the crisis that plagues us · destruction - the bottles with "radioactive diamonds" in...
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THE CRISIS THAT PLAGUES US CRAFTING NARRATIVE !!!
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THE MCGUFFIN !Watch out for it - it will lead you nowhere!
!‘The device, the gimmick, if you will, or the papers the spies are after... The only thing that really matters is that in the picture the plans, documents or secrets must seem to be of vital importance to the characters. To me, the narrator, they're of no importance whatsoever.’ A. Hitchcock !
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"A term for a PlotEnablingDevice, i.e., a device or plot element in a movie that is deliberately placed to catch the viewer's attention and/or drive the logic of the plot, but which actually serves no further purpose - it won't pop up again later, it won't explain the ending, it won't actually do anything except possibly distract you while you try to figure out its significance. More specifically, it is usually a mysterious package or superweapon or something that everyone in the story is chasing.” Wikipedia
Quentin Tarantinos ‘Pulp Fiction’, 1994
Mass Destruction Weapons, Iraq
Do the "Iraqi weapons of mass destruction" not fit perfectly the status of the MacGuffin? (Incidentally, one of the most famous Hitchcockian MacGuffins IS a potential weapon of mass destruction - the bottles with "radioactive diamonds" in Notorious!) Are they not also an elusive entity, never empirically specified - when, a couple of years ago, the UN inspectors were searching for them in Iraq, they were expected to be hidden in the most disparate and improbable places, from the (rather logical place of) desert to the (slightly irrational) cellars of the presidential palaces (so that, when the palace is bombed, they may poison Saddam and his entire entourage?), allegedly present in large quantities, yet magically moved around all the time by the hands of workers, and the more all-present and all-powerful in their threat, the more they are destroyed, as if the distraction of the greater part of them magically heightens the destructive power of the remainder? As such, they by definition cannot ever be found, and are therefore all the more dangerous... Now that none were found, we reached the last line of the story of MacGuffin: "'Well,' said President Bush in September 2003, 'then that's not a MacGuffin, is it?’" !The Iraqi MacGuffin, Slavoj Zizek, 2003, http://www.lacan.com/iraq1.htm!
Crafting A Narrative Through a Fake !!
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‘Zorba the Greek’ !Michael Cacoyannis, 1964
‘Traditional’ Syrtaki Dancers!
Crafting Tradition in ‘Zorba the Greek’, Michael Cacoyannis, 1964
CONTEMPORARY PIECES OF MYSTICAL POWER
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Objects narrating the Past
The Refrigerator, Nicholas Jacob, 1991
‘NO SURVIVOR’S ONLY LEFTOVERS’!!You’re no longer eating the content - the content is eating you. A reminder of capitalism - the food packed fridge of a wealthy owner is being processed in an ironically horror film.
!“… while there is much that I like about the Mojave, it certainly is the most abused—often trashed—of these deserts. The close proximity to LA would mean that there was bound to be a lot of films shot there. But I also wonder about the distinctive appeal of all that debris that marks the desiccated, bleached, and frayed remains of otherwise forgotten dreams.” Robert Altman
‘Rubber’, Quentin Dupieux, 2010
‘Rubber’, Quentin Dupieux, 2010
The unknown and ‘unreal’ spaces become an architecture of our memories and actions. !The killing of a tyre is obviously the consequence of our actions and so constitutes a critique on our mass culture. But it is also a haunted object - be it a horror tool or a supernatural slice of toast – it serves as a resource of information. If a human commits murder, it is shocking. If a tyre commits murder, it is first of all disturbing, because everything is in disorder. This lack of understanding generates the unreal.
!A mute tyre with telepathic powers and the urge to kill - a piece of Horror Polymer.!!The tyre suddenly becomes part of our psyche and an elaboration of our fantasies. Framed by the Mojave desert and its stranded characters, ‘Rubber’ reflects the anomalies in our culture.
!“The paranormal nature of the sandwich is mainly due to the fact that millions of people are able to see the same holy icon on the bread, not to mention that a ten-year-old sandwich has remained remarkably free of mold.” Golden Casino, Las Vegas
!“I made this sandwich 10 years ago. !When I took a bite out of it, I saw a face looking up at me - it was Virgin Mary starring back at me. I was in total shock.”!!Diana Duyser - Discoverer of the Virgin Cheese Toast, 1994 !
Find a contemporary McGuffin or develop a new form of a tradition. !
!Think about: !
The lack of importance / Something happening for no reason / New Weapons / A Crisis / Anomalies in
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