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How do we tell what is real?
Just now, a commercial came on the TV showing a metal ladle falling for a bottle of spaghetti sauce. The ladle fawns over the bottle, wraps itself around it, then drops to the counter with a clang when someone comes to the door. I know it’s computer graphics, but for the length of the commercial, I find myself believing that a ladle could really do that.
We are surrounded by such images. The artistic geniuses who turn them out have us believing that animals can talk, cars can drive on the edges of skyscrapers, and cute little robots from the cable company will help you decorate for a party.
This all started with the special effects of the movies. Through the magic of special effects, we could see Moses part the seas and Sinbad battle the rocs. This was advanced by animated cartoons, which showed us flying unicorns and dancing appliances, but those images were clearly not real. They were drawings, not film, and even children knew there was no chance they would run into fairy godmothers at the playground.
About 25years ago, however, computer graphics came into being. At first, those images were also clearly not real, but soon it was not so easy to tell the graphics from the virtual. From the elephants and lions of Jumanji to the balrog and orcs of Middle Earth, we have to know, going in, whether things are real. We can’t tell just by looking.
This broadens our horizons, I suppose, but it also feeds into the mindset that makes us satisfied only with perfection. It’s not enough to have a beautiful gown, it must shimmer and swirl like Cinderella’s. The paint on our cars must be flawless. Every steak must be the most tender and juicy possible. Life must be beautiful.
Sometimes, when reality doesn’t match our dreams, we retreat into the TV and the movies, but that doesn’t help, because what we really want is the life we see on the screen. And we can’t have it. And that makes us mad.
Some of us eventually wise up and grow up and get on with life. But it seems to me that all too many simply lash out at a world that doesn’t live up to our fantasies.
And that is very sad.
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1 comment:
I keep hearing about your blog, or reading excerpts from it :-) - this is an interesting essay. I recently read an editorial in the Sunday NY Times about the demise of the Polaroid that made some similar points. How Polaroid pix were valuable because of their imperfections. Cops like em for scene of the crime and mug shots because they can't be monkeyed with. They capture Aunt Jane's hand covering part of Cousin Walter's face at the 1969 Thanksgiving dinner in a way that makes that event real, not pretty. And so on. It made me think about them differently. The other problem, of course, with all this computerized hanky panky is that we can't trust anything we see anymore... a short trip to the larger lies that Americans put up with these days. I've been duped by commercials for medical products that began with that pseudo-documentary, sepia quality that makes you think it's a genuine medical news PSA or something, and then - nope. Another pill to buy, that's all. Ah, well. Nice to see your page; I'll add it to my list of blogs at my own, at http://prairieganesh.blogspot.com/
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