Postmodernity and the Lego Movie - web articles

http://articles.latimes.com/2014/feb/07/entertainment/la-et-mn-lego-production-20140207

http://pop-primer.com/2014/08/5-reasons-the-lego-movie-is-a-postmodernist-masterpiece/

postmodernism and film

Postmodernist film like postmodernism itself is a reaction to modernist cinema and its tendencies. Modernist cinema, "explored and exposed the formal concerns of the medium by placing them at the forefront of consciousness. Modernist cinema questions and made visible the meaning-production practices of film." The auteur theory and idea of an author producing a work from his singular vision guided the concerns of modernist film. "To investigate the transparency of the image is modernist but to undermine its reference to reality is to engage with the aesthetics of postmodernism." The modernist film has more faith in the author, the individual, and the accessibility of reality itself than the postmodernist film.
Postmodernism is in many ways interested in the liminal space that would be typically ignored by more modernist or traditionally narrative offerings. The idea is that the meaning is often generated most productively through the spaces and transitions and collisions between words and moments and images. Henri Bergson writes in his book Creative Evolution, "The obscurity is cleared up, the contradiction vanishes, as soon as we place ourselves along the transition, in order to distinguish states in it by making cross cuts therein in thoughts. The reason is that there is more in the transition than the series of states, that is to say, the possible cuts--more in the movement than the series of position, that is to say, the possible stops." The thrust of this argument is that the spaces between the words or the cuts in a film create just as much meaning as the words or scenes themselves.
Postmodernist film typically has three key characteristics that separate it from modernist cinema or traditional narrative film. 1) The pastiche of many genres and styles. Essentially, this means that postmodern films are comfortable with mixing together many disparate kinds of film(styles, etc.) and ways of film-making together into the same movie. 2) A self-reflexivity of technique that highlights the construction and relation of the image to other images in media and not to any kind of external reality.  This is done by highlighting the constructed nature of the image in ways that directly reference its production and also by explicit intertextuality that incorporates or references other media and texts. The deconstruction and fragmentation of linear time as well is also commonly employed to highlight the constructed nature of what appears on screen. 3) An undoing and collapse of the distinction between high and low art styles and techniques and texts. This is also an extension of the tendency towards pastiche and mixing. It typically extends to a mixing of techniques that traditionally come with value judgments as to their worth and place in culture and the creative and artistic spheres.
Lastly, contradictions among technique, values, styles, methods, and so on are important to postmodernism and are many cases irreconcilable. Any theory of postmodern film would have to be comfortable with the possible paradox of such ideas and their articulation.^[

Postmodernism from anniapple

Post-Modernism In One Minute

Theorists

 

Jean Baudrillard

 

 

“The secret of theory is that truth doesn’t exist.”

‘A condition in which “reality” has been replaced by simulacra’

 

Simulacra…

When a sign loses its relation to reality, it then begins to simulate a simulation

 

Simulation:

The process in which a representation of something comes to replace the thing which is actually being represented.

The representation then becomes more important than ‘the real thing’

 

Hyperreality:

Division between “real” and simulation has collapsed, therefore an illusion of an object is no longer possible because the real object is no longer there. E.g. celebrities who reach a point at which every aspect of their lives is taken care of by someone else are said to live in a hyperreal world. They lose the ability to interact with people on a normal level and are cocooned in Hyperreality. Normal people often try to copy this. This is a common case in which someone has become more engaged in the hyperreal world than the actual real world. Play station games which have a lot of violence in them often have a lot of bad press, the media believe that people will copy the actions which they see in the video game.

 

 

He described media culture as consumed by what he called ‘an effect of frantic self-referentiality’ and stated that the implication of this is that as the media doesn’t have to make any necessary reference to reality, we now face a situation in which the image ‘bears no relation to any reality whatsoever’.In other words, there is no such thing as reality, known as simulacra.

 

 

He said that due to our apparent obsession with images, for instance parents filming their children and the fact that there are images everywhere we look, we can only experience the world through a form of filter of preconceptions and expectations created in advance by culture.

 

 

Jean-François Lyotard

 

 

“Simplifying to the extreme, I define postmodernism as incredutity towards the metanarratives.”

 

 

He said that the older and larger scientific explanations may no longer apply due to changes in culture and society, so therefore newer theories need ti be developed that have more relevance to the present.

