Haven't been writing for a while...
I'm just announcing that I uploaded all my videos again to youtube, for better quality.
So go check out the videos!
One topic I was about to write was the new James Bond film. I'll just talk about it briefly. I liked it. I know that even though Bond is now portrayed a bit confused and clearly lost person, they still are not intellectual films, and they possibly shouldn't be , but I like the way Daniel Craig makes James Bond feel like a complete lunatic from time to time. He has this crazy-look in his eyes, which is nice.
All the old James Bonds were just clean fellows who had no soul but it did not worry them, now it feels like Bond is all the time ready to fall apart, when he has no clear mission, like chasing a bad guy. But I think the new bond is a bit more real and there is some moral in his character, absurdly violent as he may be, but at least he clearly is a non-well person.
So, I can't understand why people have disliked the new Bond film. It is fast and exploding, but that is just the way an action film has to be, and since it was a clear sequel, continuing straight after Casino Royale, it is totally understandable that there is no need to stop and explain what is happening. Even though there were some plot holes in the film, or some bad writing at least, but they were hard to notice when the movie went on forward so fast..
But I think that the next Bond is hard to do, because this film worked because of the blow of Casino Royales freshness, but it wont last three films, so if Bond doesn't go mad in the next film or something, the series will fall back to the uninteresting saga of films that it was before Casino Royale.
When movies were born, first films ever made were documentaries. Back then there was talk about people not having to travel around the world to see things anymore, cause film would bring all the wonders of the world to them. It was to be a new strong medium for education and civilization.
Now we live in a time when everyone (who has the level of wealth as most of Finns have) can buy a decent video camera and a laptop with cheap editing systems and produce films, much easier than Lumiere bros and our subjects could be examined more thoroughly, than the social commentary about workers leaving factory, by Lumiere brothers, because of the infinite material we have for filming, seemingly no cost at all.
When I look at films like Zeitgeist- Addendum, Loose Change, and Earthlings, I feel like "this is what we should all do, this is NOW". These three appear to be some of the flagships of internet distributed indie documentaries.
The internet and the easiness of working with moving images has only now, 100 years later of the first documentary film filmed, reached the level of really starting to work as the medium it was supposed to be. And services like Youtube contribute also to this cause. The fact that writing an essay or publishing an opinion letter on newspaper is not the only way to state your mind and taking part. Of course youtube in all its good has also set an example of the surplus that a good service always produces, and it struggles with not drowning to it.
The documentaries I mentioned are almost completely compiled of archive material or animated material. Only some interviews have been shot and they both work pretty much because of the strong text, read by a voice behind the repetitive images - meaning that the language of cinema they use is quite simple and old fashioned. But this only shows that you wont even have to film anything to make an important, or at least strong and interesting film.
And there has of course been films like this before, but now combining the lightness of digital cinema to the lightness of broadband internet, the information and viewpoints are free to take their place, out of the cages of: festivals, cinemas and the totally lost medium: TV.
The argumentation on both films is clearly simplified to serve the aims of the movie makers, but this is the fact that needs to be understood: There is no way around it that they tell us the things in the light as they want us to perceive them, but never think that this is not the case in all the movies, books, newspapers or news you see every day.
Meaning that they only give a new angle on things and I believe that this is their goal. Even though there is always a slight touch of mass psychology since all these films tell us to "Join" something..But since we already are members of this capitalist-religion, this can be accepted.
So I am not saying that a new age of political movie has begun because of these internet documentaries, but in my opinion there could be something to it. The only problem is that being a new interesting subculture, it won't be taken seriously in the mainstream media. It is partially a good thing, cause it aims to take the lead from the mainstream media. But also gives large amount of people the view that theses kind of docs are just conspiracy jibberish, not to be taken seriously.
The fact that there has not been, at least not to my knowledge, a public statement against the "proofs and theories" that Loose Change gives out, which are quite easy to believe, has two sides. On one hand it gives the image that these theories are ridiculous and therefore not worthy of a official response. But the other side of it is this: Now in the time of freedom of speech, internet, blogs and everything, we drown in opinions and theories. Therefore, to raise one or two from this mass of information, even to deny or criticize, is to state that it has some truth to it.
And since it seems probable that they can not explain for example about "the building 7" in 9/11 attacks, they see it better just not to answer the question. This is the new censorship of information: When asked - don't answer. The people will forget and stop asking and get on with our everyday life with money problems and jobs and entertainment.
We can write to our blogs, even make documentaries, no one says to us we can't do it. But it won't help, as long as the arguments don't get "publicly recognized" (whatever that means). But you still get the feeling that you have said what you had to say. This works only as long as there is the mainstream media that has some authority.
Of course, countries like Finland are still quite safe from this. The circles are so small that even one sms-message sent by some politician goes straight to every paperstand. But that is also a way of restricting our knowledge. Finnish news media tend to attract our thoughts in totally wrong things.
Now a film Earthlings, differs a bit, not building any theories of how governments enslave mankind. It just shows the facts behind our habits concerning our place in this planet,what we eat and so on. Make the connection.
So links at the end, for films to watch:
http://www.earthlings.com/
http://www.zeitgeistmovie.com/
http://www.loosechange911.com/blog/
To believe? Well, I watch them as I watch any other film..And of course there are tons of others, but just these 3 for starters.
Now comes an interpretation of Star Wars and an attack towards a great film theorist.( I put this back on the front page)
Some time ago I watched all the Star Wars movies, yes, all 6 of them, even the 3 new ones. I must admit, that even being an old somewhat "hardcore" star wars fan, it was quite a struggle. The new 3 movies are just bad movies, bad cinema, and there is no way around it. The most pleasurable view were the episodes 4 and 5, New hope and The Empire Strikes Back. Even Return of the Jedi was a bit eerie. But, although I´d like to, I am not going to complain about the 3 newer episodes or the changes made to the old ones, even though they make me feel sick.
But now when all the 6 Star Wars movies are out there, what is the saga about? If we look at the characters, we see that there are 3 characters appearing in all 6 of them. R2D2, C-3po, and Anakin Skywalker, although he appears as Darth Vader in 3 of them, but the core person stays the same. So I think it is safe to state that the main character of star wars clearly is not the 2 robot buddies, although they are 2 important ones. So the the lead character of star wars is Anakin Skywalker / Darth Vader. He goes trough the biggest changes, he learns the biggest lessons. 
Anakins mom states to Qui-Gon, that Anakin was born without a father, miraculous birth due to the high count of midichloriants. So, wanted Lucas is or not, we make an instant connection to Jesus, and all the talk of Anakin being the chosen one makes the matter even worse and irritating. Well only thing I´m going to say about that is this; Jesus had somewhat complicated relationship with his father, don´t you think?
