Big Fish

Tonight, there was an advance screening of Darwin's Nightmare, a documentary directed by Hubert Sauper, concerning the painful assimilation of Tanzania and the Lake Victoria region into the global economy. Haupert spent 4 years filming the devastating effect of the fishery industry in Lake Victoria; in his words:
"The logic of global capitalism is more visual where the capital is created." The implication is that where the capital is controlled (i.e. Wall Street) all you would be able to see are a bunch of computer screens. Indeed, his film captures the starkness of a society in crisis, under the roaring Illyusha cargo jets, and on the shore of a lake on the verge of ecological catastrophe. Hupert argues that this is not simply about Africa and its fish exports to Europe and Japan; this is a structural issue that can seen in a number of local situations: for Japan, perhaps the most pertinent example would be tuna and paper pulp imports from Indonesia, a place where the fishing communities are too poor to eat the tuna they catch.

On art: the work is not simply 'reality' though the audience seemed to respond to it in that way. They constantly thanked the director for showing the 'truth' about Tanzania and economic globalization. Yet, it's telling that Hupert himself prefers to discuss the film as 'art', and as nothing more than an expression of his limited subjective experiences in Tanzania. Perhaps overlooked is the intricate editing of the film, working Duchamp-like with found objects, catching serendipitous moments like a discussion of war in Africa interrupted by a sudden thunderous squall, to an air traffic controller in a cramped tower filled with broken radio equipment frantically swatting bees. There is a touching lyricism to the film's imagery, which is perhaps reason enough for the film's prize-winning entry at the Yamagata International Documentary Film Festival.

But when the director talks of the political effectiveness of this 'art', I am immediately dubious. He wants to express the gap between our own societies and one where justice is conspicuously absent. He wants to generate anger, fear, indignation. And yet, when he criticizes the imagery in the news that has numbed us to the reality they represent, I cannot help feel that, while he has experienced Tanzania first-hand, his audience cannot help but appreciate his documentary in the same way as any other form of entertainment. Is this not, to borrow Guy Debord's terminology, merely spectacle? Can we not be satisfied with our artistic appreciation so that we forget our indignation? Can we fully believe the images we see without being directly implicated in their circumstances?

I am reminded immediately of a dramatic report commemorating the 20th anniversary of the crash of a JAL airliner this summer. While methodically providing evidence that the government and Boeing did not delve into the cause deeply enough, the bulk of the programming covered individuals and their families. And stepping from investigative reporting into the realm of melodrama, the programs included lachrymose reenactments of the victims, and how their families dealt with the disaster. While there is potential for serious public reevaluation of the case, and creation of political action to force a deeper investigation by the government, the Japanese friends I spoke to did not believe any of this would take place. (In fact, the issue quickly faded from the media after the commemoration.) Thus, what was the point? Emotional catharsis? And how different is this from Saupert's work? Is it merely full of sound and fury? And how do we develop from this medium a politically effective awareness?

And to take this thought experiment further, I can't help noticing the connections between these types of reenactments and the Japanese traditional theatrical form 'Noh'. In Noh, the actors are seen to channel the residual emotions of restless spirits, a practice derived from shamanistic Shinto rites like kagura. The actors 'become' the spirits, whose anger or grief is quieted by a priest on stage. Thus, the ultimate aim is neither change or political action, but exorcism. The melodrama of the reenactment on Japanese TV today seems to provide a similar outlet for the audience's emotion; we share in the grief, and are thus satisfying ourselves and our need to reassure ourselves that the dead have not been forgotten.