When reading the first reading, A Dialectic Approach to Film Form, the part of the text that stood out to me the most was the idea that art should have no set form and regularity destroys art. This stood out to me because I disagree with it. While I believe originality is key to art I disagree with the authors point that art should not have a technical form. The technical form of film is what allows people to understand and comprehend the original ideas in the film. If everything in a film is new and irregular, how much of it is the audience actually comprehending and understanding. I think this brings up the question of accessibility in film. Often when I watch films, especially for film classes, I wonder who is this for? If I did not have the knowledge about film or I was not analyzing this movie in a film class would I be able to enjoy it, what does that say about the demographic films are for and why it is that demographic? I am curious what the average person might take away from movies like Portrait of a Lady on Fire and The Grand Budapest Hotel. Back to my point who are films with nor form or regularity for, upper class people who will talk together about the meaning of the movie or your average theatre goer. Film form is what makes movies for everyone, makes them comprehendible, and I think there is great value in that and in not making art exclusionary.

The second reading, The Myth of Total Cinema, honestly shocked me. When I read the line “cinema has not yet been invented” I had to sit for a minute and just think. The entire idea that even the earliest “filmmakers” saw film as a complete reconstruction and view of reality and that we have actually just been working closer to the original idea and origin of film is incredible. This raises questions for me of what is the final film form? When will we reach that origin? If real cinema is “reality” then could true cinema just be watching people, actually seeing people in reality? I also think these ideas relate a lot to the ideas our other texts have raised about the voyeuristic tendencies of film and our want to look at and see real people that if fulfilled by film. So I am also wondering what is the exact thing we want from film that makes it separate from just looking at people? Is it the drama of the stories? Is that they are separate from our actual lives and world, allowing us to imagine ourselves in another world?

I think both of these readings raise a lot of questions about the purpose of film, why we are making it, and for who, and how does the form of film play into that. However, I think there is some juxtaposition between these two readings. In The Myth of Total Cinema film is viewed as constructing something close to reality while in A Dialectic Approach to Film Form reality can be manipulated to instead create logical relationships and cause emotions. This makes me wonder how we make these choices in film and how we decide what different techniques may hold more impact.