Originally a slave boy, Anakin is characterized in a quite cartoonie way to be lost and unbalanced kid who has mixed emotions and is quite temperamental. He longs for recognition from the Jedi council but the Jedis are not so eager to accept him to be their savior and wonder child. This strange and somewhat unexplained longing for recognition and power is not too clearly explained in the film. Anakin just is that way. Yes, he misses his mother who had to be left behind, but the emotional motives for Anakins behavior are not too clear, possibly due to bad directing. Anakin is constantly saying lines like "I am the best pilot!" and "I am the strongest Jedi!", like he had something to prove someone.
Well, isn´t there a theory about sons and fathers, and the emotional distresses they can create? Anakin, a fatherless child never had the fathers love and acceptance that he is important and adequate to full fill his place in the world. He longs for it, but can never have it. Anakin finds his father figure from the "most powerfull man" in the Galactic senate, a strong senator Palpatine who quickly rises to be the leader of the Galactic senate. This person is the only one who Anakin sees to be sufficiently great to be his replacement for a father. And he turns out to be a Sith lord. So what choice Anakin has? He has to be his apprentice, cause he is like a father he never had.. A note for later: Palpatine appears in 5 of the six movies, as same as Yoda, but has much more screen time..
In Episede III Anakin is totally lost, he needs Padme, but doesn´t seem to be able to emotionally connect to her (there is something realy fake in their relationship, is it the acting or the story?), he respects and hates The Jedi´s at the same time, Padme and Anakin have this secret relationship that is unaccepted and Padme is pregnant, and it is forbidden to Jedi´s to have children. This is like a too young kid going trough life too fast, not quite understanding whats happening and ultimately unable to take the responsibility needed. (the story telling might be similar to Anakins feelings, concentrating on the wrong things, alot of extra stuff..)
The scene what we all were waiting, where Anaking finally turns in to the Darth Vader we know, is irritatingly inter cut with the scene where Padme, his fiancee, gives birth to Luke and Leia and dies in the birth her self. So we witness the birth of Luke and Leia and the birth of Darth Vader - the birth of the next(or the old)chapter of Star Wars saga. And we see the death of Anakin, Padme, the Jedis and the Galactic senate as it turns in to the Empire. Death of this trilogy. How brilliant...
But more importantly we see the transformation of a fatherless Anakin,to a father him self. Not having a father he can not become one now, without turning in to some kind of monster. Even tough he is not aware of the children surviving. Hes anger towards himself is catalyzed by the lie that he killed Padme himself. But the concrete thing we see is, that when Anakin becomes a father, he becomes this inhuman dark machine. As I heard somewhere that Darth Vader is based on Dark Father..eh.
So now, the old, good, Star Wars films tell a story about Luke, an orphan, a bit restless and rebellious. He has this unexplained longing to somewhere, which is common to teenagers, I think. He hears a tale about great wars and about how great pilot his "real father" was and how Darth Vader betrayed and murdered him. Luke starts to follow the path that eventually leads him to confront Darth Vader. This is of course told in a way much more believable way than anything in the new saga.
Luke becomes something of a hero and seems to be pleased about the fact, but something still troubles him. There is the tension that Luke must confront the man who supposedly killed his father and therefore robbed him of the love and bonding between father and son. Comparing to Anakin, Luke has a goal which he can reach for, the supposed reason for his detachment where Anakin never had any target to put all his energy to, cause there was no clear reason for his fatherless life.
Luke sees a hallucination which tells him to go to this distant planet to became a Jedi and for some reason he follows it. There he has another vision of his friends being in danger. He also fights imaginary Darth Vader and kills him, seeing that the Darth Vader was actually he himself. This is later referred as "the failure in the cave". As in if Luke just kills Vader, he fails and kills a part of himself, the chance to become complete. To reach the unity which lies in the truth about the true relationship of Luke and Vader. And also gives clues to still ignorant viewer about whats going to be revealed.
Well, soon enough Luke finds out that the reason for these weird visions was that Darth Vader did not kill his father, but is his father. Then we see a great scene where he shouts "No! That´s not true! Thats impossible!" Yeah.
"Join me, so we can rule the galaxy as father and son!" As we know, Luke jumps down from that thing, he chooses to take the chances of dying in the fall and not to join Darth. Cause the fact of Vader being his true father, his origin, is at this point seems too terrible to live with anyway. It is in incongruity with everything he had believed. This can be argued that Luke knew that he would not die when he jumped down..but then a gain..did he?
When realizing that Palpatine was evil, Anakins most precious father figure, he dropped down to his knees and pledged his obedience. And when Luke hears that hes true father was the devil, sort of speak, he dropped to almost certain death.
Comparing to Lukes situation to Anakins: Palpatine represented the "Galatic Senate" and "democracy" at that point. Jedis were there to protect them, so the revelation of Palpatine being evil was much more difficult for Anakin, cause now he knows that the leader of the Republic that he had served and the father figure he had needed so much is, what only the Jedis call evil, so there was too much mixed feelings for Anakin. Palpatine supported Anakin on purpose constantly told him that he was "becoming the greatest Jedi" giving him this feeling of importance that parents often give, so how could he deny this.. Where as Luke and his friends fight the evil Empire anyway and it represented everything that they hated. So the knowledge of Vader being his father was too much, cause all the basis for his life was suddenly gone, the target of Lukes hatred was wrong.
Luke: "I am a Jedi, like my father before me."
Surviving and unable to avoid the fact, Luke again seeks confrontation with his real father, and whats most important: with acceptance of the fact that Vader, the so-called ultimate evil, really is his father. He goes to Vader and Palpatine and again Luke chooces the almost certain death to joining the evil, for the second time, when Anakin had failed at the first try. The saga ends to the point where Anakin who never had a father, sees that his own son, who he did not raise himself, loves him enough to trust his life in front of the Emperor (formerly known as Palpatine). Kind of unconditional love that he has never experienced. At this point Anakin gets all the recognition he has ever needed, the void of never having a father is surprisingly filled from unexpected feeling of being one himself, so and decides to end the manipulative and demanding relationship to Palpatine, and saves his son, who despite all the things Vader represents, believes in him. Vader sort of accepts that hes search has been futile, but sees that he is now on the other side and has now a chance to take the place of the father he should be.
There is this close-up shots just before the act of saving, which i think is the only shot, or series of shots, that had some extra meaning with the "new saga". In that shot we see the story of Anakin gathered to this one moment. But then again, it worked without the new saga..
