Beyond Update.

When trying to update the script for this weeks class, a number of issues have cropped up that have led to a rethink on the show's focus. A trip North at the beginning of October saw the Beyond production team interview several more contributors for the punk documentary. With now over 10 hours of recorded interview with 8 different contributors has led to a problem most documentary makers would sell their grandmothers for; too much great stuff. How does one tell this story in just 60 minutes, and do it justice? The thought now is to concentrate on the Belfast and leave the Derry story for another time. The Belfast story illustrates the non-sectarian nature punk in a much better manner, as Derry scene consisted of the Undertones and very little else.

Beyond - Why radio?

Why radio?

2 reasons really.

1. Have background in radio. I have no experience, nor much love for TV/Film

2. Way cheaper than TV/Film from a number of perspectives. No archive footage to purchase. Royalties (music) covered by radio station's fair use policy. TV contributors usually look for guest fees, where as with radio the norm is for guests to provide their interviews for free.

Friedberg & Andrew

End of Cinema

Friedburg asks how movies, TV and computer media been altered (Remember that computers haven't always been digital either.. Ed.) by digital technologies. She then goes on to say that its not just digital technologies that have impacted, and that changes have hit these industries before. TV has been hit with many changing factors to its spectatorship. Cable TV, VCRs and even the humble remote all have had a major effect on the way TV has been viewed. She goes on to breakdown the effects of the coming of all these technologies and the impact they have had on both the TV networks and on their audience. She then goes on to say that the same thing now applies to the film with the advent of digital. These controls have now been moved out of the hands of the projectionist and into the hands of the owner of a DVD player, particularly one with a remote in their hand. Of course subsequent innovations in web technology has meant that her findings are even more true today and because of this that we need to re-evaluate not only film theory. Also spectatorship needs to be revisited because the screens by which we watch video all have changed too with the advent of digital projectors, LCD screens, Flat screens, iPods (bet she didn't see that one coming) and so on.

Adaptation
Dudley argues that pretty much everything is an adaptation of something else and that there are basically 3 modes of adaptation. Borrowing, which means taking extensively from a previous work, is the most common form. Trainspotting would be an example. However, Romeo & Julliet set in 1990s Miami with a heartthrob actors playing the leads would probably more likey to be considered by him as an 'intersecting' adaptation, in that the movie faithfully stays true to Sheakspeare's original dialogue even though it set 400 years later, and in America.
Dudley then says that the third mode, fidelity of transformation, is probably the most tiresome of discussion. How well it stays true to the original meaning of the originating text is just one of the factors, and that is fairly easy to see. How its fidelity of spirit, tone, imagery, values etc is much more difficult to qualify.

he concludes that adaptations, which are not only works of art in their own right, but that inform us of the cultures that creat them.

Trainspotting

Trainspotting ...

It is unavoidable that a book and a film of the same story will have some dissimilarities, if only because they are two distinct media with two different audiences. The book and movie I have chosen is Trainspotting one of my all time favourites.

In the movie the plot is linear in the main, where as in the book the time line is not as straightforward. In fact, the book is more a collection of sometimes very dark short stories with the different storylines loosely linked. However, the film plot is tied together far more tightly, and overall is a fairly traditional narrative structure. The movie is not anywhere as near as dark as the book.

Although much of the witty dialogue that peppers the movie script comes directly from the pen of Irvine Welsh, it is used in different scenes that they appear in the novel. For example the 'it's shite being Scottish' speech takes place in the pub where Begbie tosses the pint glass into the crowd below, in the movie this monologue takes place when the boys head out to the countryside for the day ... (this bit of the movie always did bother me, why were they out in the country? dinnae makes sense, likesay.)

With music, for me, it is all about the songs; as your average A&R man will tell u. Likewise with movies or literature, its all about the story. A good plot is imperative, regardless of the medium. And in this particular case of adaptation, I would so far as saying that the film ever surpasses the original work and stands on its own two feet as a genuine work of art, regardl

Punk Archives

Although there seem to be no web pages devoted specifically to Belfast punk, sites such as punk77.co.uk and the Punk in Derry pages provide me with some very useful background. Band web sites SLF.com, theundertones.com also provide some useful background. More relevant sites exist on myspace.com for some of the less well know bands, many of whom were far more important to the story of NI Punk than Stiff Little Fingers or the the Undertones ever were. That being said, the Virtual Pub discussion board on SLF.com is extremely useful, as here one can make contact with some of the old punks who were involved in the very beginnings of the North's most successful period in modern music.

For context the CAIN web site (http://cain.ulst.ac.uk) provides all sorts of demographic and socio-political data which is very important to highlight the economic and social conditions during the relevant time period. Population/census data, for instance, paints a clear picture of a society in decay as thousands fled the dole queues and sectarian violence to seeks better lives in mainland UK, the US or Australia.

Writing Machines II

Electronic literature works in a fundamentally different ways than print and thus requires a new critical framework for analysis. new paths can be forged by the reader between the different lexias.  E-lit is not necessarily about reading the words from beginning to end, but can make use of navigation to follow many different paths to discover background documents, maps, letter & journals that serve to possibly enhance the reader's experience, making it a more interactive environment that the normal print one.  E-text has its own properties and should be viewed as a medium rather than a transparent interface.

In traditional literature the author's voice is privileged, however, it is my opinion that with e-lit the voice is no longer solely that of the writer.  The graphic designer and programmer now also have a voice that was not originally there. This will obviously dilute the voice of the writer, something that has left the traditionalists agasht. But this also may perhaps elevate the work of the programmer/designer to the level of art, which in some cases is long over due. 

This new medium has lead some writers to explore and experiment with the new form, embracing the technology and making it part of the narrative.  The example cited is Lexia to Perplexia. The author here actually creates a creole in which computerspeak and english are intermingled and it all become part of the story. He continues to integrate humans and computers further. 

The wordiness of this book makes me wish i too could use a more powerful tool to navigate the reading, skipping her little life adventures and getting straight to the point.