Today we're going to be discussing Social Realism cinema, and I think it only fair in the name of journalistic integrity to point out that from the start, I hate it as an artform.

No, that's unfair. I positively LOATHE social realism - I think it's worthy but dull, dull, dull. I recognise all its hallmarks, and respect what the directors are trying to do, but I never enjoy it.

Are you even meant to? I suspect the answer is no; which leads to a second question "why put yourself through two and a half hours of misery to no visible gain?" If I leave a social realism film feeling downcast and miserable, then it's achieved its purpose. It was a success. That still leaves me in a bad mood, however - which today manifested itself in a loud argument with a man who was trying to sell me something. Very satisfying, because he couldn't answer back.


It's obviously an intensly personal thing - as someone who spends her life trying to make reality more like fiction, then an artform which tries to turn fiction into reality is obviously going to be pointless. One of the first things my lecturer explained was the question "what is realism in cinema?" is just another way of asking "what is cinema", which still strikes me as odd. Surely the sanest way to approach the question is first by "what is real"?

Which isn't a topic I've time to discuss right now, but you can imagine my views are interesting.



Joyless, plotless meandering, leading up to a resolution in which virtually nothing changes ain't my thing. I mean, plotless only works so far - while it is sometimes enjoyable to be set loose from genre rules, it's also nice to know where you stand. i always feel uncomfortable if I don't know approxamately where it's going. Even "weird things are happening for no reason" is good enough, if it's Terry Gilliam or similar. Films such as Ratcatcher or Meantime take meandering to a new level. There is nothing to cling on to - where are they going? With no plot, can there be a proper resolution? Is the entire film going to be a drift through experiences, or should I prepare myself for some action? Somebody, give me some Todorov*!


*if I remember correctly, Todorov wrote a paper or book formalising the statement that a good stories should have a beginning, a middle and an end - films begin at a state of equilibrium, something happens to cause disequilibrium and by the end of the film it has been resolved to create a new equilibrium. If I remember incorrectly, the name I meant to use was Propp...but I think he was the Russian fairy tales guy.

I don't want to experience "real" life - if I did, I'd go outside. Boring people, with pointelss conversation and mundane aims - well, I have my friends for that (just kidding! But not really.) For me, cinema is escapism pure and simple. Anger, trauma and insanity are big emotions, easy to sympathise with. Boredom, quiet despair, monotony - all far too subtle for me. Give me a good murder any day - but the ordinary sufferings of ordinary people, troubled by unemployment and unfair odds...blech. Not unworthy, but not a world I want to immerse myself in.

If I wanted snippy arguments, frosty atmospheres and the mundanity of every day life, I'd just go downstairs. Realism is the direct opposite of romanticism. Romanticism makes Don Corleone an amazingly cuddly guy, turns Butch and Sundance from more than scruffy bandits and makes Mr Blonde look...merely misunderstood. But from a Realistic standpoint, all characters are necessarily ugly and vile. They pick their toes and go to the toilet, and they talk about ordinary stuff.

It brings up the preface of the Picture of Dorian Gray - "the nineteenth century dislike of Realism is the rage of Caliban seeing his own face in the glass. The ninteenth century dislike of Romanticism is the rage of Caliban not seeing his own face in the glass", which I never really understood until this morning.

Maybe it's my white, middle class guilt, meaning I can't empathise with the (generally) working class (generally) poverty stricken heroes? In otherwise, my own discomfort at seeing the world as it actually is, instead of hiding in my ivory tower and watching Baz Luhrmann and Terry Gilliam play with shadow puppets.

