On "Filmic Experience" - 2

Casetti talks about “a double-sided situation” which arises from the experience of cinema. It meets us as the world meets us in our daily experience and it also presents a new model of the world, a new way to experience, or in other words, a particular experience of reality. Now this “particular” kind of experience, which is in a way religious, may be considered to be at the same level epistemologically with regards to a pragmatic viewpoint. Since it allows us to re-experience the world, cinema is useful and therefore, what it “shows” to us, the world that it represents, even though it is a simulation, may still be true. Yet it is not real since it is not authentic. Cassetti calls it “quasi-real”. Even though I agree that it is not “real” in a complete sense of the word, it may still be “true”.

There is no doubt that on the screen we re-view the world: both the actual one in which we live, and the possible one in which we could live. This “restitution” takes place on a multitude of levels: the filmic images can be seen as a “trace” or a “imprint” of that which has passed before the camera lens; they can be seen as a “copy” or a “facsimile” of the world in which we live; or they can be seen as a “reconstruction” or a “hypothesis” of reality. It is this multitude of levels that unfolds a double-sided situation.

The three levels of representation that Casetti here talks about roughly corresponds to different philosophical positions that discuss representational theories of mind and none of them are phenomenological accounts. The issue of representation is of crucial importance for philosophy, yet these three levels discussion is a bit outdated. An elegant solution to this may be found in Wittgenstein’s Philosophical Investigations in which he deconstructs his own picture theory.

In short, Casetti’s discussion of experience is lacking in philosophical content and he ends it rather abruptly by hinting at the relation of power and truth ( Foucault’s “Truth and Power” is relevant here) and also at some places to Baudrillard’s hyper-reality discussion and arguments about possible worlds. Cinematic experience begins and ends within certain spatial configurations yet, as Casetti points out, lines and boundaries that delineate the filmic experience is blurring. The issue of reality in filmic experience leaves itself to the issue of power and control; and in turn to our tactics of resistance.

This mixed bag of issues are all relevant to the issue of experience, but when the issue is such a widely and deeply discussed philosophical concept, it is hard to really say anything aside from pointing out some relevant ways of application. For my part, I think that the issue of experience brings with itself a host of issues which we can locate on the side of the subject,even in phenomenological formulations. The reasons that Casetti gives for prioritizing filmic experience opens a gap between cinema's essential features and the subject experiencing cinema. While it is fruitful to focus on filmic experience, the issue warrants a more thorough philosophical discussion.