 

 

His main focus was knowledge and therefore looks at the scientific theories.

 

 

He said that postmodern science:

 

Ø Is no longer coherent

 

Ø Its contribution can no longer be valued for its contribution towards human progress

 

Ø No longer follows the idea that the sum of all knowledge will give us a perfect set of information

 

Ø Has becomes a mass of incompatible theories that has no goal other than to further research

 

 

He said there is no certainty of ideas, instead there are better or worse ways to interpret things. This is because of the limited amount of knowledge that humans can understand, so humans will never know this objective truth.

 

 

Fredric Jameson

 

 

“I would like…to characterize the postmodernic experience of form with what will seem, I hope, a paradoxical slogan namely the proposition that difference relates.”

 

Best known for his analysis of contemporary cultural trends-he once described postmodernism as spatialisation of culture under the pressure of organised capitalism.

 

Believes that postmodernism provides pastiche, humorously referencing itself and other tests in an empty and meaningless circle. Pastiche is distinct from parody, which uses irony, humour and intertexual reference to make an underlying and purposeful point.  

 

He categorized postmodernism into two parts: pastiche and parody.

 

 

Pastiche mixes different past styles together, but shows no understanding of history and the need to move forward, as it cannot think of anything better to do. This reflects a society that has abandoned any possibility of change. Jameson’s belief is that pastiche is taking over as postmodernisms most dominant trait.

 

 

He said that parody is more common to modernism and copies from old styles, but unlike pastiche takes a critical view of it. So therefore it asks questions about it, rather than simply duplicating it.

Theorists

Jean Baudrillard

 

“The secret of theory is that truth doesn’t exist.”

 

He described media culture as consumed by what he called ‘an effect of frantic self-referentiality’ and stated that the implication of this is that as the media doesn’t have to make any necessary reference to reality, we now face a situation in which the image ‘bears no relation to any reality whatsoever’. In other words, there is no such thing as reality, known as simulacra.

 

He said that due to our apparent obsession with images, for instance parents filming their children and the fact that there are images everywhere we look, we can only experience the world through a form of filter of preconceptions and expectations created in advance by culture.

 

Jean-François Lyotard

 

“Simplifying to the extreme, I define postmodernism as incredutity towards the metanarratives.”

 

He said that the older and larger scientific explanations may no longer apply due to changes in culture and society, so therefore newer theories need ti be developed that have more relevance to the present.

 

His main focus was knowledge and therefore looks at the scientific theories.

 

He said that postmodern science:

Ø  Is no longer coherent

Ø  Its contribution can no longer be valued for its contribution towards human progress

Ø  No longer follows the idea that the sum of all knowledge will give us a perfect set of information

Ø  Has becomes a mass of incompatible theories that has no goal other than to further research

 

He said there is no certainty of ideas, instead there are better or worse ways to interpret things. This is because of the limited amount of knowledge that humans can understand, so humans will never know this objective truth.

 

Fredric Jameson

 

I would like…to characterize the postmodernic experience of form with what will seem, I hope, a paradoxical slogan namely the proposition that difference relates.”

He categorized postmodernism into two parts: pastiche and parody.

 

Pastiche mixes different past styles together, but shows no understanding of history and the need to move forward, as it cannot think of anything better to do. This reflects a society that has abandoned any possibility of change. Jameson’s belief is that pastiche is taking over as postmodernisms most dominant trait.

 

He said that parody is more common to modernism and copies from old styles, but unlike pastiche takes a critical view of it. So therefore it asks questions about it, rather than simply duplicating it.