After all, I like violence, ethical dilemmas and gritty realism in a safe context. Take Reservoir Dogs, for example - one of the chief reasons it struck a chord with me was the cruel, drawn out and very sticky passing of Mr Orange. Cinema, in general, doesn't do accidental deaths, and doesn't do injuries. A minor baddie will die instantly, a major baddie will die and his body vanish (are those footprints...?). A good guy will survive just long enough to pass on their last words. In other words, I most admired the film for it's gritty realism and deliberate circumvention of cinematic conventions. And all this reminds me of a great book about movie violence I once read. I should have pinched it while I had the chance (I NEVER observe usual morality about theft when it comes to books I adore, and I know no one else does). One of it's key points was this:

"Movie violence can be entertaining; real violence is not entertaining.
Movies give us a safe enviroment to explore our feelings"

For me, Reservoir Dogs is a perfectly safe enviroment. I'm not a gangster, I'm not even American - and the nameless, faceless female victims are given not a moment's sympathy. In that enviroment, I can enjoy irony and unhappy endings. But Bruno and Sophie of L'Enfant- I see them every day, in London, on the bus, in the streets. That type of girl - and please understand I'm not judging them on account of the way they choose to live their lives. It's not a class or status thing, nor am I passing judgement on their modesty in a Victorian sense - everyone lives in their own way, finds their own happiness, and who am I to interfere? It's perfectly possible for a mum on her own to raise happy children. None of these things matter to me. It's the dead expression that really kills me, and also the fact they don't seem to be stirred by anything beyond the mundane - be that art or nature. In other words, Bruno and Sophie are not a safe enviroment but something I encounter daily.

Lets talk about L'Enfant. Bruno is a dedicated petty crook. Sophie is his girlfriend, and they've just had a kid - little Jimmy. Hilarity ensues, in scummy flats and ordinary pubs. It's about crime, human trafficking, corruption and misery. I'm not saying I didn't like it. I just couldn't entirely escape from my basic dislike of social realism, all those factors which drive me nuts. What did I learn from this film? That crime doesn't pay, and single motherhood is a bad idea? For me, social realism is a bit like visiting dull relatives - it's not enjoyable at the time, but afterwards you have a warm fuzzy sense of contentment - like you've done a good deed. I didn't empathise with the characters and situations at all, and it's not a class thing either - I adore Rorschach Watchmen too, and he's a complete nut job - but about how they were presented.

It demonstrates many elements of realism. First, it is not judgemental. We understand that the characters exist in a system which has failed them, and their refusal to be victims force the audience to examine those very systems of which they are representative. Thus if any judgement takes place, it is in the wider context of their situation. L'Enfant doesn't directly engage with an obvious political message, but it does explore personal ethics, again linked to context. Like many arthouse realism films, it's also got a funny trick going on. It presents the spectacle of poverty as enjoyable for it's middle class audience, who are already converted to it's ideology. In other words, people who don't care about social problems are not it's target audience, nor those actually stuck in social problems. I also liked the title: "The child", because by the end of the film there are several candidates who it could be referring to.

One of the essays perhaps sums this all up best:

"character's situations are premised on their relations to the
envoroment, which is integral to their psychological state. Rather than
suggesting reformist or revolutionary solutions to social conditions, the signs
are that filmmakers will continue to explore themes of identity and alienation
threough forms of realism that increasingly emphasise the psychological
consequences of poverty and exclusion."

In a more general sense, there's an underlying irony in discussing "realism" in cinema, in that no cinema is real. Additionally, all films have been mediated through mechanical reproduction. With CGI you can even add things not there at all. Realism is not reality (you can argue that documentaries aren't either). Instead, it is governed by conventions of form - typically on location, with a handheld camera and somewhat rough round the edges - and content - focusing on the everyday, the gritty and otherwise marginalised groups of society. They refuse to provide easy answers, or a simple narrative, and attempt to portray complex images of reality.

There's a level at which realism is the avowed opposite of genre. Genre presents worlds familiar through formal and narrative conventions (i.e. spurs and six shooters = wild west), and sustained through continuity editing which presents it as real. While realism escapes predetermined plotlines and kinks, and is deliberately anti-convention. But I would argue that this does make realism a genre. Realism films don't use non-diegetic music, Epic movies have sweeping sountracks. Realism films take place on estates in hoodies, Epic movies dwell in castles and bear swords. What's the difference? Bazin asks, "is reality revealed or constructed" - in other words, do long takes reveal the world, or is this all artifice by the director who has not placed his camera innocently.

