Last November I had an early cinema class where the professor asked us to make a video essay exploring themes of the anthropocene, our relation to and understanding of the films themselves (what is ‘early’ & ‘early’ to whom), and how these films are inevitably mediated.
[Enter: Earth, Mother! - a 1:09s short film]
‘Due at 11:59pm’
For this assignment I made an actuality, or pseudo-actuality, of a woman exiting the mouth of a cave. When I say to pseudo-actuality, I am referring to the iris transition from the title card that 'interrupts’ the actuality. I chose to do this at the beginning of my film to foreground the film in relation to human manipulations of self-(re)presentation and time — which are central to the anthropocenic epistemology. My intention with this film was to create something that depicted an anthropocenic relationship to the land and undercut that message through the use of editing and analysis.
My inspiration for this project culminated in our class discussions about the Anthropocene and how the concept (or construction) of the White self attests to its own self-birth through rejecting the Mother or maternal figure (Brown, The Keaton Economy). This is something that I attempted to capture in my film where the cave represents an Earthy Mother and, in an implicitly graphic way, the woman who emerges from the cave effectively crawls out of the womb. Her birth is clean. There is no mess, no mud, no squinting after a gestation of darkness. She stands tall on her own two feet. When she enters the world, she is astounded by all there is; and when she looks back at the place she was born, at her Mother, she leaves. She abandons the maternal figure. This presents a fantasy of self-birth in which the role of the mother is diminished, if not totally denied, and centres the importance of the human Self.
The film itself is styled with reference to the silent films that I have watched. The iris transition, a common technique used in films such as The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, acts to separate the title card from the ‘actuality’. My thoughts here were that actuality films are viewed as representing ‘real’ moments in time and space where things happen, without mediation. I also wanted to engage with the selectivity of film where these moments of reality, so to speak, are selected. Someone sees something and points a camera in that direction. But what else exists in that moment? In that reality? What is outside the frame? What can’t we see? Anyways, my point here was to use the iris to interrupt both the actuality and the audience so to pose questions about notions of ‘objective’ reality. Another convention that I drew upon is the use of low saturation. I attempted to ‘legitimize’ my film as a silent film through the use of black and white so it would appear to ‘belong’ within my own preconceived notion of what silent films look like. However, I did try to make the saturation level just high enough that the viewer would question if there was some colour because I thought it would be an interesting effect to question the audience. The tinting is another nod towards stylistic conventions from the silent era films I have seen. To me, the red tint symbolizes the severance of the woman from the Earthy Mother. This coincides with the idea that humans exist hierarchically to the land, no longer equals in the anthropocene epoch. Rather, the land is property which is owned and subject to human use. There are also multiple overlays and grain filters to make the film appear ‘old’. All of these stylizations and effects reflect my (limited) understanding of what early cinema is and, importantly, highlights my position as a filmmaker in the 21st century reflecting on and (trying) to engage with these films.
I feel that the film I made captures most of my ideas, but I would have liked to develop them further. In particular, I wanted to include the effect of nitrate degradation in my film, as seen in The Story of the Kelly Gang (1906).
The grain and the overlays begin to produce an effect similar to old filmstock, but I wanted to draw on Cubitt’s concept of eco-mediation through using the degradation effect in my film. By doing so, this effect, or rot, would comment on the film’s participation in the formations and reproductions of the anthropocene. Since this film was captured digitally, it does not allow for the possibility of degraded filmstock as no (nitrate) filmstock was used*. Nor could I find or produce an effect that mimicked this decay or rot. Although, through the frustrating process of scouring the internet trying to find a way to accomplish my vision I was hit with a rather obvious realization:
That producing this effect in of itself contradicts the very concept of eco-mediation and subsequently reinforces the centrality of human control over presentation, time, and aesthetics. In other words, I would not have been undercutting the anthropocenic message, but rather reinforcing it through appropriating the aesthetic of natural decay.
Lastly, the cave in the film is located on Vancouver Island, north of Campbell River, my hometown. I chose this place as it is one where I feel a strong connection and identification with the land. This cave in particular is one that I had explored with my dad when I was a kid. He joined me again this time to help film my project, which meant a lot to the both of us. The end credits mentions that the film was captured on the ancestral, active, and stolen lands of the We Wai Kum ↗, We Wai Kai ↗, K’ómoks ↗, Liǧʷiłdax̌ʷ ↗, Kwakwaka’wakw A̱wi’nagwis ↗ Nations.
