within ordinary art then and now there is (for whatever reason) a massive tendency to elide the production produce; to idealise the final object and overlook the process of its arrival, treat its making as not just a distraction from the appreciation, but a kind of vulgar interruption* -- even yr point abt leni does this: actually LOTS of people were involved in the making of her films apart from her, from the people down on the floor on the day to the people who ran the factories who deliver the celluloid; and the argument that she was "ultimately" in control is just that, an argument, not a fact
there was a fashion in the late 19th century for orchestras to play behind screen so the sight of the moving arms and puffing mouths would not discompose the blissed-out listener -- that was an extreme development, but the idea that "oh! now we are surely smarter about all this!" is nonsense... there's an essay in the current Film Quarterly (from a well-known film historian and former commissioning editor at the BFI) pointing out how RARE it is that film-making is EVER treated as a contested collectivity... buried assumptions within auteurism as a thesis, the relationship between assumptions of authorship and claims about authority and authenticity, don't just end when you switch an element of creativity and decision-power over to the audience (partly bcz imagined provenance as a glamour can muffle actual provenance as a fact, but it can't erase it...): instead they become hyper-complex, and contestable themselves -- energies of debate and fields of possibility, in fact
(the bit i like in that particular essay is when the bikeboys are all talkin abt the film and all know everything about it <--- they are waiting for the NME TO COME OUT!)
Re: Film friend discusses Benjamin, not rockism
there was a fashion in the late 19th century for orchestras to play behind screen so the sight of the moving arms and puffing mouths would not discompose the blissed-out listener -- that was an extreme development, but the idea that "oh! now we are surely smarter about all this!" is nonsense... there's an essay in the current Film Quarterly (from a well-known film historian and former commissioning editor at the BFI) pointing out how RARE it is that film-making is EVER treated as a contested collectivity... buried assumptions within auteurism as a thesis, the relationship between assumptions of authorship and claims about authority and authenticity, don't just end when you switch an element of creativity and decision-power over to the audience (partly bcz imagined provenance as a glamour can muffle actual provenance as a fact, but it can't erase it...): instead they become hyper-complex, and contestable themselves -- energies of debate and fields of possibility, in fact
(the bit i like in that particular essay is when the bikeboys are all talkin abt the film and all know everything about it <--- they are waiting for the NME TO COME OUT!)