Culturize by the cinematograph

“I heard somewhere” , “My friends told me”, ” I’ve seen pictures” …Typical responses that don’t reveal much and left you wondering, as if you did care to hear other far more descriptive response. How pity, there are many folks who just don’t want to give away seemingly less reasonable, flippant, condemning source of their thought angle as yet anxiously thinking that they might lay themselves to ridicule. Anyway, one of those thought-to-be-ashamed sources is the movie watching where the film makers are amply succeeding in leaving a particular fictional image in the heads of the viewer. This image could be regarding anything, literally anything: place, culture, nation, beliefs, religion, historical events, ideology, and so forth – scooping iota details in our minds . All categories of the plot could be too perfect or too odd, too shocking or too overwhelming and therefore usually deceiving if to say nothing – more destorting and destructive that further creating stereotypical narrative. And here is no need to explain how stereotypes dull the real picture – what is been hidden or yet to be revealed; We catching the idea of the portrayed image in the movie and frivolously passing it in the masses slightly editing more fictional details – voila, trite stereotype is made!

Filming Bollywood movie in 2022 (Identicalpictures)

To learn or not to learn?

Well, not necessarily saying that learning from the movies is wrong and zany but to utterly rely on the image that you see on the screen is quite hasty. In this way our life choices could simply be doomed – choosing the life path relying on nonsensical prejudgments: “What do you know about Persian Empire? -Prince of Persia and 300 Spartans”,”What can you tell about Asian culture? – Love for dragons and anime”, “What do you think of Russia – Reckless, vodka drinkers, cold, least sympathetic society”…Tell me if Im wrong and you never heard those views and beliefs. So it’s better to strip away the habit of making up a rigid opinion after watching just a one movie, especially when it comes about how life works somewhere else. Hmm, by this layers of sentences I did sound like I’ve been through some doubt-challenge-debunk quest figuring out how movies did sketch a faulty image of certain things in my head(especially regarding the culture) that later on I discovered was quite the opposite to what I saw in the film. Not taking into account the personal life of happily-ever-after scenario, which deserves to have a complete separate analysis described in other written post…spoiler alert. But coming back to the topic, you should see my one-eye-twitching face from either disappointment or surprising  gratification once I crusade some areas, which I’ve seen only in the movies before. 

Curiosity comes into action 

Accordingly, the US is known as the most active film-maker and distributor of the movies constantly investing billion dollars in cinematograph worldwide – those guys or ‘Uncle Sam’ do know how world works when it comes to building the favourable image,  winning hearts, and creating a dream place/nation that everyone wants to join or at least come to visit. In the US they figured what is the easiest and far more luring an eye-catching info than anything else – the motion picture that capturing our attention as like tackling our focus and lead us to the story: Casual, using seemingly alike life narratives, sharply influencing to the point of following the actors of those stories in the real life. Didn’t this happen to you? I haven’t met a person yet who at least once didn’t come across the will of checking how some actor/actress in the story lives in their actual life. Simple curiosity with its so many levels: first, I would call a ‘blink’ or a ‘see-and-forget’ curiosity level when you can care less but just on the quest to fill the gap in knowing a bit more about the character or movie itself, also to excuse yourself why you even watched it; second, a ‘flip-through’ when you tackled by an idea to be well-read/enlightened about the subject of an action; third, a ‘bubble- blow ‘- sudden turn or totally new unexpected info /plot that shook your careless know-what-will-happen predictions; forth, a ‘air-juggle’ when you know its pointless but anyway would check it just because it could be fun without having much of an interest after; fifth, a ‘buzzing’ level – tempted to get deeply into the story and who is behind it; six , a ‘chaser-caser ‘-  bigotry to know as much as possible, follow the movie actors and spread this interest on others. 

We could go on and on naming the curiosity levels, as there much more than I’ve listed her, but I tried to point out the most known and often encountered ones. 

Different country, different movie script 

North Korean leader Kim Jong-il checking filming process in 1979 (scmp)

How different is the movie plot of South Korean films from Turkish ones? Can you tell where is the movie made at while reading the spirit or watching the trailer? What are the main characteristics of the movies produced by one country? More, more, and more questions that I wonder about and assume that some would interest you as well. So get on the movie-expert/critique mode and let’s start going through the key points: Idea, Strength, Weakness, Expectation, Leaving impression, Audiences Feedback.  And possibly compare with one another.

 

To be continued in another post…- Different Country, Different Movie Script

 

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