Like the quote above states, that even though Lukes father had become a dark lord, he had a father, therefore he has something to cling on to, he wants to be a Jedi, like his father was, there is a meaning in that. Where Anakin was to become a Jedi, cause, well, he had no place else to be. Some one told him that he must be cause he is so good at it. But in the light of the new episodes, Luke is no longer a leading character, but supportive to Darth Vader in completing his story.
A famous film theorist Zizek said that in the birth-death scene, Anakin becoming Vader, we see the ultimate nightmare, our father becoming immortal. And this is what the old saga is about. There is this Dark figure that dominates everything, until the final confrontation of father and son.
But where Zizek was wrong, was that, at first, Anaking never wanted to be immortal. Both Anakin and Luke suffer from attachment to the persons near to them. I mean they can´t bear the thought of them dying or even being hurt and are always running to help them. They don´t trust their loved ones to survive them selves, they have this kind of narcissistic thing going on, where they their friends exist only to compensate some missing feelings of importance and safety.. Of course this has to do with the person surviving himself, but from my point of view Anakin does not seek a path to immortality, he seeks only to make sure that the persons he loves stay alive, what matter the consequences. This is stated very clearly in many Anakins lines in the movies "Someday I am able to stop people from dying!" and "I won´t let you die" and so on. Actually it is the good side of the force, the Jedis that find a way to make themselves immortal. There is only talk about this some sith lord able to save others from dying, but then not able to avoid being killed themselves.
So Zizeks Freudian theory of never dying father being the ultimate nightmare is somewhat irrelevant, I think. And takes things out of the wholeness of the story and manipulates the story and character to fit the spychoanalytic analysis. This seems to be common for this sort of analysis. He should treat the StarWars saga as a whole, cause he takes the basis for his Darth Vader-theory from Episode 3 but it only aplies in episodes 4-6. So in that way it becames a bit meaningless.
Through my view, view of Vader being the main character, all of the Star Wars films seem to be about finding the lost father. Anakin does not choose to became immortal(or in a sense immortal), he needs to become, because had he died in the burning lava after Obi-wan cut of both of Anakins legs, the longing for acceptance and love would never be fulfilled, and finally he dies right after the moment it has fulfilled. In the scene where Anakin almost dies, he does not beg for anyone to come for his help he just shouts "I HATE YOU!" to Obi-wan, as if now that he hates everybody he could as well die..
This somehow connects to the scene where Luke jumps down in ESB, seeing what his father was, makes life feel too unbeareble and meaningles and he feels that he´d rather die, but Luke survies the fall for the same reason as Anakin survided the burn.
The Zizeks explanation of Darth Vader is at least totally inadequate. As we see right in the beginning of Empire Strikes Back, is that Darth Vader is no overlord, that he obeys the Emperor still as an apprentice. In episode 4 Vader is all the time under the power of Grand Mof Tarking, he orders, Vader obeys. And as we can understand with the help of the new saga, this is the only thing that Anakin has ever wanted; to obey and get recognition about the good work he has done. He tries forever to be the "good son" he never could be. That´s why Vader is constantly shown to kill his vassals, when they fail to do the jobs Vader needs them to do. The whole saga ends with the death of the false father figure, the true source of all evil!!
At Luke does not treat Vader as this dark father figure that must be defeated, in Episode 4 there is no confrontation directly between Luke and Vader, Episode 5, the firs saber-duel Luke still thinks Vader killed his father, Episode 6 They fight for a time, but Luke repeatedly says "I will not fight you father" and Vader is the aggressive one, because of the Emperors will.
In Return of the Jedi, Luke still has chance to think if he would joins his father and complete their relationship as the Emperor wants, but if he does that, they´ll both be under Emperors might, and by joining Darth he would never find his real father.
If Luke is Vaders son, therefore there must be something of Vader in him, so it must work the other way around also. And because of this the final battle is not between Vader and Luke, but Luke and Palpatine, the Empreror. Vader intervenes, he wakes up from the dream that started in Episode III, killing the younglings and all that, and now kills the false father figure that has been around for so long and finally gets to see the acceptance and love of his son. Now, when the false father of Anakin has died, he can be a father himself, for the brief moment. He asks Luke to take the Vader mask of, which he psychologically does not need anymore, or which Luke has already taken off in a way. "Let me look at you with my own eyes." Anakin becomes what he never had, the thing he could never own. The saga could have ended there: The real father and son are united for the first and the last time. Had there not been all the other characters of course.
This theory might explain why the new Star Wars saga is so badly directed. I don´t know, but if Lucas had some father-son trouble of his own, the feelings might have been too clear for him self, so clear that he could not, or forgot to transmit them to the audience. So that we would know whats going on.
End question: Do you know how many times a hand is cut off in all the Star Wars films? Everybody gets their hands cut off!?! The theme of cut-off hands? Could some one tell me whats the idea behind that?
I must confess that I´ve partly been wrong about certain matters. The fact still is, that computers, cameras, steenbecks, pens and brushes are all just tools to deliver a message and if a letter is written with a quill pen or with a computer the content stays the same. Or does some one disagree?
But, when talking about art and why not letters, there is still something that the tools and the medium delivers and contribute to the wholeness of the work. At an age when it is common to write a letter with email, what would it express if someone sent you a hand written letter, written with an ink quill pen? Well, atleast that he/she has possibly written the letter many times, if the text is clean and there are no errors. Or atleast the writer has thought about it carefully before writing it, and possibly concentrated much more to the actuall writing, drawing the letters, than it would have been necessary with a computer. But does this change the message? If the letter has some bad news? If it is a love letter, then it could be understood, but almost any other letter would seem odd, don´t you think? So we live in a time when we can choose the appropriate medium for our expressions. Therefore the mediums have an effect to the content, or support it in a way.
So, the choice of editing with a steenbeck has been in line with the choice of shooting in 35mm, and unlike I said earlier, it brings a certain value to it. The only thing is that it might be a value that no one else is able to see, than me, the director and possibly other filmmakers...
Even though some might argue that recieving a love letter written with a quill pen would me too melodramatic or romanticism, this is the problem with little style nuances, everyone has their own opinion about them.
I really look forward to seeing this film on screen, without hearing the sound that the steenbeck makes, and there is a sound every time a cut is coming, cause the tapes have glued to the film while being rolled to the reels, and now they are opening and streching, so I can hear every cut. So I hope that seeing it in a digital form gives me this feel of relief, cause now when watching it, every cut feels kinda bad.
