#brechtian alienation techniques->

[calugaritsa]

rips off my shirt to reveal another shirt that reads "i ❤️ going down Wikipedia rabbit holes"

[measureformeasure]

because morgan asked here is my not fully glued together read of daniel fish elektra as family abolitionist. it is also late. so this may be a bit jumbly.

it is coming from this particular train of thought: (1) this production is using a lot of brechtian techniques, (1.5) which are meant to perpetually remind the audience that they are watching a play with the intent to motivate political action* -> (2) frequently the thing it is trying to draw attention to is failings of capitalism -> (3) this play is not, despite the easy opportunities to, engaging with much class critique -> (4) so what social structure is it criticizing? -> (5) the family.

*this is probably a shamefully simplistic reduction

it's pretty inarguably brechtian, i think. i would be really interested in seeing any other thoughts on what it's socially criticizing. here is my argument for (5) as a possible reading:

the characters are not doomed through individual fatal flaws (not brechtian!) but by their allegiance to a system that needs injustice to exist. elektra spirals to her ending fate because she 'needs' to defend her father's honour, clytemnestra 'needs' to kill agamemnon to avenge her daughter, agamemnon as Father has full total control over the bodies and lives of his family and thus is within his rights in The Family to kill Iphigenia because in The Family, children are not individuals but extensions of The Parents

the emphasis on the textual familial abuses of elektra and integrating the moment where aegisthus has his hand on her thigh for nearly his entire on-stage time, implying sexually inappropriate behaviour if not sexual abuse (this was my family abolition lightbulb moment)

the pink coats indicating The Family, and elektra wrapping herself in one in the end and not feeling free - she's just solidified her presence in The Family and it's not that she could never be free she is not forever doomed - but she needs to leave The Family. and she does not. because the family is social framework.

Agamemnon Is A Gun In A Box Hanging Above Everyone's Heads.

this is barely related but i also think the shaved head is brechtian because brie larson is famous and we are being alienated from the concept of brie larson we have in our heads because she has shaved hers and is butching it up on stage. i don't usually love 'gender nonconformity is brechtian because it's alienating' because. well. that is sort of just transphobic however comma i do think it's not (just) the gender nonconformity but the fact that her appearance is radically different from what is expected and she as a particular person is in the public eye looking a particular way and that has changed.

[garkgatiss]

@causalityparadoxes Multi-roling can be used without that intent, for sure, but it's also part of a set of techniques described by Brecht to create his 'v'-effect (verfremsdungeffekt, or 'distancing' effect), which is designed to constantly remind the audience that they are viewing 'a presentation of life, not life itself'. He wrote a fair amount about how he intended his techniques to be received differently by his audience.

Anyway, I know this because I have terminal Steven Moffat-interpreter disease and this is not the first time that I believe these techniques have been deployed in a show that he's involved with(!). After Sherlock S4 I wrote a bunch about why the show had shifted in S4 to become a visual representation of John's blog, expanding even further on the showrunners' interpretation of how they don't think Watson is always telling the truth with his narration in the original canon, and a lot of the evidence I assembled rests on the show's use of various Brechtian techniques.

Plenty of the things folks have been pointing out about DW fall into the category of Brechtian techniques or things people were noticing about Sherlock S4:

-- all the fourth-wall breaking

-- how Ruby and the Doctor can hear non-diegetic music

-- the Susan Twist multi-roling

-- the Murray Gold piano-playing cameo (in Sherlock they had Arwel rebuilding the 221b set after it exploded, etc.)

Like I'm sure RTD's implementation of this idea will look different from Mofftiss's but the feeling of deja-vu with this season of DW so far has been a real fucking trip, let me tell you.

It's also fascinating -- in Sherlock they had a sort of Orientalist disaster of an episode centering around a Chinese Circus; Brecht wrote about how his epic theatre was inspired in part by the Peking Opera when they came to Berlin, and used the Chinese theatre(/circus/opera, there are multiple English names for the same general art form) as an example of how he wanted his epic theatre to be.

Hindsight being 20/20, I would be very surprised to see them attempt something like that in DW in 2024, but another source of Brecht's inspiration was music hall performances... which is perhaps related to the number of musical numbers in this season of DW so far?

Okay but Susan Twist is playing NPCs. It might just be that, she might not be someone important, but the importance might just be the fact that multiple backgrounds character are played by the same actress.

[severusish]

I am currently imagining Snape humming “tip-toe through the tulips” in a deep baritone voice while brewing poison or extracting information from the enemy or doing something equally sinister or spy-like. The image is exquisitely Brechtian and it pleases me

[lesbiansagainsttheatre]

Content Dictates Form - Filming Techniques in TGWDLM and Black Friday

Okay disclaimer I just watched part of TGWDLM with my friend and had a huge revelation about TGWDLM and Black Friday in relation to my research and I feel like I need to share it so bad. Like the past few weeks I’ve been really doubting myself and my research and just thinking that I’m an idiot with terrible ideas, but talking about Starkid and the things I like and the things I struggle with about TGWDLM brought me to a big revelation so here’s what I just spend the last hour writing about. If my idea’s seem disconnected or w/e it’s probably because I’m high :) anyways here’s the revelation I came to:

