I believe that one of the secret engines that allows cinema to work, and have the marvelous power over us that it does, is the fact that for thousands of years we have spent eight hours every night in a 'cinematic' dream-state, and so are familiar with this version of reality.
Interpretation
Cinema resonates with us because it mirrors the dream-like states we experience while sleeping.
Walter Murch suggests that the profound impact of cinema on our emotions and perceptions stems from our long-standing relationship with dream states. For millennia, we have spent significant parts of our lives in a state that resembles the immersive and imaginative quality of cinema, making us predisposed to connect deeply with film narratives as they tap into familiar realms of our subconscious.
In practice
In a film studies class, discussing how cinema reflects our inner dream states.
You can always make a film somehow. You can beg, borrow, steal the equipment, use credit cards, use your friends' goodwill, wheedle your way into this or that situation. The real problem is, how do you get people to see it once it is made?
Film editing is now something almost everyone can do at a simple level and enjoy it, but to take it to a higher level requires the same dedication and persistence that any art form does.
The notion of directing a film is the invention of critics - the whole eloquence of cinema is achieved in the editing room.
There are many, many nouns for the act of looking - a glance, a glimpse, a peep - but there's no noun for the act of listening. In general, we don't think primarily about sound. So I have a different perspective on the world; I can construct soundscapes that have an effect on people, but they don't know why. It's a sort of subterfuge.
Film is really the one art form that can effectively use silence. Music and theater can play with silence, but they can't sustain silence without losing energy, whereas film can go into a silent mode and stay there for minutes at a time.
This applies to many film jobs, not just editing: half the job is doing the job, and the other half is finding ways to get along with people and tuning yourself in to the delicacy of the situation.
When music is crashing around us, when you hear the same five songs on the radio that aren't really saying much, we can always go back to great music. Great music always lives on.
I feel like you only have so much time to make stuff. I'm definitely aware of that. I'm also excited about it.
Squeeze your eyes closed, as tight as you can, and think of all your favorite autumns, crisp and perfect, all bound up together like a stack of cards. That is what it is like, the awful, wonderful brightness of Fairy colors. Try to smell the hard, pale wood sending up sharp, green smoke into the afternoon. To feel the mellow, golden sun on your skin, more gentle and cozier and more golden than even the light of your favorite reading nook at the close of the day.
The barge she sat in, like a burnish'd throne, Burnt on the water.
I think you just have to be yourself instead of catering your sound to a specific audience, make the music you want to make, and the audience will find you.
For, I must tell you, in this world where today all lose their minds over many & wondrous Machines - some of which, alas, you can see also in this Siege - I construct Aristotelian Machines, that allow anyone to see with Words.
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