Deleuze’s time description is the most solid one for me I guess. Although there are hundreds of theories about time, it is the only one that can be represented with a schema. Of course, I don’t count the linear-time. Time according to Deleuze actually Bergsons, is like a inverse cone. The outmost cycle of the cone is the “present”. Present that passes and pasts that preserved in it. Time preserves all the past in it. Deja vu can be an example. If we skip the scientific explanations about deja-vu, I can say that these are the moments that we sensed that all past stocked in time, it is preserved in time. At the exact moment of deja vu we say “I have experienced this moment before”. At that moment, we feel like present moment is actually the past. Present passes, it is temporary.
All past is already-there, it exists in time and when we recall it, it becomes present. All the past that preserved in time can be called as “pure collection”. When we try to remember something in the past, when we try to recall an event in the past, that particular time period that we remember or the specific image that we recall is already in past, and it is called “re-collection image”.
Past can be called as memory. When we recall something from the past, a re-
collection image, we actually select a memory from the collection of memories, from the memory pool, time. “ Memory is not in us; it is we who move in Being-memory, a world memory”. All memories are the “already-there” and we select among them when we want to remember something. We can jump among the memories in the past and select the one we wanted. I am not sure that it is a conscious choice, probably it is not. Our unconscious mind also has a role in the choice. There are different type of people who have a different type of memory. Some people can recall events visually, some of them can recall emotionally. Some would recall a red napkin on a dinner table and some one will remember a loud laugh from a woman who sat at the table.
However at the end we all recall from the “sheets of past”.
I guess, Waltz with Bashir, is the best example of this type of time description. It is the best example of the process of remembering, process of selecting a re-collection image from a pure collection. In the film, we see the process of remembering. Memories are becoming present. Although they are events from past, when we watch them on screen, it becomes preset for us. It also becomes present for the character. Past becomes present. “Present of the past”. We see that all past is preserved in time. However the character doesn’t know that is already there because of the effect of a trauma. He searches his memories in others memories, in the world memory. He collects images from past an he creates his own past.
I was thinking how this film could have been shot in Hollywood. Probably it would be a mind-game movie, character would have amnesia... But how remembering process would be? I guess, character would be trying to find some cues about his past in the back streets of Manhattan. He would meet people in order to find clues, and probably those people would be criminals or so. Of course some action would be held. Some chasing scenes, or maybe even shooting scenes... Probably there would be a mysteries girl too. He would fell in love with the girl, and probably girl would be the one who causes his trauma. Thing would get complicated... Then he would remember everything and so on. That’s the Hollywood spirit.