The Lego Movie

Unlike modernism and postmodernism, the first principles of metamodernism are fairly easy to understand. The basic premise is that we’re constantly caught between opposing concepts like “knowledge” and “doubt,” “reality” and “unreality,” and “Art” and“Life”; learning to move quickly between these concepts may be our best hope yet of regaining a sense of self in the Internet Age. The core message here is simple enough, in fact so simple that not only could a child pick it up quickly, it’s arguably children who understand the metamodern “cultural paradigm” better than anyone. Children, unlike their parents, move more or less seamlessly from the realm of fantasy to the aggressive insistence of reality. In fact, they daily face the prospect of having the things they think they know undermined by their elders. And while we don’t often associate childhood with High Art, certainly the most popular child’s toy in human history—Lego building blocks—is designed to let children forget their often restrictive lives for a while and bask, instead, in their own limitless ingenuity. Legos may or may not constitute building blocks for art, but if you’ve ever seen a child (or even an “AFOL,” an Adult Fan of Lego) mucking about with them, it’s hard to tell the difference between transient play and committed artistry. Which is exactly the point The Lego Movie wants to make to kids and adults alike: It’s okay not to know where to put things, or to put things in a place they don’t seem to belong, or to let your imagination outstrip your common sense. It’s equal parts a simple message of empowerment for kids and one sophisticated enough to deserve the adjective “metamodern,” making The Lego Movie the first unabashedly metamodern children’s film in Hollywood history.

In The Lego Movie—a film that combines actual Lego models, stop-motion animation, and (to a much greater extent) high-quality CG animation—an ordinary Lego minifigure of no great distinction, Emmet, learns that he alone has the means to stop the evil Lord Business from gluing together all the building blocks that comprise his universe. The metaphor is, at first blush, a pretty obvious one: Lord Business (Will Ferrell) wants to end dynamism of all kinds, including creativity, in order to better control all aspects of Lego (and, metaphorically, human) existence. As instruments for his nefarious scheme, Lord Business uses“micromanagers,” giant robotic Lego constructions whose literal purpose mirrors the emotional work so many human adults engage in every day: meticulously arranging existential elements whose native state is wild, unruly, and wonderful. Certainly, it’s no secret that much of what makes living worthwhile—the many forms of love; the many forms of courage; the boundlessness of creativity—makes little sense when we subject it to the petty prescriptions of micromanagement.

 

http://blogs.indiewire.com/pressplay/metamericana-the-lego-movie-metamodernism-for-kids

Theories

Jean Baudrillard

 

Talks about hyperreality, ‘a condition in which “reality” has been replaced by simulacra’.

Simulacra is when a sign loses its relation to reality, it then begins to simulate a simulation.

Simulation: the process in which a representation of something comes to replace the thing which is actually being represented. The representation then becomes more important than the ‘real thing’.

Hyperreality: division between “real” and simulation has collapsed, therefore an illusion of an object is no longer possible because the real object is no longer there.

 

Fredric Jameson

 

Jameson is best known for his analysis of contemporary cultural trends - he once described postmodernism as the spatialisation of culture under the pressure of organised capitalism.

 

Genre

Genre does not rely simply on what's in a media text but also on the way it is put together (constructed). A media text is said to belong to a genre, as it adopts the codes and conventions of other texts in that genre, and lives up to the same expectations. Texts from different mediums may belong to the same genre (e.g. a tv programme like Dr Who and a comicbook like The Incredible Hulk can both be categorised as Science Fiction.)

The genre of the song being dance and pop illustrates that the video itself is most likely to be happy and colourful fitting with the lyrics. My video doesn’t have a main character but instead is something that is more of a journey and not performance based. In turn the video doesn’t focus on males nor females, allowing there not to be a male or female gaze. Pop music tends to be happy and uplifting which fits well with the video as it’s a flight to another country that portrays everyone captured on screen as beautiful. The lyrics represent the narrative of the video. As the video is fast paced, the shots are less likely to be long prolonged shots but those of fast cuts. As no one is lip-synching the song its self is non-diegetic. The video connotates realism as nothing stages but instead what the director saw (me) as interesting, meaningful footage is what is seen on screen. No planned or specific costumes are used as the video is a realistic interpretation of society.

None of the theories apply to my music video. The video doesn’t follow the stereotypical aspect of videos which theorists such as Domaille talk about the fatal flaw, the indomitable hero or the dream comes true. Nor does the video follow points Todorov makes, such as the 5 stages of equilibrium, disequilibrium, recognition, action and restoration. Like stated before my video doesn’t have a story line, it’s merely following real life. Nothing is staged.

To conclude the audience feel jubilant about themselves. Both video and lyrics are uplifting.

Explain how you used conventional and / or experimental narrative approaches in one of your production pieces.

“Media texts rely on cultural experiences in order for audiences to easily make sense of narratives”. Explain how you used conventional and / or experimental narrative approaches in one of your production pieces.

