New Media - that just means more modernised special effects, right?
Clearly that's what separates movies of the 21st century from those of the 20th, and film-makers are more than eager to make use of rapidly evolving technology to jazz up their visual story-telling methods. But don't get me wrong, I enjoy watching the evolution of the narrative process... and it give's budding animators like myself an ever-growing career to enjoy.
Story-telling in New Media is much more immersive for the audience
thanks to updated animation technology
Notice that it's only been over the last 20 or so years that new and alternative methods of story-telling have emerged: older films have had a set pattern for them - beginning, middle and end, with a hero and villain, all viewed through regular cinematic perspective (basically, through the camera lens). But now, with the emergence of films like The Blair Witch Project, Paranormal Activity, and District 9 (to name a few) where the use of a handheld camera or a documentary-style setup makes the audience believe that what's being portrayed on the screen could happen that way in real life. And with films like Vantage Point which replays the same 25 minute event, but through the perspectives of 8 different characters with the audience discovering something new through each character's eyes.
The counter-argument is that New Media is just a new way of telling the same old story over again. The biggest culprit is Avatar which spent billions in production, with some of the most realistic and immersive visual effects ever seen in cinema... but all of this to basically rehash the story of Dances with Wolves. The same goes for District 9 too: the segregation of aliens in South African society is reminiscent of the apartheid era, as well as having distinct similarities to the film Alien Nation.
No comments:
Post a Comment