we finally got an interesting, (mostly) relevant and even somewhat entertain (towards the end) lecture/symposium this week. adrian and the others actually appeared to be answering the given questions (although i’m not too sure how that first question about reality tv related to the course) and there were some rather interesting points brought up.

for me the most interesting question and subsequent discussion was in regards to the increased accessibility of media nowadays and whether or not this is ‘ruining’ films. what was important about this, as jasmine (i think it was jasmine) said, is that ‘ruin’ is a very strong word. which is true. ‘ruining’ depends on how you classify and describe ‘films’ in the first place. its a very personal word and thus it differs for every person. Adrian then took over to discuss this in further detail, claiming that what is made on technology such as iPhones doesn’t even classify as film. first off, that’s because it’s not recorded on film, nor is it a physical video. it’s an all new thing. lets just call it a moving image (or MI) for the sake of this post.

now, of course, the definition of a film is different for everyone. when we think about film in the traditional sense, does this include television? or can it only include what we see up on the big screen in a movie theatre? is there a difference between a film and a movie? where do short films fit into this? or youtube. and then we get to vines…. are they films? they’re not tv. but isn’t television just film being broadcast to an electronic box? when you start to think about it like this, it all gets very confusing and the lines start to become very blurred. but i think that’s all what this course is about. blurring the lines between all the separate technologies, everything is connected today.

i’ll give you an example that adrian gave us when answering a different question in the lecture. this example was big brother. when we think about big brother, we think it is a just a television show. but it goes far beyond that. for one, it is happening live and continuously. even when no-one is watching or when the cameras aren’t on, the tv show is still going. and we see it on tv. but it goes beyond our television sets. it has it’s own website – an online forum where people can find out more information about the ‘characters’, see extra footage that they watch online or even rematch old episodes. we see recaps of it during the week during other programs, news about it written in the newspapers and interviews with eliminated contestants and hosts on the radio. then there’s the voting system, which incorporates the vastly growing medium of the mobile phone. people can not only watch from any time from their mobile devices, but they are a part of the show, sending in votes to determine who stays and who goes, a mechanism which rakes in millions of dollars. so, what does this have to do with the point i was just making? i’m not too sure, i may have gotten a bit carried away there. but this example showcases how widespread our media is today across the different mediums. interactivity is the key. people want to be able to be a part of what they are experiencing.

this is where korsakow comes in. if interactivity is what the public wants, korsakow is here to give it to them, albeit in a weird, abstract way thats not well known and kinda difficult to understand. but surely this is where the future of film and tv and other motion pictures are heading, to the realm of the interactive media where people can choose their story so that it is unique to them, they can be a part of the narrative. all this accessibility to production means ins’t ruining film, it’s creating new types of film, new categories that can’t even be defined. and are allowing for more people than ever to be creating their own content and experimenting and interacting with something that once only the elite and rich could do. this is what Sørenssen was talking about. this is what adrian means. this new accessibility is creating a new era of film or moving image. it is free, it is raw, it can be interactive, it can be made by anyone. the only reason we keep holding back is when we call it film. it is not film any more and that title is constraining us. we need to be able to drop that title and move forward. create new things. interact and experience all new mediums. woooooo!

my only question i would ask, based of the boardwell and thompson reading, is whether our korsakow films are supposed to follow a certain structure? should they be exhibiting cause and effect? narrative plot lines? or are they supposed to be random and abstract and experimental?

finally, i would like to add that the discussion (argument) at the end of the lecture between adrian and one of the students was brilliant. however, have to disagree with adrian, i believe our lives are narratives. they have beginnings, middles and ends. there is no meaning in a narrative until the reader assigns a meaning and that is the same with our lives. we take what happens and we give it meaning. our lives follow a cause and effect structure just as narratives do.