TGWDLM is very metatheatrical. It takes on a brechtian alienation style of theatre, commenting on the ways fascist thought and ideology takes root in a society. There are many moments that purposefully break the fourth wall. The filming of this show continues to take up this brechtian alienation approach, as the way the show is shot purposefully makes you conscious of the fact you are not only watching a play, but a recording of a play. This approach to filming becomes more evident when watching the follow up production Black Friday, which deals with late stage capitalism and consumerism. This show has far fewer fourth wall breaks, and when there are fourth wall breaks they are very purposeful in supporting the musicals thesis. But over all,  Black Friday’s filming technique is far more cinematic than TGWDLM. While the shows are set in the same fictional town, they are in separate parallel universes. In TGWDLM, the songs are all diegetic, except possibly the titular musical number, and all reflect different types of songs within musicals, such as the I want song (What Do You Want Paul and Let It Out) and the eleventh hour number (Show Stopping Number). By doing so they draw attention to the way musicals utilize each song to further the plot or tell the audience about a character, contributing to the metatheatrical atmosphere and alienating the audience. On the other hand, Black Friday only has three diegetic numbers, two of which open act one and act two. The opening number is Tickle-Me Wiggly Jingle, an in universe advertisement for the Tickle-Me Wiggly doll, the show's eldritch antagonist. Wiggly, an eldritch creature, feeds off of human greed and takes advantage of late stage capitalism and the way adults attempt to find happiness and fulfilment in products (this is the show’s main thesis). The second is Deck the Halls (Of Northville High), which is a parody of both the High School Musical style of movie musicals, as well as of movies made to capitalize on the holidays, think your Hallmark Christmas movies. It introduces us to a movie about Santa Claus going to a high school to find out why teens no longer have the Christmas spirit. This is another example of how companies, in this case the film and entertainment industry, try to capitalize on people’s search for happiness and fulfilment by producing low quality films that feed off of the happiness that people associate with the holidays. The third song is Made in America. This is the song that explicitly sets out the musical's thesis. That is why this song seems to be diegetic in the way that the songs from TGWDLM are. Willey has an audience member hold the apple he brings on and eats in the scene leading up to the song. It also seems that Wiggly and Willey genuinely are communicating with the president through a real song, as they are joined by a chorus of Sniggles (minor henchmen of Wiggly), while the president never takes up in the rest of the casts singing. In this song Wiggly reveals his plan to take over the world, and tricks the president into starting a nuclear war with Russia. While Black Friday employs methatheatrics and diegesis in it’s musical numbers, these do not make up the majority of the musical, and thus the show conforms to the traditions of musical theatre. This is reflected in the final recorded version of Black Friday, as it comes off more polished and cinematic than TGWDLM, and lets you get lost a little more in the show, especially because the direction and commentary (on consumerism) are much more obvious. Whereas in TGWDLM, the writers don’t show their hand so soon, as the show's commentary on fascism is not made explicit until midway through the second act with America Is Great Again. The metatheatrical film technique keeps the online audience on their toes, and keeps them aware of the show they are experiencing, giving even more impact to the reveal of the show's intentions. This is significant because it demonstrates that Team StarKid is conscientious of how their online audience perceives and receives their content, and that to do each individual show justice they consider how the way a show is a) filmed and b) edited will affect and inform a viewers experience as they consume each show. The company is aware of the different theatrical techniques and practices their shows respond to and build off of, and make sure that those techniques are incorporated into the final product of their recordings. 

[anexplorationofstyle]

Epic Theatre

Epic theater, most often largely attributed to Bertolt Brecht, originated in the early to mid-twentieth century in Western Europe. Brecht's work was largely influenced by Marxism and almost always had a strong sociopolitical message which was delivered acutely through his plays. Epic theater uses episodes to tell specific stories that all (sometimes) lined up together in a general world or specific political message. Brecht was well known for his verfremdungseffekt which is often translated as an alienation-effect. This essentially mean that the play would actively estrange the audience from their stability, making them active viewers of the piece to fully take in the work. With this in mind, there was often a use of direct address, speaking stage directions, and using placards to title the scenes and characters. All of these devices further stated quite firmly to the audience that they were watching a play, specifically a Lehrstück or learning play that had a valuable message to be gleaned. In Brecht's theater, there was also a use of music. However unlike current notions of American musical theater, the songs sung would come out of nowhere, not likely advance the plot, and sometimes would tonally be in direct opposition to the content. This was again a technique to jar the audience awake and attentive to the scene. Brecht also used harsh white lighting over the stage and audience to make sure that the audience couldn't fall asleep or feel distanced from the actions on stage. The characters were more often than not quite archetypal, serving as mouthpieces for a general station in society rather than an individual with a unique backstory or action. In this way, actors were encouraged to not fully invest themselves in the character but let the character live as an external façade.

The assignment for this style was to make a Brechtian poster to encourage people to vote:

[incorrectshakespeare]

Can you summarise the Kubrick point? It sounds interesting.

from my essay itself: a clockwork orange is an example of “epic film”, achieved through kubrick’s utilization of the verfremdungseffekt, or alienation effect. “epic” is used here not as a reference to large-scale heroic films like the lord of the rings series or kubrick’s own spartacus, but instead refers to films that feature brechtian techniques commonly utilized in epic theatre practice. through heavily stylized acting, use of montage and narration, and juxtaposition of images of violence and wendy carlos’ score, kubrick’s epic film forces the audience to think critically about their role as passive observers of ubiquitous violence in contemporary society.

[titleknown]

bogleech replied to your post: I honestly do think Belle Delphine represents a...

