Abstract

The city has a strong memory and it never forgets its own experiences. The past, the present and the future of the city can be read in its streets, buildings, sounds, myths, rhythms and stories. More importantly, if the city is portrayed through a camera, it becomes as fictional and designable as films. At this stage, there is no difference between watching a film and seeing a city. Also, cinema itself turns into a paradigm that belongs to the city. This parallelism between the city and film is like an inevitable destiny so much so that they constitute and develop each other. Accordingly, those who attempt to understand the notion of the city should consult the films made about them and vice versa; hence, this paper deals with the question of how the city is cinematized, but this question involves another question: how does the cinematic imagination fictionalize itself in the city?

Highlights

  • How does cinema differ from literature, music, painting or theatre? Why do most theorists attempt to analyze social forms such as community, culture, ideology, religion and urban experience by means of film? More importantly, why do we look at the city in films? I suppose that, as Orhan Pamuk, a Nobel-winning Turkish author, writes: “ ...just as we learn about our lives from others, so, too, do we let others shape our understanding of the city in which we live” (2006, 8)

  • A monologue from the Turkish film, The Letter / Mektup (1997), summarizes why we need an external eye: “Once upon a time, the swamp was being seen from a distance, but, it is not being seen, because we are under the swamp”

  • The cinema, as an external eye, stimulates an off-voice, activates fiction and logical cohesion, clarifies how modern cities turn into a dump due to complex relations, unlimited consumption, endless mobility, uncontrolled population explosion, thoughtless demolition, rebuilding and increasing pollution

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Summary

INTRODUCTION

How does cinema differ from literature, music, painting or theatre? Why do most theorists attempt to analyze social forms such as community, culture, ideology, religion and urban experience by means of film? More importantly, why do we look at the city in films? I suppose that, as Orhan Pamuk, a Nobel-winning Turkish author, writes: “ ...just as we learn about our lives from others, so, too, do we let others shape our understanding of the city in which we live” (2006, 8). A monologue from the Turkish film, The Letter / Mektup (1997), summarizes why we need an external eye: “Once upon a time, the swamp was being seen from a distance, but, it is not being seen, because we are under the swamp” This aphorism indicates the importance of cinema in cities that are full of swamp-like visual images and messages. In parallel with social scientists rather than film critics, it is necessary to focus on the technical parameters such as editing, camera movements, light and sound, and on the narrative dimension of cinema, such as the stories and lives that inhabit streets and buildings, in order to comprehend all the corners and details of the city. Films have a power to simplify the city in such a way that as to reflect it as is (Kracauer 1995, 328)

A Methodological Discussion
Conclusion

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