Wednesday 9 May 2007
Wednesday
I like the beginnings of films. I like the moments where we are given the basic rules of a world and the behaviour of the characters that exist in them; the 'home' from which the characters are wrenched, and to which they will always want to return; the structure which we first see them in, and which is consequently broken down. I like Neo in his office in The Matrix, Kevin Bacon and Fred Ward waking up in the morning in Tremors, Alex Rogan in his trailer-park in The Last Starfighter, and Luke Skywalker kicking dust on Tatooine. These are the moments before everything changes. And this doesn't just apply to fantasy films (although maybe all films are fantasy), it occurs in serious drama too. Perhaps I am being too nostalgic. Normally at the end the characters will return to these places, but the places aren't the same anymore. They seem smaller, less important. It wasn't the place that was significant, they realise, but the time and their previous self in that place. This is why the ending to Revenge of the Sith is so good: Aunt Beru and Uncle Owen holding the baby Luke and looking out over the two moons. It ends, but it also returns to the start. I like the beginnings of films.
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3 comments:
Although I would probably argue that this characteristic is true of all good stories (having the home / before period) it is arguably most memorably shown in the movie the Wizard of Oz. The world before is in black and white and the world of OZ is in colour. When they return at the end the world goes back to being black and white again. It was all the more powerful at the time for being one of the first colour films.
I always thought it was the first film to use colour. After your comment carefully saying 'one of the first', however, I looked it up: many people do still think it was the first, but it wasn't. However, the whole things seems quite complicated when you get into different types of colour, and whether a film was a 'full-length' movie or not. It's safe to say that The Wizard of Oz is the earliest, best known film to use colour. But to be nice and obscure you can go with 'Cupid Angling' from 1918.
I never could remember the details of which one is exactly considered the first, but I vaguely remembered that one is supposed to say, "one of the first" to be nice and safe. Your phrasing is also good.
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