NOVOCINEFILE -
(Metamorphosis in Film)
To dream of the person you would like to be is to waste the person you are.
“Without contraries is no progression. Attraction and repulsion, reason and energy,
love and hate, are necessary to human existence.”
What is metamorphosis? This is a wide question, which has been tackled over the years by many philosophers, writers and artists, the thing is I really feel, I don’t need to go into a long spiel on the many forms and definitions of metamorphosis except to say that when it comes down to nuts and bolts, the definition of metamorphosis is ever changing. One thing I do believe to be important is the fact that we all as individuals metamorphose and consequently our thoughts ideas and concepts of self and the world constantly change. My supervisor, Bill Schaffer made an interesting comment one time after he had delved more questioningly into my recent illness. I must say, as an aside, he has been excellent, just asking little questions now and then and seeming not to be too concerned, until one particular day when I realised he really did understand how sick I had been and that this is a chronic illness. The week previously, I had jokingly referred to the fact that I had morphed as a person physically emotionally and intellectually, losing so much weight my boys were calling me Gollum, nearing death and walking away. The next time I saw Bill, the first comment he made, while not revolutionary was pertinent, it was, “so you really have morphed as a person that is interesting because I think we all write our own story in whatever we do, so our research and writing changes with and becomes a picture of our life experiences.” And, yes, I can verify that statement wholeheartedly as can be seen by the evolution or de-evolution of my project.
Click on scottie's head to reach NovocastrianCinefile
William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, “The Argument,” 1790
Metamorphosis [L, fr. Gk metamorphosis, fr. metamorphoun to transform, fr. meta- + morphe form] (1533) 1 a: change of physical form, structure, or substance esp. by supernatural means. b: a striking alteration in appearance, character, or circumstances. 2: a marked and more or less abrupt developmental change in the form or structure of an animal (as a butterfly or a frog) occurring subsequent to birth or hatching.
Since the beginning this project, I have dramatically changed as an individual and as a member of my community and social groups. Before beginning this piece, in fact the year I did my honours essay, I believed I knew I had to go further in that area of research. It seemed the most important thing was to say what I felt I had to say. While researching The Matrix it became apparent that I had a strong interest in what is known as the turning point of the morph. In The Matrix, the turning point appears as the agents invade bodies of the projected humans within the matrix system and again as characters transfer from one reality to another. Interestingly the change between worlds or realities is portrayed differently to the change between identities. Firstly, when a character is plugged into the matrix system, the change from one reality to the other reality is shown by the computer graphics creating a vortex through a phone line in and out of each reality, effectively stretching the time of the moment of change, or turning point. Secondly, the entry of the agents into a body is created, in The Matrix, by a CGI morphing technique, the turning point being the meeting point of two warps. During each of the transformation sequences when a human becomes an agent, the process stills for a millisecond at the point when the human and agent are both there but not there, the still point of the morph. I felt that I needed to investigate this turning point more, so began looking a little further and decided to research metamorphosis in film, especially science fiction.
My research began, and so did my problems, which may in the end turnout to be blessings. The year started with me being very enthusiastic and feeling that I rather knew what I wanted to do. But by the time, I was meeting both my temporary supervisors things were rapidly deteriorating. I didn’t know why, just as I did know I had been Losing weight for no apparent reason over the past year or so. But had been feeling so good I wasn’t too worried, despite the constant doctor’s appointments and numerous blood tests for the previous six months. The thing that was becoming more and more disturbing was the brain fog. As I went to meetings with my supervisors, my mind was becoming more vague, and my memory was failing, I would read constantly and lose everything.
So, with all this happening, it seems somehow appropriate that at this moment of my life I was and am heavily into film studies and that I had chosen to focus on metamorphosis. The cinema is an industry always in transition and a place where the screen as the place of representation is futile without a viewer, who is also always in a state of transition. Over the past two years I have been suffering a debilitating and chronic illness which has both hindered my progress and given me some insight into what I am doing. During this time most of what I have read has bounced off the back of my brain, like a film projected into an empty cinema. While the films were running over and over, there was no one to watch, see or take in and understand the images that floated across the screen. As my eyes read and read, my mind remained passive thinking only of surviving each day. I am thankful to those here who have seen me go through this and have waited and been there to help me and hold me up as I have just managed to tread water. Over the past six months, things have become markedly better and I have begun to wade through the quagmire and mess of jumbled and repetitive notes that surrounds me toward land. Not being the most organized of people at best of times; this period of illness has left me feeling hollow, isolated and numb, the isolation being added to by the seclusion of post graduate work. But, at the same time the isolation has been a blessing as I really could not face the world. So amongst all this I feel I have experienced and understand what Deleuze is describing, when he talks about Bodies without Organs being that pathein (mental state) in which one decides to literally dis-organize oneself from a social context that has rigidly defined selfhood.[1] Except that, for me it was not a decision as such, rather something I was forced into by circumstances.
1. Rodowick, D.N., Gilles Deleuze's Time Machine.
“Science Fiction, Melodrama, Spectacle, Suspense, Mythology.”
