VVC talk
I was going to be organised and do show by show reviews of all the VVC vids but RL pretty much precludes that ever happening, so this is more of stream-of-consciousness approach scribbling down thoughts as they occur. First off reactions to three of the most pushing-the-meta-envelope vids of the con:-
How Much is that Geisha in the Window? by lierdumoa for the “Fuck You! Challenge show
White America anonymously for the same
Climbing up the Walls by obsessive24 for Premieres
How Much is that Geisha creates a Firefly that could have been to the perfect sound track of Eastern plucked strings marking the rhythm in counterpoint to a honky tonk accordion melodic line. Aurally it’s the Western instrument that’s the intruder; visually (to anyone familiar with the source) it’s the Asian elements that have had to be added back in. Technically it’s astounding, thematically the use of masks to ghost actual Asians across the screen and the desaturated but otherwise perfectly matched echoes of Asian-lite scenes from the series/movie combine to make the point of who wasn’t there with surgical precison. More I love the progression in the external source from the decorative Memoirs of a Geisha to the violence and exploitation of the Chinese railway workers from 3:10 to Yuma to the confederate flag flying over the battle of Serenity Valley. This progression broadens the message from condemnation of one producer’s appropriation of an Asian aesthetic to a wider point about the movie industry’s aversion to histories not written by the winners. Not “Fuck you Joss,” but “Fuck you Hollywood.”
“We were there. We lived, laboured and died. Tell our stories or let us do it.”
After that I have to say the credits spelling out the original narrower point felt something like a loss of nerve. At least it did until I heard the cast’s rendition of “How much is that Geisha” which someone saw fit to include on the DVD extras. So yeah “Fuck you Joss! You can take it.”
White America by contrast, comes across more like a kind of content-free appropriation of political vidding’s current cool by one of the Erica/Erics of Eminem’s lyric.
Finally Climbing up the Walls, which while also a comment on fandom issues spotlights what we celebrate rather than what we condemn about our sources. This vid has one of the most powerful and to the point opening sequences I’ve ever seen. Blood spilt and building from a stain to a torrent, the stick figure drawings flipping round to the two Winchester brothers trapped in a frame and that motif repeated for the two other ‘couples.’ The sequence to the instrumental howl that ends the song matches it scream for scream, zooming in on successive still image fragments each one adding to create the final shattered monster in the mirror.
The vid is beautifully structured - I can see exactly why the middle section has to be what it is. It has to be different from the introduction, it has to up the ante to build to that amazing final sequence. Still it doesn’t quite work for me for two reasons. One is technical ambition. The first section of the vid uses almost entirely traditional vidding technology matching motion and and imagery with largely invisible adjustments to colour and zoom. The second combines photo manips and additional of external source to transform the narrative but the jump is too sudden and these new elements too prevalent for closure. By the time the third section began I was ready for its innovations but the second threw me out of disbelief suspension.
It may not just be resistance to newfangled techniques that did that though. It may also be that the vid succeeded in what it set out to do. Much of the emotional power of the final section comes from the way it puts the viewer in the POV of the elder sibling. The thing is that personally speaking (and it works differently for different people), while the sexual overtones of the three incestuous relationships depicted are a big part of the unhealthy fascination they hold, once that sexual aspect moves from nightmare to reality I just stop caring how bad/broken-up/monstrous the ‘parent-brother’ feels. He either gets out or becomes a thing and fictional things are less involving than fictional people.
How Much is that Geisha in the Window? by lierdumoa for the “Fuck You! Challenge show
White America anonymously for the same
Climbing up the Walls by obsessive24 for Premieres
How Much is that Geisha creates a Firefly that could have been to the perfect sound track of Eastern plucked strings marking the rhythm in counterpoint to a honky tonk accordion melodic line. Aurally it’s the Western instrument that’s the intruder; visually (to anyone familiar with the source) it’s the Asian elements that have had to be added back in. Technically it’s astounding, thematically the use of masks to ghost actual Asians across the screen and the desaturated but otherwise perfectly matched echoes of Asian-lite scenes from the series/movie combine to make the point of who wasn’t there with surgical precison. More I love the progression in the external source from the decorative Memoirs of a Geisha to the violence and exploitation of the Chinese railway workers from 3:10 to Yuma to the confederate flag flying over the battle of Serenity Valley. This progression broadens the message from condemnation of one producer’s appropriation of an Asian aesthetic to a wider point about the movie industry’s aversion to histories not written by the winners. Not “Fuck you Joss,” but “Fuck you Hollywood.”
“We were there. We lived, laboured and died. Tell our stories or let us do it.”
After that I have to say the credits spelling out the original narrower point felt something like a loss of nerve. At least it did until I heard the cast’s rendition of “How much is that Geisha” which someone saw fit to include on the DVD extras. So yeah “Fuck you Joss! You can take it.”
White America by contrast, comes across more like a kind of content-free appropriation of political vidding’s current cool by one of the Erica/Erics of Eminem’s lyric.
Finally Climbing up the Walls, which while also a comment on fandom issues spotlights what we celebrate rather than what we condemn about our sources. This vid has one of the most powerful and to the point opening sequences I’ve ever seen. Blood spilt and building from a stain to a torrent, the stick figure drawings flipping round to the two Winchester brothers trapped in a frame and that motif repeated for the two other ‘couples.’ The sequence to the instrumental howl that ends the song matches it scream for scream, zooming in on successive still image fragments each one adding to create the final shattered monster in the mirror.
The vid is beautifully structured - I can see exactly why the middle section has to be what it is. It has to be different from the introduction, it has to up the ante to build to that amazing final sequence. Still it doesn’t quite work for me for two reasons. One is technical ambition. The first section of the vid uses almost entirely traditional vidding technology matching motion and and imagery with largely invisible adjustments to colour and zoom. The second combines photo manips and additional of external source to transform the narrative but the jump is too sudden and these new elements too prevalent for closure. By the time the third section began I was ready for its innovations but the second threw me out of disbelief suspension.
It may not just be resistance to newfangled techniques that did that though. It may also be that the vid succeeded in what it set out to do. Much of the emotional power of the final section comes from the way it puts the viewer in the POV of the elder sibling. The thing is that personally speaking (and it works differently for different people), while the sexual overtones of the three incestuous relationships depicted are a big part of the unhealthy fascination they hold, once that sexual aspect moves from nightmare to reality I just stop caring how bad/broken-up/monstrous the ‘parent-brother’ feels. He either gets out or becomes a thing and fictional things are less involving than fictional people.