Actually though, title, if you ever haunt the 4chan type boards there is indeed a massive community of guys who say that real girls are “gross” to them compared to anime

While I haven’t personally seen that directly myself (Probably because the one I go to, /d/, is blatantly impossible), I will say I believe you on that from what I know, and I will agree that holy shit it is a problem*.

The problem with Brett’s rhetoric comes in when one attributes it to “just” being “poisoned by anime porn” and not the broad variety of factors that creates that hell-nitche, because that ignores the actual fucked up dynamics of erotic art subcultures in favor of blaming erotic art itself.

Which leads to erotic art getting cracked down upon and mocked instead of the actual pathologies fucking up those communities. Which, if folks haven’t noticed from the wake-up call that was the Tumblr Horny Ban, is a problem...

*Which as an aside, as much of a passive-agressive condescending technique as it is, I’d say taking some notes from Brechtian Alienation Effect might be an interesting way of combatting that as artists.

Like acknowleging hentai biology as basically a relative of toon physics, which I will state to my dying breath.

[seurir]

Classical discontinuity and alienation in Vivre sa Vie

‘

In Vivre sa vie I have attempted to film a mind in action, the interior of someone seen from outside’ – Jean Luc Godard

As John Belton notes, “Classical Hollywood style becomes the means by which narratives are realized; it provides the formal system that enables them to be told. They draw attention to, underline, and point out what it is that the audience needs to see or hear in order to read or understand the scene” (1994, 88). Thus, style becomes a tool entirely at the dispense of the narrative. While Hollywood is concerned with the subordination of cinematography, editing, and mise en scene elements to achieve uniformity and believability in the action being communicated, Godard does the opposite in Vivre sa vie (1962). For example, during the café conversation between Nana and Raoul in episode 7, Hollywood norms dictate the deployment of a shot/reverse shot to help the audience follow the conversation. However, this only features momentarily, and other classical techniques such as the eye line and 180 degrees rules are abandoned altogether. In place, we see glimpses of Nana face behind Raoul’s as the two converse and the camera pans from left to right across the room. His looming specter-like figure obscuring Nana’s, making the viewer stretch and crane for an unobstructed view of her that is not there.

The influence of Bertolt Brecht is abundantly apparent in Vivre sa vie. As a playwright, Brecht developed counter techniques against the emotional manipulation used by fascist regimes within propaganda film, drawing parallels with the techniques and styles of the Classical Hollywood zeitgeist. These include deliberate fragmentation and episodic structure to break up the flow of the narrative, challenging the audience to be critical and active spectators. Consequently, Godard segments the film into 12 tableaus or episodes, ordered chronologically from 1 to 12 and detailing the main events during the episode in the episode title card. Between these episodes, significant spatial and temporal gaps are present, with the viewer not told exactly how much time has passed. The effect of this irregular structure and the discontinuity between episodes, with distinct variations in mood and tone, is to reduce the notion of cause and effect and open avenues for ambiguity and interpretation. For example, there is no lingering close-up shot of an important object like a key, that becomes central to the plot later. When each episode finishes, they transition onto the next through a simple fade to black, leaving noticeable aural and pictorial vacuums between the episodes where the audience is left to wonder. The discontinuity introduced by this tableau structure is heightened by Michel Legrand’s score. Chopped and spliced in no discernible order, it appears throughout the film. Less like a soundtrack and more like an operatic leitmotif, which in conjunction with the episodic discontinuity furthers the stop/start rhythm of the film, eschewing notions of lineal storytelling found in Classical Hollywood cinema.

So, if the goal of classical Hollywood cinema is to absorb the spectator into the narrative, Vivre sa Vies’ is to alienate. Godard begins doing so from the opening passage that follows the credit sequence, during the establishing scene of Nana and her estranged husband Paul in episode one. We hear them speak but we do not see their faces, their reflection barely visible on the glass behind the counter of the café. During the entire conversation, Nana and Paul are filmed separately from the back, with no cross-cutting between the two. Such separation of the aural from the visual occurs multiple times across the film. In episode 6 where Nana’s head occupies most of the frame as she talks to Yvette. In episode 9, where the profession of sex work is explained to Nana in procedural detail through a montage and in the penultimate episode, where Nana is seen speaking to her new lover. The dislocating effect is furthered in this scene as the spoken conversation is alternated with the subtitled version, suggesting all is not well, calling into question the very reality of what is occurring altogether.

Godard’s subversion of classical Hollywood conventions is clear to see from the opening credits where Nana is first introduced. Instead of through the classic three-point lighting system, she is (partially) revealed through several brooding shots. First, an extremely poorly lit, close up shot of her side profile that is followed by a close up straight on, then a return back to her side profile with just enough light to reveal the silhouette of her features. During the second close up of Nana’s full face, she looks back at the camera hesitantly, twitching and biting her lips, aware of the cameras invasive gaze, challenging “Hollywood’s pride in concealed artistry” (Bordwell 1985: 25). This awareness and erasure of the fourth wall, a stable tenant of classic Hollywood practice, is not isolated to the credit sequence. Nana meets the gaze of the camera again in the interrogation scene in episode four, but even more directly this time, and with a palpable sense of discomfort. In doing so, she removes the security of the cinematic one-way mirror and posits uncomfortable questions regarding the role of the spectator as an active and ravenous consumer of Nana, her life, and her body.

