Third Reading Response.

I've always been annoyed when people make snarky comments while watching films that are slightly out of the ordinary. It is a pet peeve, and I hear it much more often than I should be able to stand. I've never questioned, however, the reason why people feel the need to complain about a film that seems strange and unconventional. In his article, "Introduction to 'Avant-Garde Film,'" Scott MacDonald explains why many people feel uncomfortable in the presence of unconventional films.

Most people, when they see a movie, go to see cinema - they want a show, not a film. So the majority of mainstream movies follow certain structures to pander to that desire. And every movie is neatly packed into a particular genre and sent out to marketing experts to be formatted for advertising. The whole process is very commercial. Because of this, most people have ideas in their heads of what a given movie will be like before it is seen. It is no surprise, then, that people don't know how to react when they see a film that is 'avant-garde.' But it isn't as if 'avant-garde' filmmakers are unaware of this problem. They know that many of their viewers will have a difficult time watching experimental films. Consequently, many 'avant-garde' filmmakers take into account how they think their viewers will react when they are constructing a film. For example, a very long take in a film is probably not just an arbitrary long take. Instead it is likely that the filmmaker chose to use a long take to allow the viewer to concentrate on a given image.

MacDonald's article helped me realize that making a film is more than just assembling images and sound to create a story or an environment. The filmmaker must also keep in mind the context in which his or her viewers are seeing the film. And that context is a cinematic environment wherein most movies are tailored to a certain mainstream structure.