How TV close-up shots diminish the meaning of the inaugural ceremony

(Note: this entry includes a discussion about movies that are intended by their makers to be liberal, but that, because of their artistic integrity, are unintentionally non-liberal.)

Spencer Warren writes:

The way the oath-taking is presented on TV has been ruined since about 1992.

The shot should be, as it was before then, one long take of the President and Chief Justice being seen together, with the President’s spouse in between gazing with pride upon the President. Such a shot captures the majesty of the ceremony and is the first image used with photographs of earlier inaugurations. However, as you have noted many times with regard to contemporary cinema direction, the TV direction now emphasizes a close shot of the President only—the personal is raised above the contextual. Then the direction distracts us by cutting to the spouse before cutting back to the President. The Chief Justice is heard but not seen, except when the direction cuts away from the President. To achieve this, the Chief Justice now is moved farther to the other side of the lectern.

LA replies:

Yes. We’ve all seen many times the photo or film of President Kennedy being sworn in. The shot is from the distance with Kennedy and Chief Justice Warren seen in profile facing each other, and with the other dignitaries standing behind them looking on solemnly. It is majestic, a scene appropriate to the life of a great republic. The close-up angle destroys that. At GW Bush’s swearing-in in 2001 the camera was bizarrely placed under Bush, so you looked up at his face from an angle as if you were standing a few feet beneath him, while his right hand, which kept moving or shaking with an emphatic gesture as he took the oath, dominated the screen.

Of course, if the respective presidents and presidents-elect over the last 20 years or so had recognized this problem, they could have required that the TV feed return to the traditional long shot. But the presidents, like everyone else, are creatures of our culture, and I’m sure that the problem we are discussing here has never occurred to any of them. If it were pointed out to them, they wouldn’t see it as a problem. They would say, “The long shot is too formal and stiff. That was from another age, when leaders were seen as above the people and unreachable. People today need to feel that they are up close and personal with the event. That’s what democracy is about.”

Bill Carpenter writes:

Here is a note for our film critic, Spencer Warren. My wife and I see a lot of movies, and I maintain a very small file in my memory of movies that are based on liberal premises, but which have sufficient artistic integrity to express fundamental truths with force and clarity notwithstanding such premises. Possibly you maintain a similar file. Until recently, I only had two movies in it: Dead Man Walking and A Few Good Men. Recently, however, we saw Traitor, starring Don Cheadle. The premise is laughable, though you don’t learn the true extent of its risibility until late in the show. [Spoiler alert!] It is this: an ex-Green Beret has discovered his Moslem roots, and become a devout Moslem, but because Islamic terrorists are traitors to the true, peaceful Islam, he has undertaken an incredibly dangerous, off-the-books undercover operation to combat Islamic terrorism. This is not what Aristotle would have tolerated as a probable impossibility. It is ridiculously improbable. However, the blinding truth jumps out of every frame that Moslems are enemies of the West, who do not belong in the West, and that Westerners are therefore feckless to the point of insanity for permitting them to live in the West. This truth is told with clarity and force and scarcely mitigated in any fashion. That makes it a powerful film, despite itself—like the other two mentioned above.

Woe to those who have eyes that they may not see!

LA replies:

I don’t keep a formal list, but am certainly aware of the type of movie you mention. I agree on Dead Man Walking. Another is Wilde. Liberals see this movie and think it’s about the cruelty of anti-gay prejudice. But what the movie really shows, because of its artistic integrity, is how sexual vice corrupted and destroyed a charming and talented man. Another example of Koyanuswatsi (I don’t know the spelling), the 1983 movie which its makers and most of its liberal audience thought was about urban civilization destroying the environment and dehumanizing humanity, but which was really a deeply moving affirmation of the underlying cosmic-divine reality of existence. After I saw that movie with a socialist lady friend from Germany, she talked seriously about its grim message. I was on a high of expanded consciousness.

As the Protestant theologian and culture critic Francis Schaefer writes, what defines the liberal culture that took over the West in the 20th century is that it is a culture of despair. So, when a liberal movie that is intended to convey the typical liberal message of despair actually conveys, despite itself, joy, that’s a pretty neat thing.

There are others movies of this type—intentionally liberal, but unintentionally non-liberal—that I don’t remember at the moment. But yes, putting together such a list would be worthwhile.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at January 22, 2009 02:06 PM | Send