What is Amateur Film?

This essay is in two parts. The first part specifically about colonial era amateur film, a large amount of which I had worked on as my research for the Colonial Film: Moving Images British Empire project.11 www.colonialfilm.org.uk second attempts to think some fundamental properties film such, and indicate problems that arise from consideration or private material. During Film project, came be sure much what seemed true regarding was likely more generally, so it potentially good place start thinking wider problems. It also me posed by analysis historical are crucial understanding privately made films ubiquitous social media. Amateur absolutely central ways contemporary media forms, both otherwise, now employed major corporations, individuals, groups; therefore all aspects personal life, geopolitics minutiae relationships. And given how important this kind film-making plainly is, extraordinary there little scholarship tried parse out exactly works. For instance, we know things like editing, camera angles, types shot function professionally various techniques were developed, on; meaning images screen always being negotiated less detail. But neither process comprehension, nor development formal analysis, has really occurred kinds individuals their own use, call, broadest sense, films. (This roughly term will used essay, though just loose definition indicates starting point identifying highly disparate set practices. use interchangeably here with ‘private films’, ‘home movies’, etc.; do not pretend these ideas very precisely defined.) What, edit an film? What even ‘edit’ home movie? cut? shot, kind? How understand field vision identity film-maker regard action? Are coherent questions, when speak 5 video phone, 8mm reel child’s birthday party? None anything attention evidently requires. clear ‘amateur film’ is. been thought somehow self-evident – declares itself openly gives its whole self over without any need further explanation. so. attending pressing, difficult, complex at probably significant than those cinema film. because film-making, widest no longer merely pastime: everyday extension self, essential tool becoming, mode political engagement, sophisticated popular art, interpersonal communication, facet journalism, legal tool, weapon wars informational kinetic, besides. (In truth things, but them only embryonic larval forms.) codes history overlap obscurely divergently conventional television. ignore our peril, after nearly hundred years almost total invisibility, last decades have seen suddenly become decisively powerful element within social, political, action. Given latter fact, certainly possible especially source because, already tangled psychological geographical displacement, power, violence, encodes makes such present predicaments. Much work undertook project took closed institution, Commonwealth Museum (BECM), Bristol.22 Since closure BECM, holdings passed Bristol Records Office; references website records BECM films, BRO does seem accessible online catalogue time writing. holdings, unlike BFI National Archive Imperial War examined composed exclusively films: BECM’s collection policy focus movies reels gathered people who travelled colonies. Though patchy various, vast contained incredibly task examine depth, make selections research. Naturally different researching produced up bulk corpus. There institutional commercial paper trail, production documents, information releases screening. nothing attached they effects whoever owned last, often wasn’t person them. Only unusual cases might considered secondary material, documentation usually direct donor. In would diary, list contents, other useful material submitted reels. mostly all, save name perhaps minimal typically couple lines accession document. So method devised, one based circumstantial evidence, discovered through detective primary looking details postings official correspondence, calling relatives, scouring memoirs close themselves, including forensic cross-referencing tracing visible aeroplane boat names, models, serial numbers, analysing features landscape, trying identify locations, buildings, on. final results similar achieved well documented professional films; specific context made, could ascertained quite accurately. experience working left idea contains something mysterious poorly understood. Not did sometimes contain importance, add known past example, historically events hold promise stranger, intangible essence, lock yet key. then way intimately directly connected believe new privileged status YouTube, causing previously hidden latent significance rise surface old studying. Perhaps deep content giving understood perceived before advent digital attendant devices; modern revealed earlier acutely strange prophecies, spoken indecipherable language. mobile phone ubiquity hand-made Rosetta Stone; became susceptible translation, horror beauty finally surge Of course, examining quantity colonies fail provide fascinating enlightening perspectives itself. speaking show, say seldom never found them, rarely provide. (I should reiterate can sample available archives surveyed, thousands must screened hundreds hours consider representative sample.) First, occasionally demonstrate closely ordered selection subjects systematic approach image-making. course exceptions, notable ones, rule general unprogrammatic execution. extend observation include said definite aim, recording business trip family holiday, where evident skilled control technology ease intelligence (sometimes ‘better’ carefully edited, intertitles like). distinction well-made see intended beyond sphere, shown small audiences friends, effectively usage. call movies’. As result, caught capricious most level. ‘unprogrammatic’, mean service snaps photographic ‘project’ (though once again, under conditions photography transform, becomes ingested possessed socially networked capitalist desires). modus largely purposeless, say, completely radically free. That recordings broader interest historical, anthropological, instance. They regularly do. attempt record sort end, least end went curiosity desire interesting use. exceptions. A interior Guiana epidemiologist Cenydd Richard Jones, indigenous Wai people, whom Jones assigned Medical Officer, Wai.33 Collection 1-26 (ID: 2007/035/001-26) http://www.colonialfilm.org.uk/node/5107 instance Nigeria noted missionary, George Thomas Basden, extensively documents Igbo dance, masquerade, ceremony. am afraid managed fragile transferred, Basden titled Africa Dances, document.44 2006/070/003) http://www.colonialfilm.org.uk/node/4200 (1873–1944) missionary Church Missionary Society, eventually elevated post Archdeacon Niger; 1931, he represented Nigerian Legislative Council. He spoke fluent Igbo, author widely read semi-anthropological volumes language culture, which, Among Ibos (1921), standard officials Nigeria. across six 16 mm sometime late 