Classical continuity editing is also subverted in episode 7 when Nana and Yvette are in the café. Instead of cutting to the pair sat down, the camera pans from right to left, canvassing the non-diegetic bodies inside and outside the café while their conversation continues in the background. Later near the end of the scene, Godard uses a POV pan shot from Nana’s eyes which again tracks the café landscape and the people within it. Given that Nana and Yvette are the primary causal agents in the screen, this return to the same camera movement and subjects further unsettles classic continuity editing. The Mise en scene also marks a departure from traditional Hollywood filmmaking which is identifiable by its deliberateness, studio sets, and pre-planning. Vivre sa Vie is filmed almost entirely in the streets and cafes of Paris (the interrogation scene in episode 4 was shot in the studio office), with the presence of non-actors that often acknowledge the intrusive presence of the camera. As a result, the dialogue is often difficult to hear, as ambient noises and conversations duel for center stage, imbuing the film with an ambiguity that asks the viewer to assess what they see and hear critically and not as the narrative dictates.                                       

The selective denial of Nana’s face to the camera establishes itself as a recurrent motif in the film. It is evident in the credit sequence, during her argument with Paul in episode 1, in episode 2, where she is hidden by a column while she works in the record store and once again in episode 8 when Raoul takes her on as a prostitute in the café. Coupled with the rheumy, nervous looks Nana darts back at the camera regularly, it presents an unsettling question about the devouring gaze of the camera and the viewer’s role as her secondary consumer. Godard teases this idea further in the last episode, where he inserts himself into the scene to read an excerpt from Edgar Allen Poe’s Oval Portrait. The story concerns a painter’s morbid obsession with capturing every aspect of his wife on canvas, which ultimately leads to her death. Given the story’s singular focus on Nana (Anna Karina), who was also Godard’s wife at the time, it provides a macabre auteurial self-awareness that is ‘emblematic’ of art cinema (Bordwell 1979). There are more examples of Godard’s self-reflexivity throughout the film - the shot of fellow New Wave pioneer François Truffaut’s ‘Jules and Jim’ screening at the theatre in the last episode, the lengthy inclusion of the real-life philosopher Brice Parain. These inclusions all serve to disjuncture the narrative in a Brechtian way by continually reminding the spectator of the artificiality of the medium and challenging them to be an active and critical viewer.

In place of heavy editing and swift cuts, Godard opts to use simple, drawn-out long takes to underline the voyeuristic nature of filmmaking. This can be seen throughout the film, from the opening scene where Nana leaves Paul, to episode 2, where the camera tracks Nana over several minutes working in the record store. While classical Hollywood conventions focus on verisimilitude to transport the viewer into the reality being conveyed in the narrative, through, for example, costume design, special effects, or period-specific dialect, Godard subverts this not by breaking verisimilitude, but by attuning it to the mundane, the liminal, and the inconsequential. He utilizes extensive long shots of Nana working in the record store, going over to different shelves (episode 2), speaking to Yvette (episode 6), challenging the audience to confront the reality of everyday life. Godard also draws an interesting comparison between this scene and the scene in episode 10, where the camera tracks her movement as she inquiries into different rooms in the brothel looking for other girls at her client’s request. Given Godard’s Marxist background, it is plausible that he is drawing parallels between both forms of labor, as under capitalism everything of value is commodified. This labor/capital relation is also explored during the montage in episode 8, where wage, taxation and hours of work are discussed as well as during the letter scene, where Nana is writing down her qualifications to send to a brother owner outside the city. 

Notably, the title of the film – “Vivre sa vie” translates to ‘to live one’s life’ as the verb ‘Vivre’ has neither subject nor tense, creating a title loaded with passivity and detachment. This passivity, or rather lack of personal agency, is hinted at throughout the film in relation to Nana’s character, from the parallels established in the cinema between Nana and Falconetti’s doomed Jeanne d'Arc through close-ups, to the omission of her movement through various spaces in the film. While she occupies a varied range of spaces throughout the film; hotel, café, record store, police station, theatre, the Parisian streets, she is hardly ever shown moving between these places. For instance, in episode 10, where she is seen checking different rooms across the brothel for women that are available, but only shots of her opening doors, or just arriving, are included. A similar denial of her corporeal dynamism occurs in episode 9, whereupon Nana and Raoul exiting his car, the camera quickly pans to him talking to the bartender and then Nana arrives abruptly. On the rare occasions Godard chooses to show Nana moving between spaces, she is almost always accompanied by another person (Yvette, her first client, Raoul). In episode 5, where she is alone and walking the streets of Paris looking for clients, the camera pans slowly from right to left, hinting a regressive change has occurred as Nana begins her new life as a sex worker under Raoul. 

This lack of agency for Nana is symbolically captured in episode 3, where she attempts to break into her apartment to which she cannot afford the rent. There are three doors for her to get past. First the door from the street to the courtyard, which she passes through, only to retreat off-camera, and come back through again. Following this is a cut to the concierge sweeping and a high angle shot of the courtyard where we can see the door to the concierge’s office where the key is stored. Nana runs, attempting to steal the key but is stopped by the concierge. She fakes defeat and tries again, making it past her only to be stopped by the concierge’s husband who is near the third door, not even making it to the door of her apartment. Despite this, Nana claims that itis indeed her life to live, claiming “I smoke, that’s my responsibility, I am unhappy, that’s my responsibility…”. However, it is plain to the audience who are privy to a birds-eye view of the events unfolding, that she has very little choice nor chance in the events that are about to transpire.