Previously posted view of the digital age-director is much due to my own way of shooting and directing. There has not been a single thing I´ve directed that I´ve hadn´t thought trough editing. I mean, during the shooting I´ve thought "Oh, this I can use from this shot, this from the other one, and lets take few more if something else comes up". And ofcourse this is the way to make an outside editor crazy. I hope there will be a day that I have a chance to work with an editor. I really look forward to it and I am planning to use an editor I ever get a film done.
And as I some time a go stated during the shooting of my own short film, shootin a lot of material is not a sign of "indecisivines", sometimes that is the only way to get the look for the film that is carefully planned. So it is not like if the is a lot of shots and variation, that it means that director does not know what he wants, usually it is the opposite. It about the style of the storytelling. But I think this kind of style has grown with digital editing.
As I spoke about the clear and unclear material before, well, the situation was that the mechanics of using steenbeck took most of my energy and I might have been a bit frustrated about it, so this may have had some effect on my creative thinking :)
But, the experience of editing with film has given me insight more about my self as an editor, than it has about editing a film. Cause editing stays the same, but my attitude and my abilities to use the tools change. This has been interesting.
But I leave deeper contemplation for later.
No, really everything is going ok. I´m just having this illness going on right now, hope it will pass, cause I still have to edit 2 things at the same time. Jalil-film is nearing the end, it looks fine and the duration is something about 30mins 15s. Including end credits so we still have to cut about 20s. out and that is not that much.
I had some deep thoughts about editing, but right now I can´t remember them, cause I woke up with a sore troath too early.
Soon I have defeated the enormously hard job of fixing the rough cut to first decent cut..but not yet, or almost. There is still some cut-fixing to do, but now the editing is much much more easier when the film is beginning to have some shape.
Few days ago I enjoyed one of the brighter sides of my work. Being at the Sputnik oy, Mr. Kaurismäki visits there occasionally and today I had a chance for a small chat with him. We briefly talked about editing and I whined a bit about this Steenbeck business, being so slow and all, to which he replied "It is much faster than a computer...or have they shot some extra material? If they have shot only what is needed and no more, Steenbeck is a much faster way to edit."
Funny man and very nice and supportive. But this made me think. When I looked at the raw material before I started to edit it, I thought "how nice, this material is really simple and clean". Meaning that it was easy to see what they had thought about in the shootings. Well, during the editing it did not appear so clear to me anymore. I could not tell by looking at the material what was intended and seemed like many shots were shot with out a clear idea where or how to use it.
Well, If I had worked with final cut it would be a clear material, but editing with steenbeck makes you think what you are going to do before you do it, and I noticed that not only is this a challenge for me as an editor, but maybe for the director and cinematographer as well..
It appears so that many directors have completely absorbed the working methods of digital editing. And why shouldn´t they? But it is seen in the material. My guess is, that if, for example all film schools made the directors edit their first film on a steenbeck, they might think an alternate way to shoot a scene, in comparision to being able to edit it digitally.
What I mean is that the knowledge of being able to twist the material to almost any form and try again and again in few seconds might give directors this feel of safety and putting the "decisions" for later, to the editing table.
So in a sense, with digital editing, the emphasis of editing has grown. I did not think like this before I edited with steenbeck. But editors now-a-days usually get all the material, eventhough the selection of shots is usually done with director, but we still have all the material and we can use bits and pieces from here and there and with digital editing the sound editing has become bigger part of film editing, being able to connect different lines to different shots already in the editing room and so on.
And I know, that all this has been possible before digital editing. But it has been much harder. Much slover. Like Kaurismäki said "If they have shot something extra, its slover". Like I assume that he is a man who knows how he wants his picture be framed and knows what he is going to use. That is the reason he often edits his own films. Cause he does not need an editor because he has done most of the editing already in the shoot.
Of course for me, this digital age with "indicisive" directors ( I don´t say this to insult any of the directors I´ve worked with, just pondering about this matter) is much more interesting for me as an editor. I guess I would not be an editor, had there not been this breaktrough in digital editing, about the same time I grew up.
So, maybe I now ruined everything, or maybe not. If working with film has something to offer, did I neglect the chances of learning by using modern tool to help my editing? Let me elaborate on the matter.
Few days ago I looked the material and was in anguish because of its complexity. My teacher had said that complex dialogue scenes would be better to plan with a pen and paper before cutting the actual film. So I sat there, watching the raw material I had put together and wondered should I start to draw some storyboards or what.. Then my eyes moved on the table and I saw my mobile phone. Nothing happened yet but when I looked it a bit longer I realized that it has a "good quality" video camera in it.. There was not yet a thought in my mind.. I just slowly opened the videocam-opiton from my phone and pointed it to the screen of Steenbeck. At this point the idea formed in my head. "If I shoot with this the raw footage I´ve gathered and done preliminary editing on, I can do the ´demo´of the final edit using this mobilephone video material!" Isn´t that the same as doing it with storyboards?? Even better!? 
(in picture "the nail closet" a real life replacement for "bin" look down for more info)
So I shot some scenes and went home to edit them. The director found this really funny, but in my opinion it really gives me a big help. I can do the thinking as I would do it normally in editing, but then go there to cut the film, using the video as a reference. And it worked, today I cut one of the scenes I had edited with my laptop and it was easy and fun. So, do I now miss all the teachings that editing with steenbeck has to offer? I believe not. I just speed up the editing, cause I don´t edit the whole film like this. Only the few harder scenes. In my point of view it would be stupid not to use this method for help.
After all, in the movie Space odyssey 2001 the monkeys that learned to use tools, bones as a weapon, defeated the monkeys that did not understand to do this. So it is idiocy not to use all the help that is available. And I still work with the film and I had to overcome some problems concerning the sound. And I did! Although I´m still not using 2 soundtracks, cause I find that hard and weird. I just do edits in different places in sound than in picture. Simple, but keeping the sync wasn´t easy at first.
So, I have only one week time to do this, then I have to start editing this tv-show. So after next week I have to do this on the evenings. But now I feel that this will work, that maybe we can get this film edited someday :)
These are the alternate "bins" where I collect the material which I´ve edited out..And this is what I am used to->
Or actually at first I use the nail closet, then I move the film to the bins...
So, today, after 2 weeks. I finally finished the first assembly of the movie. It is still quite primitive version, whit parts of many takes including the same action/dialogue. From this version I start to scrape the final film.
(in picture: the raw cut reels, duration: unknown)
I must say, I´ve gone through some variable emotions during these 2 weeks. The knowledge that the time wont be enough always pops to my head and if I am doing something difficult, the indignation starts to rise.