Our lecturerer brought up Slumdog Millionare. Is it a realism movie, with its portrayal of the slums of Mumbai and a lead character firmly placed as a representative of that world? But it's being sold as a feel-good genre movie. In addition, there's a strong element of fantasy in the movie, and a lack of genuine agenda - especially as it revolves around the hero winning a capitalist handout.

What are the formal properties then? Through authentic mise-en-scene and strict use of diegetic sound, they create a unity of space (i.e. it all feels real). Furthermore, claustrophobia, crowding, inescapable, argumentative spaces is used to back up the political points of enviroment shaping character.

These characters tend to be firmly placed in their location through long takes and depth of field - this isn't just a woman, this is a Middle Aged, Once-Widowed Cleaning Woman in 1970s Berlin. Furthermore, she is taken as a representative of all Berlin's Middle Aged Cleaning ladies.

A lack of narrative clarity means we have to derive the plot from "dead spaces". We've got to understand things from gestures, and mundane activities, rarely from dialogue. Mundane tasks take precedence over the demands of the narrative. In addition, the ordinary nature of the characters means their motivation tends to be pretty unconventional. Or, in the case of Meantime, entirely absent.

The use of handheld camera gives an impression of being an observer. A critic describes this as "not empathy, conventionally speaking, but proximity". Most conventional movies will tell you "this is Stan, Stan is our hero - sympathise with Stan". Realism tends to just do the first part "this is Stan. Watch Stan. I'm not saying anything. What do you think?". In other words, they refuse to be judgemental. There's space for the audience to distance themselves, and they are not forced to identify with any one character. This influences our field of vision - we will not experience anything that Stan does not, no montages, no cross cutting, no flashbacks - only the present.

Looking at my common complaints on watching realist flicks, namely boredom and not caring, I've a suspicion this is where my problem lies. You're not asked to judge or to empathise, and in extention, you're not asked to care either. Take Watchmen: you are not presented with a hero in that either. But at least you have some very solid ideas to work with: nihilism, idealism, pragmatism and absolutism, as presented by the Comedian, Nite Owl, Ozymandeus and Rorschach.

I'd add "totally miserable" to the above description too - I've only ever seen one social realism film which I enjoyed, and that was the "gay coming of age in 70s Britain" classic Beautiful Thing. Which managed to be optimistic, upbeat and packed with Mamas and the Papas to boot.

But then there's an argument again, is realism about aesthetics or politics? In other world, is it the style or the message which denotes it? As a historical trend, Realism seems to surface in conjunction to important political moments - hence it's importance in post-war Italy. The "spectacular real" of Slumdog Millionaire is an element of realism today, and you could also add La Haine or The Full Monty as films which use the aesthetic sucesses of realism without its politics. There's the more traditional "rhetorical realism", which is a service to a particular point of view, and fighting world ideology. Yet offering no solutions - all realism films are pointing out these things are bad, but few have active ideas.


Final question: is Quentin Tarantino realism? No, bear with me. Character driven, aimless plots, realistic dialogue. A lack of empathy - the characters and situations are presented with a lack of judgement, and the audience given little clue whether they are supposed to be finding them horrific or hilarious. A lack of clear heroes or villains - and a genuine sense of distance. Even characters you warm to, you can watch get gunned down unaffected on an emotional level (with the odd exception, and on some days I can even watch Reservoir Dogs entirely cold and not care a jot)

What plot there is we have to infer from dialogue and character - there's no exposition or easy description. We have to work it out, and it's peppered by characters going to the toilet or forgetting which cupboard they left things in.

The chief aim of the film seems to be building up an image of the characters and their world - always closely linked - not conveying a narrative. A preference for character-loving long shots and long takes over direction that draws attention to itself. Lots of handheld camera. Additionally, his use of music tends to be wholly diegetic.

Obviously, his use of genre conventions and stylised playing with previous movies takes it in the other direction entirely. In addition, a major departure is that Tarantino is FUN TO WATCH. Kill Bill singlehandedly smashes my theory. Yet I think there are aspects of Pulp Fiction, Res Dogs and Jackie that do correspond - especially if you consider the L.A. underground scum as Tarantino's personal equivalent of the street life.