I think I am set in the idea that I want my film to explore the kind of existential desparation and dread caused by the collapse of one's belief system.
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On The Nature of God
Recently in my own life I have struggled with the idea of a benevolent God. Likely due to my upbringing, I find it impossible to disregard entirely the idea of some higher power, and so I have been navigating through the unfortunate possibility that, if the abrahamic God exists, it does not carry our best interests.
We are born into a world where we are hostages to belief. If we worship God and live our lives how he wants, we are rewarded in death. If we act against him, in death we are condemned to suffering. From birth, we are prisoners of God's expectations. And yet, how can we justify worshiping an entity that, if all powerful, allows us to live in a world drowning in evil, where people are cheated and beaten, and millions die pointless deaths indescriminately every day. There is a poem by the philosopher Epicurus that I believe captures this dilemma:
“Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?”
The contradictions that we come to accept, when examined comparatively like this, do not make sense. If this God exists, why is it indifferent to our suffering? Alternatively, if God does not exist, then we must be responsible for our own suffering. And this notion leads down another path of self destructive nihilism.
It is this mood that I wish to establish. I have debreifed you on my relationship with God and faith, but I haven't gone in depth on the feelings which that dilemma envokes for me, or how I find it rotting into my own view of the world, like an infection, when left unchecked. It can be bleak and suffocating. It is desolation, and a silence that is all too loud, it is the cackle of gulls fighting over scraps of food, and the howl of the wind as it weaves between branches, it is the murky black expanse of the ocean at night, and the distant beats of thunder over the horizion, ancient and unknowable, having nothing to do with you and I.
And it is the struggle against gravity, and pressing on through the dark, despite the cold. It is a universe that doesn't care, yet it is filled with people who do. And I think that continuing to survive amidst all of this is what defines our humanity. It must mean something.
On Inspiration
Now that we got that out of the way, here is my mood board :3
Two of my biggest inspirations right now is the art of Yoshitaka Amano and of Philippe Druillet.
Amano's art is charicteristically bleak and distant, with muted colors and hazed faces, but there is something so soft and inviting about it. There is a sense of mystery and awe with each charcater, yet past this dream-like surrealism always some degree of desolation, for both the character and the obscured world they are delicately cradled in.
Druillet's art is best described as wide, often combining multiple different subjects, collage-like compositions and massive stretches of space. There is always this grand sense of importance in every panel. I've seen his art described as "quasi-baroque", and this sensibility combined with the saturated colors and set pieces echoing Dune and Star Wars, everything in his repetoire is embued with the science fiction trends of the 1970s.
Also scattered around my mood board is some surrealist paintings and images that I am drawn to. I love the irony of the woman with the fish head, and the moths carrying lamps, and the rabbit people waiting on the train tracks. It is strange and absurd, yet comforting.
Two films that I think also have played a role in launching me onto this path are Ben Wheatley's A Field in England, and Mamoru Oshii's Angel's Egg. Both are very experimental in nature, the former breaking plenty of filmmaking conventions to progress its narrative, and the latter being a story that is kept vague and unknown, communicated primarily through its surreal and dream-like visuals. Both carry a similar theme, that being the presence and absence of God in our lives and in the world, and the confusion that comes with questioning what was previously understood to be a certainty.
On Concept
Now for the question, how do I encorporate all of this into a radical film?
To me, at this moment, the main goal of the piece is to establish an atmosphere (channeling the ideological deconstruction that inspired the first three or four paragraphs of this post), and then once that is accomplished I imagine building off of that as necessary.
I think that I would like to work in the realm of found-footage (or footage that I film and edit to look like found footage, or most likely a combination of both). I see this process as being very stream-of-consciousness, in otherwords me working on a bunch of different things and seeing how they work together, if at all, to set this mood.
As far as subject, I think I would like to work closely with the macabre. This might raise some concerns, macabre being a word describing death. Instead, I want to provide an abstraction this concept. The origin of the word macabre comes from the old french Danse Macabre, meaning 'dance with death'. This dance with death I feel well describes the picture I want to paint. And also, I don't mean death as being just carnal decay, I mean death as a concept, as an end or a finality of one thing (in this case, belief or faith), and perhaps even the beginning of something new. After all, death does not exist in a vacuum, it is just one part of a larger cycle.
Two directions I think I could take this in is intertwining the use of music in the piece, or alternatively intertwining the use of spoken word. With music, I beleiev that this would complement the goal to set a particular type of mood and encapsulate a particular type of feeling. With spoken dialogue, to be honest I am not so sure about what this would do for the piece. As I will mention later, I don't want to undermine the power of the visuals alone.
My biggest challenge is my lack of competence when it comes to editing, specifically with altering video. My knowledge pretty much ends at Premiere Pro, and while I am sure I could find tutorials on After Effects, etc... this will be my biggest point of contention.
On Narrative
Naturally I am drawn to creating some kind of narrative, but I would like to challenge myself to step away from having one (or, if there is one, leave it as vague and as open ended as possible). However, I am cautious to step away from this entirely. I would like to achieve the balance between real narrative and direct allegory (a balance that much of narrative-driven experimental cinema struggles with). Either they lean heavily into one or heavily into the other. I think that, with many experimental films, their vague nature and open ended possibility is what keeps them interesting and engaging. However, when so many films attempt this style, it is often frustrating for the audience. It is a balance that I am eager to attempt to achieve.
I should note that if this attempt doesn't pan out, I will likely dilute it even further, or cut it entirely. The project is still in its infancy, and there is much to be considered along the way.
Addendum: I forgot to mention the works of Béla Tarr.