While Nana’s demise and her lack of personal agency are clear to the viewer, it is tragically juxtaposed by her own affirmation that it is indeed “her life to live”. Through conscious cinematographic and mise en scène choices, as well as various editing processes and framing techniques, Godard encourages a conscious spectator and bring to light the artificiality of cinema. The focus on the every day and the mundane - the many café scenes and the inconsequential dialogue throughout the film capture aspects of reality typically ignored by Classical Hollywood cinema. Furthermore, the absence of a studio set, and limited use of camera variety lends the film a documentary-like quality, where each uncomfortable look returned by Nana to the camera elucidates he extractive dimension of the subject/viewer relationship being played out on-screen.

Bordwell, D. (1979) ‘The art cinema as a mode of film practice.’ Film Criticism, 4(1), 56-64.

(1985) ‘Classical Narration.’ In: Bordwell, D. & Thompson, K. (eds.) The Classical Hollywood Cinema - Film Style and Mode of Production to 1960. London: Routledge. 

Belton, J. (1994). American cinema/American culture. New York: McGraw-Hill, Inc.

Vivre sa vie (1962). [Film]. Jean Luc Godard. dir. France: Films de la Pléiade.

[thetiptoeingtulip]

I’m doing a 6 minute solo performance that’s meant to be dedicated to Brechtian theatre theory (alienation techniques). Anyone have any ideas for a plot? I’m thinking about adopting a poem or a short scene from a book.... 

[acting-techniques]

Acting

AIMS: Exploring Non-Naturalistic Acting Techniques

BRECHT’S METHOD

A DOLL’S HOUSE Playing the roles Helmer and narrator (multi-rolling)

Unlike last time, using Brechtian style to act out the same script again definitely gave a different look to everything and had created a completely different play and mood to the scene as a whole. WWW: This time we worked in groups of five, using Brecht’s techniques of multi-rolling, split-roles, multimedia and placards and instead of realistic acting, we went over the top and tried to exaggerate as much as possible. We decided to change it up a bit. We had two narrators who played as the childish ‘puppet-masters’ and 2 people who played Helmer and Nora. Throughout the scene, the objectives of the narrators was that one of them wanted a toxic relationship between Helmer and Nora, while the other wanted a happy and loving relationship. As the scene progress, the narrators begin to lose control of their ‘puppets’ and Helmer and Nora call out to the audience (using direct address) and whisper to them loudly and says things like 

“Help us! We’re trapped!”, “They won’t listen to us!”, “We don’t want this!” etc.

Towards the end, all 4 character begin to argue with each other until and audience member who is ‘watching’ this stops the everything and gives their theory of what they think the relationship should be like. This created a drastic effect and change and leaves the audience intrigued on what’s going to happen next, as well as using Brecht’s alienation effect to make sure that the audience isn’t immersed in the scene and still have a place to think, judge and have an opinion on the current events. At then end, we used creepy music to finish our scene after the ‘puppet masters’ decided to take the audience in and turn them into puppets as well.

WWW:

Memorized lines

Confident

Stayed in role

Multi-rolling

Direct Address

Tableaux

Use of different lighting

Facial expressions - variety

Exaggeration

Tone - Soft, affectionate - Harsh. aggressive

Music

Objectives

EBI: It would have been great if we could have a added a pause in our performance when Brittany’s moment came on, it would have been really suspenseful. I also feel like our actions and physical theatre would have been much better if they were more sharp and clear instead of improvised and running all over the place. I think what the big issue for all of us was timing. If we had enough time to think our work through and rehearse it instead of rushing through, it would have been a lot better. I did manage to emphasise some of the words that I felt were important such as “agony”, “awful”, “it’s all over” etc. and I think it really helped since using Brecht’s Epic Theatre, everything is over top and non-naturalistic so those key words really helped me to exaggerate the acting. I also feel like, if we had enough time, we could have applied more music and spoken stage directions to truly achieve that alienation effect that Brecht wanted.

[kmmasnuproject]

SNU - Research:

I have already looked at Stanislavski’s techniques for acting, however I wanted to analyse more techniques to identify the different methods of acting, and how I can incorporate these into my animated performances through the character’s performance. I researched Michael Chekhov’s technique to learn a different method of acting, and also how it differs from Stanislavski’s.

Chekhov was a student of Stanislavski, and therefore studied and understood his method. A report suggests that Chekhov believed Stanislavski’s method to have many risks, as the method requires the actor to use emotional recall (i.e, real experiences of an emotion) to act in, what Stanislavski believed was, a realistic way (Solomon, 2002). Chekhov created 5 principles for acting, all of which encourage the actor to focus on the psychological and the physical. Chekhov states that the actor should be able to use the intangible (inner feelings – emotion, sensation, and imagination) to be able to use the tangible (physical elements – the body (movement), voice, and speech), suggesting that physical factors are reliant on emotion or imaginative elements to be effective. In my animated sequences, I could use the character’s emotions to drive their actions in their performance, which could make their performance more effective and clearer for non-verbal communication to the audience (MICHA, no date).

Chekhov developed his acting method around using the imagination and movement, as he found it was less destructive and yielded more effective results than using emotional recall alone, which was emotionally draining. The report also states that Stanislavski admitted to this as well, and adapted his method to use a combination of inner emotions and exterior (imagination) factors, suggesting that Stanislavski’s method was effective using emotional recall, however he realised that this could be combined with imagination to not drain himself, but to also still create a believable acting performance. Chekhov’s method, later called the psychological gesture, is described as ‘a physical movement or gesture which captures the total essence of a character and is executed inwardly while the actor portrays a character’ (Soloman, 2002), which means using the imagination to create emotions and gestures for the character without experiencing them physically or emotionally yourself. This suggest that Chekhov understood that gesture and movement affected a character’s performance, which could mean that it will be important in my animated sequences to use gesture and movement, but that I should incorporate imaginative elements into the sequence as well to create an effective character performance.

