1. In the first commentary Deleuze contradicts Bergson’s first thesis of movement being very different from space since “the space covered is divisible…whilst movement is indivisible.” (1) Bergson is saying that movements are “irreducible among themselves,” because they are all continuous and at the same time all different making it impossible to divide up into homogeneous equivalents. Furthermore, Bergson’s thesis suggested that since movement is heterogeneous it cannot be reconstructed with still “positions in space or instants in time: that is, with immobile sections.” (1) This is a clear reference to cinematography which attempts to reconstitute movement on the screen by quickly combining static frames together. Deleuze asks a very interesting question, however, which causes us to think in a different perspective about reality: “Can we conclude that the result is artificial because the means are artificial?”(2) First, this made me think of cinemas and their apparatus—even though the movement is machine made, does that make it fake? Is movement only real in real time…when it is blatantly in front of us? Isn’t it still movement if someone is moving around “on the screen” even though it was shot from still frames? Moreover, this made me think of video art and the idea of reality vs. virtual reality. If a movie or a game opens up our senses and makes us feel a part of it even though we aren’t actually in them—what is reality? Is it only what is physically around us at any given moment, or can it also constitute anything that makes us feel like we are a part of it?
2. In his discussion of Bergson’s second thesis, Deleuze defines cinema as “the system which reproduces movement by relating it to the any-instant-whatever.” (6) This any-instant-whatever is basically any instant that is equidistant from another one—like the numbers on a clock. What caught my attention was that Deleuze describes cinema as “‘industrial art’…neither an art nor a science,” because this makes us question the purpose of cinema. Deleuze argues that it doesn’t have much scientific interest since science focuses on analysis and it is hard to analyze something related to “any-instant-whatever” which is literarily any random moment in time. Furthermore, he argues that cinema does not have much artistic credibility because art focuses more on “poses and forms that science had rejected.” (6) What is “industrial art” then? Industrial implies machine-made, modern, and repetitive. Art holds connotations of uniqueness, creativity, individuality, and man-made. Thus, it is difficult to image what these two words combined would create. Nevertheless, suggesting that cinema is exactly that is very interesting—I never thought of it that way before. It is simultaneously man-made because it uses machines, but, it produces movement which is something natural, and human-like.
3. The section on Bergson’s third thesis describes his philosophy is a general formula. Basically, reality consists of “movement as mobile section” and “qualitative change” (9) while the illusion in which we all live consists of “immobile sections” and “movement” (9). So, in reality everything is constantly changing including movement; also, instead of objects changing because they are moving, it is their qualities that constantly vibrate and change. The illusion that our perception builds, however, is that the world is made up of static objects and the change only arises from their movement which is direct and has a distinct beginning and end.
4. Lastly, in the section identifying the image and the movement, Deleuze makes a (what seems as a) profound but very confusing statement which caught my attention: “with the cinema, it is the world which becomes its own image, and not an image which becomes world.” (57) Does he mean that cinema is becoming greater than the world in a sense since it can do so much that we cannot do in reality? I understood this as if the world becomes its own image then the camera is the mirror into which the world looks to see its own reflection.
Alina Goldenberg
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3 comments:
I thought Deleuze’s method of using Bergson’s Creative Evolution to refute Bergson’s own arguments an interesting and useful one in terms of exploring new grounds in cinematic art. In addition to Alina’s comments, I found the re-examination of Bergson’s sugar water example a very applicable description of what Bergson lacked in his argument. Deleuze points out that, “[it] is slightly strange, since Bergson seems to have forgotten hat stirring with a spoon can help it to dissolve” (9). The change in ‘wholeness’ of the system is speed up by the process of stirring. This ‘wholeness’ now encompasses the sugar water; however this makes me wonder whether the fundamental wholeness had been changed? It is obvious a new element, namely the spoon has been added to an open ‘wholeness’; however, the water and sugar themselves are essentially what they are: when sugar dissolves in water, the particles in water still remain its original form, which is C6H12O6. How would the wholeness be different if instead of sugar, we dissolve salt cubes into the glass of water? When salt dissolves in water, NaCl bonds are broken, and resulting twice as many particles in water. The floating Na+ and Cl- ions in the solution changed the form of salt molecule. In this case, the ‘wholeness’ of the system also changed, but in a different fashion and more dramatic, and an addition layer of duration could be observed as well. This change in ‘wholeness’ also occurred within the system, which could imply that the wholeness is closed instead of open.
- Cathy Hwang
To some extent Deleuze's argument is technically correct but lacking in meaning. Sure, Bergson could stir the sugar into the water--but that was never Bergson's point. We could easily change the example to waiting for a full cup of tea to cool, waiting for a friend to pick you up in a car, or any number of other events that produce personal impatience. Bergson's point is more about his own experience of time and the way it creates absolute duration as opposed to scientific time and its indifference to anything but temporally meaningless numbers. Deleuze's other very strong arguments are slightly diminished by the way he uses a technical flaw to unravel Bergson's theory of absolute duration.
4. In the statement "With the cinema, it is the world which becomes its own image, and not an image which becomes world," Deleuze refers to the source of image creation in his movement-image. In the movement-image, actions and situations react to one another to form a narrative story. In cinema, the situation is derived from the real world (as depicted on film) and as such the contents of the film actually occured in some form in reality. As such, the real world is become an image. This contrasts with other artforms where what is visually portrayed does not actually exist in reality but is created by the artist and suggests a new 'world' or plane of existence.
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