Blow Out night

In class last week we watched Blow Out directed by Brian De Palma which I recommend to anyone wanting to watch a really thoughtful and carefully constructed film. Like Donna said, everything had a clear purpose and was placed in the film carefully but with confidence. From the prolific patriotism imagery to the constant reminder that we are watching a film, De Palma does what he wants with the movie and doesn’t make any excuses.

Particularly I find that the view on the role of audiences to be one of the most interesting aspects of the film. Blow Out is not a movie in which we get “sucked into” the created world on the screen. With the special camera shots (like the spinning shot, overhead shot, and just the camera reel prop in lots and lots of shots, etc.) we never really forget that we are in the audience watching a film. Also, just the content of the film serves as a reminder that we are watching a movie what with the shallow use of nudity and vulgarity (within the frame story film that is, Coed Frenzy). We are given a dramatized and mixed view of reality which emphasizes the idea that we are purely shallow entertainment-seekers as audience members.

Another thing that I thought was interesting in the film was the treatment of the idea of American ambition. I can’t decide if Blow Out was mocking the idea of the investigative, honest, skilled, good citizen-character making a difference or if the film genuinely tried to give a view of the ambitious “regular” guy doing something big (like figuring out a murder of a high profile political leader). Some part of me (the optimistic, patriotic side I guess) wants to believe that De Palma was actually making a comment on the patriotic spirit within some citizens. Jack (a very nondescript name—emphasizing how he could’ve been any guy off the street) fights for truth in that he refuses to back down in regards to the actual happenings of the murder. However, I also think that all this overt patriotic imagery and the ending in which Jack ends up where he started (just with a more authentic scream in the crappy movie he works for) only mocks the idea of the “American ambition” (all idealized and utopia-esque). I’m leaning more towards the latter, but I wish I could believe the former view. I think that’s De Palma’s intention though, to mock the audience’s idea of a “good” story—complete with damsel in distress, young brave attractive hero-man, and creepy demented bad guy. He “disrespects” the audience in giving us “reality chopped up and mixed with vulgarity and nudity” (noted from Donna’s end-of-movie comments). But he also makes fun of that type of entertainment by providing it to us using methods that keep us from forgetting that we are watching a movie.

I think the fact that Jack worked on the sound for a film, a job in which he must create/find each noise and make it sound believable, is particularly interesting in that it gives another dimension to the already multi-faceted views of reality within the film. We see the murder scenario from the media’s view, Jack’s view, and then our own view watching the film. Reality is a plaything throughout the entire film. The battle between these different views inspires much thought about what “reality” exactly is. Is it what the media shows us, what we see for ourselves…can we ever truly know and witness reality? If not, then what limits us? Is our own subjectivity keeping us from seeing the “real” in reality?