Both the location of the cave, my relation to it, as well as the acknowledgement of whose land it is had an intersection with the idea of the anthropocene. In my understanding, under the anthropocene the land is characterized as an empty subject of (White, capitalist, heteronormative, masculinized) man. However, by choosing land that I feel strongly connected to and acknowledging its present and ancestral ties, it could be argued that it pulls at the threads of the anthropocenic message my film embodies. Certainly this is not enough to undo the entire message, but it does something to pose questions about our relationship to the land and whose land it is that we reside on.
*although digital forms, too, have their own form of rotting so to speak — more to read in Cubitt’s finite media
‘What lives will rot’
It’s been a while since I returned to my film. So why am I writing about it here? Since I worked on this project I’ve found myself invested in the ways in which cinema and ecology interact and shape one another (yayy nature!).
Now… things might get a little weird… my reflections on this film have wandered a little bit and I might wander here too… they may also be a little sparse, but just bear with me…
The concept of eco-mediation proposed by Cubitt deals with the film strip — specifically the (nitrate) film strip as a chemical object. Perhaps, a chemical organism. For the strip to rot it could be, briefly, considered ‘living’ (please don’t get philosophical on me because I will lose). Not alive in the same way as you or me, but living in how it is mediated by time and other natural forces. If the film strip is ‘alive’ so to speak then perhaps film itself changes — it, like the many things, is altered by its time, space, conditions. Film can be transformed outside of and beyond our control and conceptualizations.
Equally, it is not solely analog filmstrip that is effected by this rotting, this eco-mediation. Digital media alike is equally as ‘living’ and fragile — it rots or rather, corrupts(: I would know as last summer my USB corrupted with all of my pictures — tragedy.)
However, an intentional example of this digital rot is used thematically in Trevor Mack’s film ‘Portraits from A Fire.’ The Tsilhqot'in Canadian filmmaker uses this effect to contextualize the connection between the protagonist, Tyler, to his mother and the past (I highly recommend watching this film!!).
There is something beautiful in the eco-mediation of film (although there doesn’t have to be). Bill Morrison works alongside with the decayed (evolved?) archival footage from the 1926 film The Bells by James Young in his film Light is Calling (2003).
He created a meditative and thought-provoking short film with the ‘remains’ of the film. What we see as an audience in the 21st century vastly differs from the film’s original ‘meaning’ and context which remains inaccessible to us in the present. Morrison’s mediation, in addition to the ecomediation of the film itself, proposes new (or perhaps experimental?) methods of filmmaking — one that decentres the anthropocenic notions which commercial films are often constructed upon. He works with the rot and the past, the archive, to bring something to the present — or rather, returns something.
Perhaps film strip is alive (It’s Alive, Dr Frankenstein!). And if it lives as its own entity and rots, in isolation from human interference, then perhaps like the undead, our beloved zombies, it connects to another world beyond the human… beyond and outside of our anthropocene.
So… that’s all.
Thank you for reading :D
References & other materials (aka special features!!):
Brown, William. Navigating from the White Anthropocene to the Black Chthulucene, John Hunt Publishing Limited, 2023. ProQuest Ebook Central, https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/ubc/detail.action?docID=7246506.
Cubitt, Sean. Finite media : environmental implications of digital technologies. Duke University Press, 2017.
Tait, Charles, director. The Story of the Kelly Gang. J & N Nevin Tait, 1906,
Morrison, Bill. “Decasia.” IMDb, IMDb.com, 3 Oct. 2003, www.imdb.com/title/tt0303325/.
Morrison, Bill, director. Light Is Calling. Hypnotic Pictures, 2003,
https://icarusfilms.com/if-lic
Film strips being alive is not that far out a concept if you consider the earliest form of film stock - celluoid was indeed made from gelatin (aka animal glue, stock from "stock") and rendered, to both evoke the editing term and slaughterhouses (to rend), as the basis for film and photography. I know you said not to get philosophical but film being itself animated from film (stock), the inextricable animality/anima present in cinema is something worth getting into. Lippit's Electric Animal is a fantastic read in that regard. This is not to mention the idea of cinema itself being alive, as Capital/Cthulhu/Leviathan...which of course you'll get to once you've read Kinoteuthis Infernalis :).
Great read though. Loved the whole data rot bit and learning about your attempt at disrupting actualities. Films do transform and affect us in ways any other medium would struggle to do. Perhaps for this reason we should treat it with the same sentience as we would do to another "being" (in the midst of becoming?).