MICHA (No Date) Chekhov’s Five Guiding Principles: The Michael Chekhov Technique. Available at: https://www.michaelchekhov.org/five-principles (Accessed: 2nd March 2020)

Soloman, R. (2002) Michael Chekov and His Approach to Acting in Contemporary Performance Training. Available at: https://digitalcommons.library.umaine.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://www.google.com/&httpsredir=1&article=1642&context=etd (Accessed: 2nd March 2020)

John Winsor-Cunningham (2013) WHAT IS THE MEISNER TECHNIQUE? (Acting Coach NYC) Available at: https://youtu.be/Dgje3PtoQXg (Accessed: 2nd March 2020)

I also researched the Meisner acting technique to see how this technique is used for acting performance. The Meisner technique requires the actor to begin by acting to learn how to build their performance for when they perform. This technique uses repetition, as well as imagination to envision a scenario, and build upon the character’s emotions from repeating the lines, not only allowing the actor to memorise the lines, but to find the most effective use of the lines. Acting coach John Winsor-Cunningham states: ‘you repeat what you have been told from your point of view’, when using the Meisner repetition exercise. Winsor-Cunningham also states that: ‘it doesn’t matter how many times it goes on, it’s only the last time you need to remember’, suggesting the exercise is about the tone and performance, rather than what is said. In addition, the exercise needs to involve two people, one having a preparation for the exercise (such as a prompt), and the other needs to have planned an activity that they will perform in the scene, whilst both are using repetition. Winsor-Cunningham states that the two actors will have consequences if they do not complete their scene within the limited time provided, which suggests to me that either the preparation and activity may not work together, or the actors need to be more aware of timing whilst performing. (John Winsor-Cunningham, 2013).

This method of acting seems to use dialogue and tone of voice as its key focus, relying on movement to enhance the speech of the character. As I have decided to have no dialogue or vocal communication in my animated sequence, I will need to rely on using body movements and gestures for my character to communicate, so I think that I will not be using this method of acting in this project, however it may be helpful in my Master’s Project, as I plan to include dialogue in my short animated film. It may be difficult to practice this, however it may help me to understand my characters more, even if I do not use this method in my final film.

A fourth acting technique I have looked at is the Brechtian acting method. Bertolt Brecht was a German playwright who worked mostly in Epic Theatre. He has several techniques that are still used in both theatre and film today: narration, actors performing out of character, using sound and music during a performance, and actors acknowledging or breaking the fourth wall (characters/actors talking to or recognising the audience during the performance). From my previous research, I can agree that these methods are used today, especially in both silent and modern films, as well as other forms of visual media, such as TV, online videos (like Youtube and Vimeo), and video games. Brecht’s method could arguably one of the first types of interactivity with the audience during a performance, something that has become a norm in media today.

Brecht wanted to communicate to his audience, rather than only perform to them. He wanted the audience to think about the performance, and have their own thoughts and opinions about the content. Brecht wanted his actors to be ‘unemotional’, and for his productions to be unbiased to allow the audience to decide for themselves. This suggests that Brecht’s methods were focused on using performance as a tool for communication to the audience, as well as using the actor’s imagination to envision a role, rather than use their own opinions and emotions. Brecht likely wanted his actors to perform this way to not sway the audience’s opinion from their performance. This also suggests that Brecht’s method allowed the actors to use imagination for their performances, using less real emotion like Stanislavski, and focusing more on generating an effective performance for the audience to form their own opinions from.

Brecht uses the verfremdungseffekt (distancing, alienation or estrangement effect) in his work, which is said to be achieved by having many roles played by the same person, as well as other techniques, to remind the audience that the performance is not real. By using the distancing effect, the article suggests that the audience (and the actors who portray the characters) do not create an emotional, empathetic attachment to the characters. Gestus is the other method used by Brecht. Gestus, unlike verfremdungseffekt, was created by Brecht, and it focuses on the actor using gesture and movement to communicate social meaning non-verbally. This may be an important method for me to use in my animated sequences, as I can use gestus to communicate the character’s emotions to the audience in a non-verbal way, which could make the character’s emotion easier to recognise. I can use gestures associated with emotions, especially with hands and the head, to help convey the emotion in the character. The article states that:

‘Without becoming attached to the characters and the story, which is commonplace in dramatic theatre, the crowd can recognise social issues and create their own real opinions that are not tainted with emotion’ (Brentyn, 2019). Whilst I disagree with actors not using emotion in their performances to create empathy in the audience, I think it is important to recognise that stories are meant to make people think, and Brecht’s method allows the audience to think for themselves without being influenced by the actors or the director/playwright.

Brentyn (2019) The Brechtian Method. [Blog] Available at: https://www.superprof.co.uk/blog/the-brechtian-method-and-epic-theatre/ (Accessed: 2nd March 2020)

Method acting is another acting technique, inspired from Stanislavski’s method of creating a natural performance by using the actor’s own experiences to create a realistic performance. It is likely that today method acting can apply to any acting technique, however method acting requires the actor to understand the character, how they would feel, how they would act, etc., which is reminiscent of Stanislavski and Chekhov’s techniques. How much inspiration the actor uses from these teachers will vary depending on their performance, and each actor may reference this differently (City Academy, 2019).

