An "open mic night" is essentially free speech as a performance art. Every few months the Salt Lake City Film Society holds such an event for local amateur directors to show their films to whoever wants to watch. I've gone twice before and genuinely enjoyed what some of what they had to offer.
Most of what they were showing this time was pretty terrible. They didn't have to be, but most of the films were far too long for what I could gather they were trying to accomplish. I remember one film was 10+ minutes of the what looked like the same clips over and over again from someone's vacation to Guatemala. The only two elements of such a film can possibly have are "Guatemala" and "looks", whatever they were trying to say about what Guatemala looks like was lost because 10 minutes is a really long time when you're just sitting there being told to think about nothing and only look at something that is totally confusing. Instead of showing me a photograph of something to illustrate what something looks like, they felt the needeto show me hundreds of confusing moving photographs that jerk around in bouncing-wrist-camera way while shouting unrelated music for the whole time. It was obnoxious that they felt they had the right to shove a thought or emotion into my head in such a way - instead of actually letting me observe something in a way that allows me to come the conclusion like I'm a intelligent person.
The real problem is, that people do such things because they think they're smarter than everyone else. If someone were to approach them to tell them that they were being ineffective, they would dismiss the argument as the result of some intellectual peasant. One who wasn't good enough to understand the depth of some illusory artistic plane they've created for them self.
tl;dr : if no one understands you, it isn't their fault.
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1 comment:
i agree with what you said. film is a medium used to express and connect with the viewer. if you as a film maker alienate the viewer, then you have failed at the task you have taken on. too many times amateur film makers miss the mark in having a point / message to the work they are presenting, and instead of using this powerful medium to make a statement, the viewer is left wondering why they just wasted 5 minutes or more of their life on something that was horrible.
then again beauty is in the eye of the beholder and the person making the film has hopefully tried their best at the piece they are presenting. which would probably explain why this individual was showing their work at a "open mic night" through the film festival.
this is a awesome idea and i am going to have to check the salt lake film societies website to see when one in the future is so i can attend.
good observation, and post!
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