Sometimes it has been hard to control the rage that boils, but mostly I´ve been doing fine. I guess now I am at the point that every other day feels good and every other bad.
I just mostly think "Why am I doing this?" . Today I thought about development in mechanics and all these electronics. And the over all importance of all these equipments. Like a cellphone is basically totally unnecessary, but when it was invented, suddenly everyone had one and now, it is hard for me, for example, to think about living with out it. So even though the human race managed with out a cell phone for all these years, was there a need for that kind of equipment in our species or culture? Cause if it had been a totally unimportant invention, there would not be so many of them in the world. Like for example, I don´t own a tamagochi or whattehell they were, or a palm-computer...
So, before digital editing was invented, people made good films. No doubt about that. But for me, a person who has never used even an analog video-editing system, just edited some stuff with 2 normal vcrs, but basically learned editing with a computer, it seems really, really odd to be editing with Steenbeck. I mean, yes it is cool to use the old-school method. But it feels so hard. It is so ponderous to do..And I still would like to question the fact that it is somehow more real way to do it or more hard-core. I think it is just more harder.Cause although digital editing has made editing easier and more approachable to everyone, it still requires some skill to do it well, some understanding about things that not everyone seem to understand. Using steenbeck might be the old hand way to do things and it might include some heavy thinking that "the soft generation" today can not do, but I claim that if you find an old editor who has never used Final Cut pro, he might find it quite hard. It is only a question about what have you become accustomed to. Nothing else. Editing basically stays the same.
So at this point, my claim is that I´ll just learn to use steenbeck, but that is all I am going to learn and what we achieve with this? Well, I just hope that the movie will become as good as it would have been If i´ve edited it the normal way. And I possible will be soo tired after all this.
And still, I feel that using digital editing, lets you sculpt the material in a really special way, compared to steenbeck-editing..
but I think we still sometimes miss the romanticism there was in meeting a person, and not being able to keep in touch with him/her all the time with multiple equipments (like facebook, cellphone, messenger...). So is there something in not using the latest inventions of everything? Or is it just stupidity. Sometimes maybe, not all the time.
First full day of real 35mm film editing behind. Before today I was just syncing the material and we watched trough with the director and my teacher came to give me some advices with the editing yesterday.
I tried to do something yesterday, but suddenly I realized the magnitude of work needed and the work being so slow that our timetables would not hold. I got really anxious and could not work at all. Luckily clock was something about 6´00 p.m. so I went home to cure my anxiousness with some jasmine tea.
Today I started fresh but it still seemed hard. It is hard to explain. People call me "a fast editor" or "a good editor". But the thing is, that like with writing, which I prefer to do on a computer because for me it is much faster and more pleasant to write with keyboard, cause with a pen I must concentrate to every letter, cause my handwriting turns really really bad if I write too fast, same thing applies here.
With Final Cut Pro, for example, I don´t need to use the program to edit. What I mean that I don´t feel like I am using some tool to shape the material. I am just shaping it. I feel like I have almost straight contact with the material cause all the versions of all different ways of cutting appear in front of me right a way, almost simultaneously when I think about them. ALMOST. Working with FCP is so fast, when you´ve learned it, of course, that just seeing the material, and with few clicks seeing the cuts, lets you imagine in a very concrete way.
People always talk about the different way of thinking. Well, that is true. But right now I am not convinced that the thinking method with steenbeck-editing is in any way better than with digital editing.
It requires that you visualize the cuts beforehand in your head. This you can do with a computer instantly. Here you look at the material, think that "this might work" then you do it, then you evaluate. The process is in its simplicity the same with digital editing, but at this stage, I feel that there is a machine between me and the material. This is of course present with all new instruments.
But the way I´ve learned to use digital editing, which enables me to work fast with it, I cut corners with some stages of thinking, editing with digital edit is more like feeling for me. I never think about my first versions. Or not that much, I just make what feels good, then I watch it, and see that some of it is good, some of it is bad.
This sounds bad, I know. "with digital editing you don´t have to think". But that is not what I mean. Or even if it was, that still would be a good thing I think, cause for editor, feeling is as much important than thinking rationally. Even more important and for me, it is good that feel comes before rational though and not the other way around.
What I mean is just that with Steenbeck, it takes a very long time to complete a single cut. So during that time, at least for a beginner, you have to concentrate on doing the right markings, keeping the sync and rolling the left over material to left-overs reel and do all the taping and cutting. All this time is away from thinking about the film itself.
So, it might be that this procedure becomes mechanic for me that I don´t have to think about all the stages, but still... There is some reason that I still write with computer and not with a pen. And I believe that it is not only because it is just easier.
This connects straight to one other thought I´ve had aboud editing. It´s about all the people that talk about the beauty and power of editing and use examples of Eisensteins´ montage. . . Yeah that is a cool thing.and interesting. But the real power of editing comes with the feeling of the material. The ability to evolve already shot scenes with actors to the next stage, only with choosing the right moments and what to leave out and what to show and editor also can think about how to show it. Emotional editing. And I don´t mean pictures connected with weird ways. Just a simple conversation scene for example. A really good editor is found through these kind of scenes.
Now I´ll rest for the weekend and see on Monday if the reels really are all in sync. After the screenings begins the editing, which will be interesting.
Before the film cutter was invented, or the film splicer, editors cut the film with scissors, stropped the frames with sandpaper and glued them together. After adding the glue they hold the glued frames with 2 fingers for about 10 seconds. Then the cut was done.
Dr. Leo Catozzo was editing Fellinis´La Dolce Vita (Now if I am wrong, please correct me), and during the editing, I guess he got frustrated to the constant changes and versions Fellini wanted to see, and he started to think that there must be an easier way to do edits. Why cant we use just simple tape? would it hold? what about the perforation-holes on the sides? Well, he started to design a machine and soon enough the guy invented the Self- Perforating Adhesive Tape Film Splicer.
It has a track for the film to go in, and little metallic holders for the perforation holes. The topside opens and you can put the film there, and on the right side there is a blade to cut film with.
After you´ve cut the film you move the film to the right side of the splicer, so that the end is in the middle, and the other end, which you want to cut to, to the other side, so that the cut is in the middle of the splicer, and use the tape which can be seen in the middle of the splicer in the photo. Then you press the thing down with some strength and the splicer cuts the tape and does perforation holes also. This thing takes about 10 second. So in its time this was an awesome improvement, and possibly saved many editors lives out of stress-related deaths.
So the good doctor Catozzo got a patent for the machine became very rich, stopped editing films, bought a mansion at an island somewhere and lived nicely there. And might still be living, I could not find any birth dates or like that on the net, so lets hope he enjoys himself where ever he is.