City Academy (2019) What is Method Acting? Available at: https://www.city-academy.com/news/what-is-method-acting/ (Accessed: 2nd March 2020)

For this project, I think that Stanislavski and Chekov’s methods are the most appropriate for me to use in my animated sequences. I would argue that Chekhov’s method is more effective, as it uses imaginative elements, which will be crucial to making my animations more effective and appealing. I can use this to produce a realistic piece that can have imaginative (exaggerated) elements in animation.

[mfmagazine]

The Tiger Lillies

Article by Dominic Viti

Photo by Andrew Attkinson

The Tiger Lillies—a dramaturgic, neo-Brechtian Oompah trio from London—recently released Cockatoo Prison, a grand opera that shines light on the plight of the millions of people locked up in cells. Accordionist Martyn Jacques' brooding lyrics and lilting falsetto voice, accompanied by percussionist Adrian Huge's playful drumming (uses kid's toys as drum sticks) and string bassist Adrian Stout's slinky stick-slipping, forms a haunting yet lighthearted triumvirate of madness that foregrounds contemplation.

What inspired Cockatoo Prison?

The eight million people who are locked up in prison cells.

What is your goal?

Well, it would be nice to bring the whole nauseating imperialist capitalist system to its knees without a single death or violent act. That would be nice.

You’ve been categorized as gypsy cabaret, death Oompah and satanic folk. What do you not what to be considered?

I'm not a sheep. Baa!

Do you like making people feel uncomfortable?

Yes, if I make people uncomfortable I'm doing part of my job. I should also make them laugh, cry, etc.  

What do you despise?

The armies (terrorists), the generals, the politicians who support them, the greed, the stupidity.

What is your outlook on people, and who are your favorite kinds of people?

I don't like uniformity, conformity. You see that in music and art and all the way down, people who are driven by ambition and personal gain. Not by belief and idealism. So my favorite kinds of people are those who haven't lost that.

Who are your favorite musicians?

Some of the very early recordings by Caruso are sublime. Maria Callas was great. Lotte Lenya is my favorite singer, and the Three Penny Opera by Brecht and Weil is my favorite opera.

What is your first memory of music?

Well I grew up in the sixties, so lots of rock and pop from my older brother, and 50's pop from dad.

Did you receive musical training?

No, I'm too working class. My parents weren't interested, my schools weren't either. I went to a few evening college classes to grasp the fundamentals of technique. That was it.

What is your first recollection of opera?

I had no experience of opera as a child. I'm working class!

You play a dark character on stage. Are you playing the persona in which you feel you are perceived, the personification of Slough, the angel of the junkyard?

Well, how poetic. What can I say but “yes!” The angel of the junkyard—no. The character is the antichrist of Slough.

What album are you most proud of?

The Sea. It's my favorite. And I'd like to dedicate it to Frank Woolf, who was a lovely man who helped make it and collected musical instruments.

Do you experiment with other mediums?

Yes. Film, painting, theater; I've done a bit of those.

Do you consider yourself a citizen of the world, or do you identify yourself with a particular place?

"We are the world. We are the children" so that nightmarish anthem went. I am filled with nihilism and alienation towards my fellow man. I am shocked by the greed and selfishness . . . people driving around in large jeeps in the middle of cities. All the self-centered macho shit. The Muslim extremists. The capitalist imperialist disgust me. Hehe, alienated enough for you!

What makes you feel alive?

I like to be on stage. I like to move people, take them on a journey.

How do you want to die?

In my sleep at 120. It makes me laugh; those Hollywood films where someone like Clint Eastwood wanders around looking like he's not scared of dying. He's so macho and strong! Everyone’s scared of dying. Even Clint!

If you could be reincarnated, what would you become?

I'd like to come back as a slug, live in a lettuce and feel kind of smug—alternatively come back as a bug; I'd live in a rug and feel kind of snug.

If you could write your epitaph (six-word memoir), what would it be?

Alienated alien I reject your values.

[filmart1230]

6 Types of Documentary

Poetic documentaries, which first appeared in the 1920’s, were a sort of reaction against both the content and the rapidly crystallizing grammar of the early fiction film. The poetic mode moved away from continuity editing and instead organized images of the material world by means of associations and patterns, both in terms of time and space. Well-rounded characters—'life-like people'—were absent; instead, people appeared in these films as entities, just like any other, that are found in the material world. The films were fragmentary, impressionistic, lyrical. Their disruption of the coherence of time and space—a coherence favored by the fiction films of the day—can also be seen as an element of the modernist counter-model of cinematic narrative. The ‘real world’—Nichols calls it the “historical world”—was broken up into fragments and aesthetically reconstituted using film form.

Examples: Joris Ivens’ Rain (1928), whose subject is a passing summer shower over Amsterdam; Laszlo Moholy-Nagy’s Play of Light: Black, White, Grey (1930), in which he films one of his own kinetic sculptures, emphasizing not the sculpture itself but the play of light around it; Oskar Fischinger’s abstract animated films; Francis Thompson’s N.Y., N.Y. (1957), a city symphony film; Chris Marker’s Sans Soleil (1982).

Expository documentaries speak directly to the viewer, often in the form of an authoritative commentary employing voiceover or titles, proposing a strong argument and point of view. These films are rhetorical, and try to persuade the viewer. (They may use a rich and sonorous male voice.) The (voice-of-God) commentary often sounds ‘objective’ and omniscient. Images are often not paramount; they exist to advance the argument. The rhetoric insistently presses upon us to read the images in a certain fashion. Historical documentaries in this mode deliver an unproblematic and ‘objective’ account and interpretation of past events.

