“Only photography has been able to divide human life into a series of moments, each of them has the value of a complete existence.” Edward Muybridge
Mirada y percepción: siempre en relación a la tecnología.
“If Flaherty and Nanook were able to tell the difficult story of the struggle of man against a thriftless but beneficial nature, it was because there was a third party with them. This small, temperamental, but faithful machine, with an infallible visual memory, let Nanook see his own images in proportion to their birth. It is this camera that Luc de Heusch so perfectly called the “participatory camera.”” Jean Rouch
“Cinema-verite is a new type of art; the art of life itself. The cine-eye includes: all shooting techniques, all moving pictures, all methods-without exception-which will allow us to reach the truth-the truth in movement” Dziga Vertov
“You had to be crazy, as some ethnographers apparently were, to take such forbidden tools to the field.” Jean Rouch
“What are these films, and by what weird name shall we distinguish them from other films? Do they actually exist? I still don’t know, but I do know that there are those rare moments when the spectator can suddenly understand an unknown language without the gimmick of subtitles, moments where he can participate in strange ceremonies, move through a village, and cross places he has never seen before but nonetheless recognizes perfectly well. Only the cinema can produce this miracle, but no particular aesthetic gives it the means to do so, and no special technique uniquely provokes it. Neither the learned counterpoint of a cut nor the use of stereophonic cinerama can cause such a wonder. Often this mysterious contact is established in the middle of the most banal film, in the savage mincemeat of a current events newsreel, or in the meanderings of amateur cinema. Perhaps it is the close-up of an African smile, a Mexican winking his eye for the camera, or a European gesture so common that nobody would imagine filming it; things like these force a bewildering view of reality on us. It is as if there were no cameraman, soundman, or light meter there; no longer that mass of technicians and accessories that make up the great ritual of classical cinema. But today’s filmmakers prefer not to adventure on these dangerous paths. It is only masters, fools, or children who dare push these forbidden buttons.” Jean Rouch
“And tomorrow? … Tomorrow will be the time of completely portable color video, video editing, and instant replay (“instant feedback”). Which is to say, the time of the joint dream of Vertov and Flaherty, of a mechanical cine-eye-ear and of a camera that can so totally participate that it will automatically pass into the hands of those who, until now, have always been in front of the lens. At that point, anthropologists will no longer control the monopoly on observation; their culture and they themselves will be observed and recorded. And it is in that way that ethnographic film will help us to “share” anthropology.” JR
Cinema verité (Francia) – Direct Cinema (EUA) – Free Cinema (UK)
As filmmakers we believe that
No film can be too personal.
The image speaks. Sound amplifies and comments.
Size is irrelevant. Perfection is not an aim.
An attitude means a style. A style means an attitude.
Jean Rouch
Le Maitres fous (1955)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3L58X_-xAfs
Chronique d’un eté (1961)
Jaguar (1967)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHMBj393nN0
Robert Gardner
Dead Birds (1963)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CO58Si-u4sI
Forest of Bliss (1986)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eY2xBY0Lw4k
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xC7JZKprUTM
“I don’t think either of us knows what the rules and regulations of ethnographic filmmaking are. Our work fits awkwardly within anthropology, awkwardly within art, and awkwardly within cinema” Verena Pavarel
Chick Strand.
Fake Fruit Factory (1986)
https://vimeo.com/10012466
“All documentary, just by its nature, is going to be inadequate” Ben Rivers