Of course, from my point of view even using the film splicer takes a lot of time, cause I am used to the little "razor icon" on the screen that i can click. Or even better the fast key for it on my keypad.
On Tuesday I worked 10 hours, on Wednesday 11 hours and today, Thursday 12 hours. There seems to be too few hours in a day. Today I left work just because I counted that I won´t get enough rest for tomorrow, if I don´t leave now.
(in picture: film cutter )
My working tempo has improved and if everything goes well I have all the scenes in sync by tomorrow evening. But if everything doesn´t go well...Like today at around 7:30 p.m when I had been working already over 11 hours. I was going to ad one shot to a reel, when I noticed that almost the whole reel, except few of the last shots are out of sync about 2 frames. I started to fix this, and when I was nearly finished, I realized that I had not gone from the beginning to end fixing the mis-sync, but from end to beginning, rewinding, and fixing the sync. This was a great mistake. The problem would have been fixed by adding 2 frames to the beginning of the reel, but now I added 2 frames to 10 different shots in a reel, so the first shot that I fixed was now something like 18frames out of sync. I realized this when I was nearly finished, and started to fix it again, removing all the other "fixes"besides the first one...how foolish of me.
But this is something that at least I need to work on: Linearity. Computer editing is non-linear. And it truly is that. I sometimes hear that in comparison to Steenbeck editing, digital editing has different "direction" in editing than in Steenbeck. People sometimes speak about editing "on the right side" on the computer, or "on the left side" on Steenbeck. Yes, on Steenbeck you do the editing on the left side of the table, but on a computer, there is no sides. You can edit however you want. Not on the right or the left, but on both or in the middle or up and down if you will. So..Nonlinear editing has made it difficult for me to always understand that things are linear.. but of course this is not a major problem.
Here you can see some film cases on the upper shelf. Below that you can see (from the right) some empty film, for the beginning of the reels or where there is no image but it is needed, some empty sound (the blue thing) for the same purpose. Some cleaning liquid for the sound sensors, and some sound reels for syncing.
I have some anecdotes to tell, as soon as I get some time to write here properly. Now some sleep.
So, now that I again do something that differs a bit from my everyday doings I might as well write about it here, cause I feel empty and out of ideas.
Today started the editing of Jalil- shortfilm, at Sputnik-production company. I am editing it the "old school way", I cut 35mm film, I roll the reels. I tried to talk my way out of this, I just wanted to edit it with my laptop or something, you know, the usual way, but the producer and director were quite strict about this and laughed at my worries about working with real film.
Many times I emphasized that I have no idea about how to work with film or with the Steenbeck apparatus. But everybody told me that it was going to be fun and I would learn it in a few days or something.
Well, last week I went to see the horrific apparatus and my teacher from school came to give me some advices about using the ghastly machine. The main thing now is that working with Steenbeck is soooo slow. But it is different than computer being slow. If computer is slow, you get mad and start to hit it and your blood veins start to pop from your eyes and temples, but steenbeck goes as fast as you can use it. You have to rewind the material all the time, you have to check the sync all the time, you have to do your little markings all the time and make sure they are correct. So it is kinda like more natural way of working, even tough you operate an infernal gizmo.
What I noticed right away is that it feels really good not having to work with computer all the time. You can not just click the screen and go to check your facebook site, see the status updates of your friends and you can not check your e-mail every 5 minutes. I find this really soothing. The one thing I hate in editing is the fact that you have to sit in front of a computer all day, and when you have free time at the evenings or weekend, and you have time to write or something, you always end up sitting in front of a computer. If you are not outside.
What bothers me a bit is the fact that picture and sound never really meet while working with film. They are always separate and that makes me feel uneasy. Working with computer you sync the sound and picture to the same file and they stay that way. With film you just make the film and sound the same length. So every time you load a reel you have to check the sync.
But quite quickly I got rid of the first weird feeling of handling the real film material. That you have to really pull and roll and touch and cut the film. This was something that I thought about before I started working with film, that it must feel weird, but that feeling went away fast. At first I didn´t even dear to touch the film, at the end of the day (I worked 11 hours at the first day) I grabbed it and pulled it and made some strange markings to it and cut it with no worries..
So, let´s see what tomorrow brings, I only have this month to cut this film. It should be 28 minutes long. Im not sure how much material I have cause I can not count from the reels given to me.
I got almost 3 scenes to sync on the first day. There were many delays and I worked slowly, I hope my tempo quickens.. but there are 22 scenes so a good start! :)
The during the discussion about Fight Club some elements rose up that reminded me of another of my favourite films, or a film that like previous one, has made a strong impresion to me. I started to wonder the characters and the story in this particular film, and how I could compare it to Fight Club or to Demian possibly.
This is an underrated film called Gattaca, from 1997. Story takes place in near future, where children are conceived by genetic manipulation, to create a perfect human. Natural born humans are now a new underclass. Its a story about Vincent who fights against the future predicted for him, from his genes. Gattaca is a basic tale of one mans fight over unbelievable obstacles. So nothing new.
The Lead character Vincent has "invalid genes" and to reach his goals he has to become Jerome Morrow, a good gened guy with bad luck. He buys his personality. He becomes a so called "de-gene-rate", which is illegal of course. In the world of Gattaca, where genes mean everything, the most unclean, and intimate things, which humans usually don´t exchange with each other, things that might be regarded as dirty, or the Abject maybe, are now the most precious and expensive things and things that matter the most. A big part of becomin Jerome is that Vincent must leave behind traces of the good genes. Humas loose all the time hair, spit, skin, things that all hold the persons individual gene in them. Vincent practically buys Jeromes blood and piss. (because the frequent blood and piss test).
In Gattaca humans personality is diminished to genes. If your blood is good enough, no one cares about anything else. when Vincent and Jerome meet and they don´t look anything alike, but the middleman says that "it is close enough! when was the last time you´ve seen anyone looking at a picture" or something.
So now, an outcast man want´s to dive deep in the wrong-gone society and be one of the elite, but being an outcast he has to become some one else. Where in fight club, getting out, becoming an outsider, meant becoming someone else. So the direction is opposite from Fight Club.
The question of individual and personality in proportion to society and its expections and limitations is obvious.
Vincent: I can't go anywhere without seeing my own face. They'll recognize me.
Jerome: They won't recognize you.
Vincent: They'll recognize me.
Jerome: I don't recognize you.
It could be argued that Gattaca shows us what most of us are doing in real life. We have weird imaginations and expectations of our selves and what we should do with our lives, like Vincent has, he wants to go to space, and thats it, no explanations.