The music video I’m making isn’t based on any music video in particular. The video is a journey of my holiday, going from country to country showing beautiful people around the world. There isn’t a story of sorts but merely a voyage that allows audiences to realise, no matter where in the world and the goings on of what happens around us for example war and suffering everyone is beautiful. It doesn’t matter if you’re homeless, working class, rich or whatever race, the concept still applies. Together with the beautiful people I also capture beautiful destinations and scenes.

None of the theories apply to my music video. The video doesn’t follow the stereotypical aspect of videos which theorists such as Kate Domaille talk about the fatal flaw, the indomitable hero or the dream comes true. Nor does the video follow points Tzvetan Todorov makes, such as the 5 stages of equilibrium, disequilibrium, recognition, action and restoration. Like stated before my video doesn’t have a story line, it’s merely following real life. Nothing is staged.

As the video is not one of performance it’s one that follows the lyrics of the son ‘Beautiful People’. The use of long shots allows the audience to see the scenery and the culture that beholds Zambia and London. People would be interested to see what a country in Africa is like. For those who live in hyper-reality and believe all they see in the media would assume there’s only poverty and wilderness, when a matter of fact it’s advanced. The video allows people to step out of the bubble of hyper-reality and see the bigger picture…it’s not all doom and gloom.

The video I’m making is linear; the video refers to a journey being told in an order of events, in addition to being omniscient narrative. The message is more or less what is seen on the screen. The meaning can be perceived in many different ways. The meaning is left open to the audience. What is provided in the music video is the simple meaning; everyone is beautiful, the lyrics to the video illustrate this alongside. The audience is left to perceive the video in anyway and mainly based on what they want to believe they are seeing. The video uses verisimilitude which is that the quality of appearing to be real or true and follows the rules of continuity. As Pam Cook argues that the Hollywood narrative structure includes: “linearity of cause and effect within an overall trajectory of enigma resolution” and “a high degree of narrative closure”. My video goes against this and allows the audience freedom to have their own understanding. Not following conventions of typical videos I’d like to think my video is postmodern. It’s not restricted. There are no rules. Laura Mulvey – argues that cinema positions the audience as male. The camera gazes at the female object on screen. It also frames the male character watching the female. Once again the video ignores this and doesn’t exploit women but instead shows men and women as equal.

Video Narrative

Chris Brown - Beautiful People (My Video) Narrative

The narrative is how beautiful people are around the world are. I travel from London to Zambia filming the people and the culture. The story shows how no matter what people are going through, what race and what culture; everyone is beautiful. It’s not just what’s only on the outside but what’s on the inside. My video shows the scenery and people being happy in their own right. I mainly use long shots to show the background as people might be interested in seeing what Zambia looks like for those who have a pre-assumption of what Africa is like. It’s not all doom and gloom. My video is linear which means the video refers to a story that is told in the order in which events happen - from beginning to end.

My video is an omniscient narrative. The message is more than just what is seen on the screen. The meaning can be perceived in many different ways. The meaning is left down to the audience. What is provided is the basic meaning that everyone around the world is beautiful. The scenes captured are left to the audience’s perception and what they want to believe they are seeing.

Postmodern/Postmodernity VS Modernism/Modernity

Skepticism of idea of progress, anti-technology reactions, neo-Luddism; new age religions. Vs Master narrative of progress through science and technology.

 Sense of unified, centered self; "individualism," unified identity. Vs Sense of fragmentation and decentered self; multiple, conflicting identities.

Subverted order, loss of centralized control, fragmentation. Vs Hierarchy, order, centralized control.

Rhizome/surface tropes. 
Attention to play of surfaces, images, signifiers without concern for "Depth". Relational and horizontal differences, differentiations. Vs Root/Depth tropes.
Faith in "Depth" (meaning, value, content, the signified) over "Surface" (appearances, the superficial, the signifier).

Hyper-reality, image saturation, simulacra seem more powerful than the "real"; images and texts with no prior "original". 
"As seen on TV" and "as seen on MTV" are more powerful than unmediated experience. Vs Faith in the "real" beyond media, language, symbols, and representations; authenticity of "originals."

I am a postmodernist. Post modernism allows for more imagination and freedom. I believe in the sense of hyper0reality as sometimes representations aren't seen as more important as the original.