1920s, edited explanatory begins travelogue style. After showing voyage Liverpool Onitsha, work-related scenes, majority taken dance masquerade performance, identified intertitles. remarkable document, footage; seems anthropological kind. However, ever distributed screened; rubbish skip house clearance, BECM. So, come upon Dances partly conceived ethnographic, eventual church (there movie’ style material); frequently find footage potential value. Sometimes clearly type postcards speak, sent future self. travelogues picture postcards, visual studies human type, individual. places influence slips into established modes exotic activities (for many Jerusalem during mandate period reproduce elsewhere called ‘street scene Jerusalem’: sequence shots city, churches, ethnographic-style representing religions city).55 Francis Gooding, ‘Side Side Peace: Tolerance, Terrorism “Street Scene Jerusalem”’, Middle Eastern Journal Culture Communication (2014), no. 2 (14): 207–218. random, furnishes us glimpses, contextualising information. observations, fact Empire, anywhere else, quotidian sociological view take partial divergence value lie primarily shown, manner shown. reveal concerns makers making captured connected, way. When collections, rule, party viewpoint: constitute (and public) life civil military classes, wholly consumption. candid generated organically socio-cultural parameters. significance: strictly terms, amazingly intimate portrait period, actors, indiscriminate capturing scenes persons unknown. think, that, able else: us, above ostensible insofar determines content, sensibility classes. show class members it: district officers, senior figures, missionaries, etc. saw world. ‘saw’ conceptual although are, naturally, implicated; purposes communication audience another legacy displays greater clarity directness. instead, if unclear role actually constructed, see, literally, saw: camera, operated eye person, recorded eye, person. At level again important: chosen subject, presence release qualify assertion saying ontology filmed subject problem, investigation itself, help track: traces preserved celluloid spoor bigger game. chooses look at; constructed noticeably constructed; whether moves, moves; duration still shots; relative spent subjects, All bread butter obscure disordered archive play, persons, aspect work, scattered moments professional, lives ends. indicated, reading borrows basic tools viewers unfamiliar way, turned away straightforward comprehension casual viewing, usual byways frequented trained scholar academic. Both ordinary text self-explanatory, construction existence signs expectation audience. kind, thus sense comprehend, Instead, confronted evidence whose opaque purity diary: technologically filtered shreds cognition, mechanically processed attentions projections proofs place, time, direction. done major, comparative film; may vagaries swamp unsupportable generalisations risk becoming mired in, chimera case. each terms individual cases, together demonstrated views deepened overall emerged vital complement immediately comprehensible mass semi-professionally film: against startlingly body animated motives jaw-dropping transparency, provided bracing baffling corrective: variously inexplicable, dramatic, staggeringly dull, touching, upsetting, plain weird, document be, day-to-day functioning Empire. tentatively whole, draw between civilian persons. thumb, civilians move around lot more; film-makers shots. Civilians frequent recourse panning 360 degree pan, tend follow moving cars, walkers, animals (in go far pan critical defining old, centrality action). By contrast, successions shots, let objects pass front movement back original position. People walk shot; remains static. vehicles, recall surely deliberately) ‘ghost ride’ early cinema. acting world; observes world motion, still. Generally, frame better. words, speculate related training assists gun, conception landscape requiring concentrated analyses strategy static patience surveillance. Figures appear elements field: allowed camera. Whereas conceptions particularly case actual administrative imperial actors implicated fluid surveyed eye: register proprietary. followed: connection object analytic space assessment, surveillance, strategy, relationship, action, status. With few (when all) military, best vibrant colour India Partition, Waziristan (‘Kurram Militia 1946–1947’, held Museum).66 Kurram 1946–1947, MGH 3630) http://www.colonialfilm.org.uk/node/3126 Major Michael Nelson 8th Gurkha Rifles, succession composed, still, alternate dancing wedding, friends leisure, shoaling fish pond wide open Kurram. once; extraordinarily beautiful intense Generalising difficult. having watched great struck offer clues next address typical takes form tentative propositions. definitive, problem functions. Home movies, especially) ‘acted out’ fictions, actuality. not, demand suspension disbelief. tempt category alongside beginning cinema, pictures know: trains entering stations, workers leaving factories, workmen breaking down walls unbreaking again. these, spectacles, else spectacles closer moreover explicitly actor: neutral, testimony actualities operator personally same manner. Very regularly, often, shooting knows well. she participating independent viewer position: cleared either side lens. unintelligible, camera’s behaving likelihood Or rather, too going include, primarily, themselves. play benefit, motivations connects moment watching tightly compacted, movie functions director, actor combined continuity minds participants shooting, entire event entered deferred self-observation. (We note passing since arrival platform, greatly complicated. We return this.) affects behaviour everyone involved movie. Like coming photography, availability continuum technologies contribute external internal representations thereby affect performed. Bazin’s remarks concerning penetration formerly sacred theatrical stage machinery germane connection, world, transforming melancholy Jacques’ theatre metaphor prophecy fulfilled.77 ‘Drama freed contingencies space’; André Bazin, ‘Theater Cinema Part Two’, Cinema? (Berkeley, CA: University California Press, 2005 [1967]), vol. 1, 103. drama projected, watch filmed: infant Lacan’s stade du miroir negative print, psychologically projected unity reflected child mirror transformed hard filmically viewer. acts imagined imago promised infancy image; performance anticipation seeing confirmed screen. Mugging, joking up, obscene gestures, laughing theatrically pretending perform ‘real’ universal spontaneous responses profound self-awareness concept Why mystical ‘on television’, widely, correctly special existential imprimatur, objective proof reality self? asking disbelief, manners film-maker, rather excess belief, faith invested. generally lack toward objectivity documentary forms. One considerations eliminated, replaced image keeps company magic: magic maintains