Alfonso Caurón’s Gravity mirrors the purpose of Sunshine’s thinking machine, again
grappling with the concept of life as absurd.
Whereas Sunshine focuses the
message through a macro-lens that aims to demonstrate the necessity to
perpetuate life in terms of humanity as a whole, Gravity focuses the message through a micro-lens that aims to
demonstrate the necessity to perpetuate life in terms of the individual.
Mainstreaming and narrowing
the message is accomplished with disorienting effect. For one, while the film constructs a
protagonist that demands empathy, her situation is the furthest thing from
relatable. To put in Momma Schaef’s
terms: “I could handle all that flipping around in space…but not the water on
Earth.” Additionally, there is a selfish
and simplified shift in attitude when compared to Sunshine: participating in the agonizing absurdity of life is
justified because we should simply “enjoy the ride,” because either way we are
going to meet our imminent demise. The
conceited meaning of life develops inevitably because the collection of data
for the argument is conceited. Only the
life of Dr. Ryan Jones hangs in the balance from the film’s narrative
perspective, which is strange considering the global implications of the
tragedy that is depicted.
To communicate this concept,
Caurón accesses his infatuation with the potent symbolism that pregnancy
harbors within its metaphorical (and literal) womb. Within this film in particular, he
manipulates multiple dimensions of the film to create a sense that the
protagonist is in the womb and crippled by the anxiety of leaving the womb and
being born. In addition to the
reoccurring motif of umbilical cords that keep her connected to the ship, there
is one shot in particular that depicts her in fetal position after she safely
returns to the ship’s interior: it may as well have been a three-dimensional
sonogram. Safe within the ship’s
interior, sounds of the outside world are often distorted and stifled as if the
ship was immersed in water.
The womb, within and without the film, is a
cage. The womb is a medium that
simultaneously protects and isolates from the outside world and the womb is a
medium that makes one susceptible to internal dangers (in terms of the film:
oneself). What is beyond the womb is
foreign and terrifying. The ships that
Jones occupies are all foreign: whenever she establishes communication with
“Mother Earth,” it is rendered benign as language barriers arise. The ships, like life, are dangerously
intertwined and complicated: whenever the ship is struck by debris, it sparks a
tense chain of events that sends all of the components of the ship spinning due
to tangled wires and ropes.
As effective and moving as
the film was during my first (and only) viewing, it again had a very
disorienting and paradoxical effect. For
the film to work, we must put stake in the character: we must sympathize with
the character. The character denies any
responsibility to interact with the world, but we the audience [the world?] are
forced to interact with the character and want the character to have the
crystalizing moment where she realizes she should interact with us [spoiler
alert (because this is the first spoiler?): she has this moment]. In terms of Icarus' tragedy, Dr. Ryan Jones recognizes George Clooney as flying too close to the Sun (metaphorically, not a major spoiler) and sacrificing his life for hers. She actually mimics his "why not?" approach to life, and he is largely her inspiration to stay alive.
The operation of the film is
an appropriate cadence to this course.
Perhaps not for the whole of the class, but for me anyway. All things considered, this post would wrap
up nicely with a conceited conclusion.
Like I was saying, the reason why this film left something to be desired
was because film, like life, cannot be enjoyed simply for the ride itself. While certainly the aesthetic pleasure of the
ride factors itself into the equation when applying the film as a mechanism for
thought, the ride itself can’t exist in a vacuum: like the ship, it is
dangerously intertwined with the four kinds of meaning. And sure, ignorance may be bliss, however not
only is the unexamined life a life not worth living, but it is conceited and
even unethical.
*Cheese alert*
On that note, if I took away
one thing from this class, it would be that the unexamined film is a film not
worth viewing.
*Drops mic*
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