In order to attain these goals, like a good job or a career, the society around us gives us no choice but to leave our natural selves behind and become something else. We all must be better, cleaner, more intelligent and more good looking. We must be productive and happy. We willingly do unnatural acts to become these roles we have imagined for our selves. Because we think, or are made to think that we aren´t enough we have to be like society wants us to be, to reach happines or whatever.
Still, Gattaca shows us a hopeful view that anything can be done, but also shows the cost of it. Everything Vincent does, is for his career in space. Is that a good thing?
There are 2 men in a really close relationship, which is not approved by surrounding society. And there is the one woman in the middle of them. The relationship between Vincent, Jerome and Irene is somewhat similar to the relationship of the Narrator, Tyler and Marla in Fight Club. Irene is in love with Vincet, but for her he is Jerome, much like narrator is Tyler for Marla. So Irene is in love with the "imagined" person of Jerome Morrow, which is not real, like Tyler isn´t. Of course Vincent can never discuss Jerome with Irene, like in FC "never talk about me" says Tyler.
This arrangement is not the main focus of the movie, but its still clearly there. When the process is reaching its end, the real Jerome kills himself, leaving only the secretion bags for Vincent to last the rest of his life. And when the real Jerome disappears from the world, Vincents identity is also finally destroyed and replaced by Jeromes, by a push of a button. The rebuilding of ones personality is complete, and there is no coming back.
Vincent: [voiceover] For someone who was never meant for this world, I must confess I'm suddenly having a hard time leaving it. Of course, they say every atom in our bodies was once part of a star. Maybe I'm not leaving... maybe I'm going home.
In the movie Vincent has just reached his goal, but having second thoughts, cause he has now conveniently stepped to the life of a "valid", but fortunately he still remembers that his main goal was not getting in to a society of elite-people, but to use it to fly away from it.
So compared to Demian, where a bird must break the shell around it to break free, in Gattaca Vincent had to first built one, then be shipped in it to freedom. :)
A person from the dark world works his way up to the clean and desired world. Element similar to Fight Club are: society that gives the boundaries to fight against, 2 guys in a close uncommon relationship one being the unwanted starting point and the other the goal or the desire, the personality game, the process in which one becomes something new, a synthesis of 2 different factors, and maybe the Soap thing, if it is interpreted that way of the fat that it is made of is now being used to the goals of the characters, like here the real leftovers from human are precious for our main character.
Im going to totally set aside the fact that this movie deals with gene manipulation and makes a strong statement about it.
There is the question of brothers in Gattaca. Vincent is a "child of love" a product of passion where is younger, better brother is carefully planned and properly produced child.
Brother becomes a cop who tracks down a killer, who he suspects is Vincent. So this is a kind of Kain and Abel tale, which brings us to Demian and to the Bible of course.
"The mark of Kain" is the mark of Vincent being an "invalid". But it is also the mark from Demians interpretation, mark of desire, power and determination.
Water and swimming play a big part in Gattaca, to be honest, I really don´t know what that is about. The 2 brothers compete by swimming, yes, but they could do it running I guess.. Except being in water is like being in space, there is no way out, you can´t just stop swimming and walk away, you have to swim, or you die. We all swim in the current situation we are in. We can´t stop it if we want to survive.. Maybe that´s the point? Anyways, it is the part that made an affect on me when I saw it the first time. Swimming scenes with the beautiful music score. Check it out.
I´ve had this imaginary plan to interpret Demian by Hermann Hesse for the big screen. This is a project I´ve just rolled around in my head from time to time for 6 months or so, just for the interest of it. Project is in its beginning, nothing is written yet or anything, just some notes done. And of course I realize that this is never going to happen.
First I though that it should take place in the modern society, not in the period before World War 1, like the original story. But soon noticed that the time and the surroundings have too much to do with the story and the meaning of it that I just started to do gather the main events and characters and developments of the story, keeping it in its original surroundings. Like it should be.
But today I started to think that If the story is put to present day, all the symbols and meanings had to be changed, all but the basic story of Sinclairs (main character) development as a person from displaced and scared, and somehow missled person to understanding his significance and true self, in the context of the state of the world around him, and finding the same patterns from the whole world that he finds in himself.
-- Now follows a long and possibly pointless comparison of a book Demian, and a movie, Fight Club. This is insane, I know. I should probably read the book Fight Club, but the point is, that if Demian should be translated into a film about this time, could it resemble Fight Club and is Fight Club somehow the Demian of the 90´s? I am not saying that Fight Club is as good as Demian, but examining their similarities just as a curiosity. The point might be that the basic story is somehow architypical (?) and thats the main and only reason for any similarities. One difficulty is that movies and books use different kinds of methods of expressing things, but thats partly what this is about. And just to point out: I am not over excited about Fight Club. This just came to my mind today. --
So in Demian the main things are Sinclairs religious up bringing and the struggle of the "light" and "dark" worlds. Meaning the traditional (way of the parents and teachers) and way of the "outsider"seen as dark and forbidden, alternate way of interpreting things and living ones life. And there fore the whole state of European culture at the time had the same arrangement in it self. Old traditions started to tear themselves apart until it all culminated to WW1. So there is all the time this situation with opposites, with out any synthesis.
In order to move this story to present time, we would have to find analogous phenomenon from the present culture, which could be presented as being on the verge of breaking down.
In Fight Club, there is the empty, clinical and shallow world of white-collar worker whit negligent father who has told him what to do, but not why and never really got to know his sons. It shows a whole generation, which is described in the film ; "
We're the middle children of history, man. No purpose or place. We have no Great War. No Great Depression. Our Great War's a spiritual war... our Great Depression is our lives. "
So there is the abstract culture of jobs for money, money for furniture and fun, but no deeper meaning. No knowledge of the spiritual side of life. Which could be seen as reverse arrangement, but also somehow similar to Demian, cause the old, firm religious tradition keeps young man from getting to know himself taking on a own perspective to life. Shallow traditional and restraining religion has changed into shallow restraining consumerism.
Next comes some obvious, or interpreted similarities, on factual events in the stories.
First, there is the Bully, Kromer, that keeps pulling Sinclair to the "Dark" side of life. In Fight Club, Jack is bullied by his insomnia which starts to notify that everything is not right.
The character arrangement is similar. While Sinclair is in school, he first starts to see Demian, not to talk to him, he just notices this boy with special substance. In Fight Club The Narrator, or Jack, doesn´t really see Tyler, but the audience sees him. On the one frame flashes and going past him on the escalator.