Lyric Narrative

Katy Perry – This Is How We do Post Modern video essay

The video starts off with a long shot of a man looking at an art piece of Katy Perry with his back to the camera. The start of the video allows the audience to note that the video is most likely going to be artistic due to the reference to many pieces of art and pulp culture. As the director zooms in more into the picture, the picture starts to show more colour. As camera gets closer the audience can see the wig Katy Perry is wearing is similar to one of Beyonce’s many wigs. From this the audience can foreshadow that the video will make references to many well known celebrities. Pastiche/homage to the 70’s fashion and colourful style is immediately noticed in the first scene by looking at the large earring in Katy’s right ear while she doesn’t wear one in the right ear which is bizarre to do in this day and time. Male dancers dressed in grey suits with white shoes and red bow ties pays homage to Pee Wee Herman, who served as inspiration for Joel’s video for “Water Fountain” by tUnE-yArDs. The video pays homage to modern pop art through colourful pieces that visually represent the lyrics of the song. For example when she sings “Playing ping pong all night long, everything's all neon and hazy” the audience can see a neon ping pong table in the middle of the screen with people dressed in neon outfits with neon stars to represent that its night. Neon colours were popular in the 70’s making the video more post modern. As the video goes on a mid shot is used to shot Katy Perry Surrounded by Fake Chanel which illustrates that many people who cannot afford Chanel buy fake channel ‘if you can’t have fake Chanel’. Emphasising pastiche using an explosion of pop art, vintage fashion. What was worn in the early days is now being called vintage, the video is made more post modern by using a wide variety of vintage clothing. Ice cream truck and high ponytail is like the ice cream truck used in the Iggy Azalea “Pu$$y” video. The video takes even existing videos and pays homage to them through making the post modern just by the use of the bright colours on the truck and vintage clothing that is now back in fashion. The red, blue, and yellow squares reference the De Stijl Dutch art movement from the early 1900’s, going back to the point that the video references many pieces of art and pulp culture. use of the openly gay NBA player Jason Collins illustrates that it’s ok to be gay while Katy Perry sings “this is how we do” bringing forth the idea that being gay is normal more now than it was years back.

Reference to world famous Italo Disco, Pizzarina di Bellesima while Katy Perry wears everything from the Yves Saint Laurant Mondrian dress to a pepperoni pizza swimsuit to green hair extensions. Connotating that anything goes, people go with the flow and weird is part of our everyday life; people are allowed to express themselves in more ways than ever. She cruises around in a convertible with her hair teased out the way Fran Fine had in the hit TV series The Nanny, wearing similar clothing and colours the character would wear. This makes reference to an old TV show that people now wouldn’t have heard of. This part of the video is more like ‘you had to have been there to understand’. The video plays both references to topics relevant now and was relevant then. The director zooms out of the shot where the audience can see Katy Perry getting her nails done while sitting on a large hand. This mise-en-scene makes reference to Miley Cyrus’ foam finger in 2013 at the VMAs. There’s interetextual reference to Mariah Carey. This seen is merely a parody and mocks the well known singer as the celebrity double in the long shot wears and extremely tight dress that reveals her dress and her figure while she poses for the camera trying to look ‘sexy’. Nicki Minaj’s iconic bright hair colour is used on one of Katy Perry’s wigs while she sits on Lorde’s table-tennis. She makes references to well known singers in one take. In the scene where Katy Perry is on the floor singing Karaoke the audience can make link and the hair references to FKA twigs who’s an old singer born in the later years. The video as a whole is s sequel of sorts to both California Girls and Last Friday night which are both well known party songs by Katy. The strutting ice cream treats are a reference to the famous 1957 “Let’s Go Out To The Lobby” movie theatre snack promo. Intertextuality to Last Friday Night. A close-up of the singer is used to reference Brooke Candy who is Tumblr’s favourite rapper by the use of the hair style. Portrait of singer Aretha Franklin. A prince charming reference is used when an image of a shirtless man with a 10 on his face is shown where next a frog appears on the screen. This in turn references to princess and the frog as she ends up kissing a frog thinking it was her prince. This is shown by the putting on of the glasses when the ‘hot’ male is on screen and when the glasses are on the male turns out to be a mere frog. The twerking ice-cream makes renefrence to the singer Miley Cyrus as she recently brough back the trend of terrible twerking which in turn had a snowball effect leading to more twerking video on the net.