have always been anti-utopian. There's a bit in The Hobbit where Tolkien addresses the reader directly and essentially says 'And then they had a great time feasting for a while, but that's boring to read about, so let's skip ahead to them taking up their dangerous quest again'. Narrative demands sin, imperfection, pain and drama, I think partly because that's what we know - it's the stuff of our mortal life - but also because peace just can't be talked about. It's so ineffable, but also so...static. It isn't about going anywhere, doing anything or being anyone, so by definition you can't tell stories about it. It's not the road you walk along, it's the end of the road where you finally get some rest.
Music seems to have an easier time representing beauty despite the fact that it's constantly moving - maybe because no words are involved. But even there, the ear generally demands some tension and release, some intriguing dissonance. It'd be hard to sit through a static major-chord drone for an hour, technically beautiful though it might be.
Thanks for another thought-provoking post Carlos. My own take on film's anti-utopianness is that our stories and myths have always been anti-utopian. There's a bit in The Hobbit where Tolkien addresses the reader directly and essentially says 'And then they had a great time feasting for a while, but that's boring to read about, so let's skip ahead to them taking up their dangerous quest again'. Narrative demands sin, imperfection, pain and drama, I think partly because that's what we know - it's the stuff of our mortal life - but also because peace just can't be talked about. It's so ineffable, but also so...static. It isn't about going anywhere, doing anything or being anyone, so by definition you can't tell stories about it. It's not the road you walk along, it's the end of the road where you finally get some rest.
Music seems to have an easier time representing beauty despite the fact that it's constantly moving - maybe because no words are involved. But even there, the ear generally demands some tension and release, some intriguing dissonance. It'd be hard to sit through a static major-chord drone for an hour, technically beautiful though it might be.
Awesome post 👍
Where did you get that second Terry Davis graphic from, the word cloud??