The first time Sinclair meets with Demian, He tells him that the story of Abel and Cain can be interpreted differently than the teachers want them to interpret it. ( Cain having the mark cause he is different and strong, not because he is evil). First time Jack and Tyler meet, Tyler tells him that the safety instructions are there just to give false hope and that one can make explosives from items found at home. Both tell a story which is about looking things in a different light, not the way we are thought to look. On both situations an important element of the story is introduced. In addition to the other character of course.
After this starts the journey for both, Sinclair and Jack, out of the past world to search for something new. Where Sinclair is tossed about in the life of a student, trying to fight his bad feelings and rip everything from the old person away from him, Jack starts literally to fight against the other people with same kind of problem, he fights with Tyler, and as we later on get to know, he fights with himself.
At this point the stories differ, cause Fight Club has taken more obvious view that Jack and Tyler are the same person, where in Demian, Sinclair is not so obviously "same" with Demian, but Demian shows the path and stays behind the curtains, but obsessing the mind of Sinclair. These 2 journeys are different, due to the different natures of the stories, but some similarities can be found.
When Tyler and Jack organize the Fight Club, they (or he) becomes some kind of icon or a celebrity. In Demian, because of Sinclairs "uncertainty" about his own personality and the world around him, he becomes, for a while, a daring "bar hero" drinking the most and talking the meanest things. And he is known to his entire school.In Demian, dreams have an important role. and they tell us about the state of Sinclairs persona like in Fight Club scenes of fight or arguments with Tyler etc. Also the painting that Sinclair does in the story, which starts as a girl he likes, becomes Demian, then Demians mom Eva, then Sinclair himself, describes the lack of consistency of Sinclairs identity, or the path of finding the connection to his subconsciousness. And almost all the scenes in Fight Club can be seen from this angle.
Sinclair also often contemplates the fact that things that Demian says sound like answers to the questions an thoughts in his own mind. Much like the situation with Jack and Tyler. "Sometimes Tyler spoke for me.."
Cause Sinclair is a young student it is natural for him to paint and think and dream, as in Jack´s situation that would seem odd. So in FightClub the chain of events is presented by scenes of action and mischief.
Tyler saves a character named Marla from suicide in Fight Club. Marla has same kind of problems as Jack, and they form a problematic relationship together. Later on in Demian, Sinclair saves a young boy, Knauer, from suicide. The boy resembles himself when he was younger. In both stories the saving occurs unintentionally, or unconciously. Jack doesn´t remember that he went to Marlas place, cause it was Tyler, but he remembers the sex scene, but thinks he has dreamed of it. In Demian, Sinclair wakes up from a dream, goes out in the middle of the night and just walks "like a sleepwalker" to the place where Knauer is about to kill himself. Knauer develops an obsession to Sinclair for a while after this. Of course Marla plays a much larger part in Fight Club than Knauer in Demian...
Quote from Demian (translated from Finnish to English by me): "The most true calling for one is only this: To become your self. Should it be a poet or a madman, prophet or a criminal - it is not for us to decide, and at the end, it makes no difference."
From Fight Club: Tyler Durden: You're not your job. You're not how much money you have in the bank. You're not the car you drive. You're not the contents of your wallet. You're not your fucking khakis. You're the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world.
Fight Club is more individual based, in terms of content I guess. Demian gives a lot more spiritual and possibly hopeful view, where as FightClub is a lot more violent in its opinions and has more harsh tone. And because of the different time periods they deal with different worlds and ideas. Demian dwells in the depth of subconsciousness and the unified soul of the world, finding answers from staring to the fire and listening to music, where as in Fight Club there are the same themes, but answers are found in more concrete level, on the dark streets or basements, doing a thing that most certainly feels and is real, fighting.
Demian describes an end of an era, Fight Club is done in the end of a millenium. And both describe an end of an era on a person.
The scene where Tyler leaves Jack, resembles the scene where Demian is last seen in the book. Jack and Sinclair both lie almost unconscious, Jack after near fatal car crash, Sinclair after a near fatal explosion. Jack tries to speak to Tyler, but can´t, same with Sinclair and Demian. and in the mornign Demian and Tyler are gone. We get the impression that Demian is dead. Or is he?
Because of the War Sinclair is sent to the army. Scene before of the scene where we meet Demian for the last time, Hesse describes very beautifully and with many image-like descriptions that can be interpreted in many ways, the event of Sinclair almost getting killed by a bomb.
In Fight Club there is this cool slow motion shot about Jack shooting himself to the mouth. We can see the explosion in his mouth and everything.
So, in a way, both, Demian and Tyler are dead in the end.
In the book Demian, we are left with the strong message, that with a person or with the world, in order to become what we are supposed to be, like a bird must break the shell around it in order to get born, we must break the shell, the shell being the restricting and "old" ways of seeing our selves or the world around us, if we want things to change.
And in the end of Fight Club we see a total destruction of the person Jack/Tyler used to be, and the destruction of the basis of the current career and money driven culture; The exploding buildings of banks and credit records.
One important thing missing from fight club is the symbol of synthesis. In Demian it is the god Abraxas.
But in Fight Club there is numerous remarks that refer to god and making a synthesis; it is not wanted anymore. " Fuck damnation, man! Fuck redemption! We are God's unwanted children? So be it!" So at this time, we do not search for god anymore, we don´t care about those kind of thoughts, as long as there is something to believe in, something that is real.
Demian tells a story about a boy from 8 years old to 20-something. And Fight Club? About 25 to 30? maybe. So being done in a different time, it is only appropriate to tell about the next phase. Or is the culture today infantile? Tyler himself refers them selves, grown up guys to children. In both of the quotes I´ve written here.
The thing might be that this is no news for some, but for me it was some kind of revelation today. The stories and character arrangements are similar in many stories through out the history of literature and it is not a big deal. The things I´ve written here might come across quite shallow in terms of similarity. But what interest me the most is that Fight Club might well be a dated version of Demian. They are in many ways parallel to each other, just because of their differences. Differences caused by the time they were conceived and the way they´ve been made (book/film). These things have an effect on the way a story develops and where the emphasis lies. Is the similarity there just because of the 2 main characters and the story of finding your self in this messed up world?
I am also quite sure that there is a scene in Demian when Sinclair feels like destroying something beautiful and does some kind of act because of this, al tough I can´t remember/find it now.. In Fight Club Jack beats the face of this blond guy like a maniac and after this says "I felt like destroying something beautiful".
24/10/2008: I've noticed that many people come to read this post, It would be nice to hear your thoughts about it!