Examples: TV shows and films like A&E Biography; America’s Most Wanted; many science and nature documentaries; Ken Burns’ The Civil War (1990); Robert Hughes’ The Shock of the New (1980); John Berger’s Ways Of Seeing (1974). Also, Frank Capra’s wartime Why We Fight series; Pare Lorentz’s The Plow That Broke The Plains (1936).

Observational documentaries attempt to simply and spontaneously observe lived life with a minimum of intervention. Filmmakers who worked in this sub-genre often saw the poetic mode as too abstract and the expository mode as too didactic. The first observational docs date back to the 1960’s; the technological developments which made them possible include mobile lighweight cameras and portable sound recording equipment for synchronized sound. Often, this mode of film eschewed voice-over commentary, post-synchronized dialogue and music, or re-enactments. The films aimed for immediacy, intimacy, and revelation of individual human character in ordinary life situations.

Examples: Frederick Wiseman’s films, e.g. High School (1968); Gilles Groulx and Michel Brault’s Les Racquetteurs (1958); Albert & David Maysles and Charlotte Zwerin's Gimme Shelter (1970); D.A. Pennebaker's Don’t Look Back (1967), about Dylan’s tour of England; and parts (not all) of Jean Rouch and Edgar Morin's Chronicle Of A Summer (1960), which interviews several Parisians about their lives. An ironic example of this mode is Leni Riefenstahl’s Triumph Of The Will (1934), which ostensibly records the pageantry and ritual at the Nazi party’s 1934 Nuremberg rally, although it is well-known that these events were often staged for the purpose of the camera and would not have occurred without it. This would be anathema to most of the filmmakers associated with this mode, like Wiseman, Pennebaker, Richard Leacock and Robert Drew, who believed that the filmmaker should be a “fly-on-the-wall” who observes but tries to not influence or alter the events being filmed.

Participatory documentaries believe that it is impossible for the act of filmmaking to not influence or alter the events being filmed. What these films do is emulate the approach of the anthropologist: participant-observation. Not only is the filmmaker part of the film, we also get a sense of how situations in the film are affected or altered by her presence. Nichols: “The filmmaker steps out from behind the cloak of voice-over commentary, steps away from poetic meditation, steps down from a fly-on-the-wall perch, and becomes a social actor (almost) like any other. (Almost like any other because the filmmaker retains the camera, and with it, a certain degree of potential power and control over events.)” The encounter between filmmaker and subject becomes a critical element of the film. Rouch and Morin named the approach cinéma vérité, translating Dziga Vertov’s kinopravda into French; the “truth” refers to the truth of the encounter rather than some absolute truth.

Examples: Vertov’s The Man with a Movie Camera (1929); Rouch and Morin’s Chronicle of a Summer (1960); Ross McElwee’s Sherman’s March (1985); Nick Broomfield’s films. I suspect Michael Moore’s films would also belong here, although they have a strong ‘expository’ bent as well.

Reflexive documentaries don’t see themselves as a transparent window on the world; instead they draw attention to their own constructedness, and the fact that they are representations. How does the world get represented by documentary films? This question is central to this sub-genre of films. They prompt us to “question the authenticity of documentary in general.” It is the most self-conscious of all the modes, and is highly skeptical of ‘realism.’ It may use Brechtian alienation strategies to jar us, in order to ‘defamiliarize’ what we are seeing and how we are seeing it.

Examples: (Again) Vertov’s The Man with a Movie Camera (1929); Buñuel's Land Without Bread; Trinh T. Minh-ha’s Surname Viet Given Name Nam (1989); Jim McBride & L.M. Kit Carson's David Holzman’s Diary (1968); David & Judith MacDougall’s Wedding Camels (1980).

Performative documentaries stress subjective experience and emotional response to the world. They are strongly personal, unconventional, perhaps poetic and/or experimental, and might include hypothetical enactments of events designed to make us experience what it might be like for us to possess a certain specific perspective on the world that is not our own, e.g. that of black, gay men in Marlon Riggs’s Tongues Untied (1989) or Jenny Livingston’s Paris Is Burning (1991). This sub-genre might also lend itself to certain groups (e.g. women, ethnic minorities, gays and lesbians, etc) to ‘speak about themselves.’ Often, a battery of techniques, many borrowed from fiction or avant-garde films, are used. Performative docs often link up personal accounts or experiences with larger political or historical realities.

Examples: Alain Resnais’ Night And Fog (1955), with a commentary by Holocaust survivior Jean Cayrol, is not a historical account of the Holocaust but instead a subjective account of it; it’s a film about memory. Also, Peter Forgacs’ Free Fall (1988) and Danube Exodus (1999); and Robert Gardner’s Forest of Bliss (1985), a film about India that I’ve long heard about and look forward to seeing.

I can use these different forms of documentary to analyse my own documentary technique. What I find particularly interesting is the role truth plays in documentaries and how the different forms presented here show facts in very different ways.

[micaramel]

Artist: Philipp Timischl

Venue: Secession, Vienna

Exhibition Title: Artworks For All Age Groups

Date: November 16, 2018 – January 20, 2019

Click here to view slideshow

Full gallery of images, press release and link available after the jump.

Images:

Images courtesy of Secession, Vienna. Photos by Maximilian Anelli-Monti.

Press Release:

Philipp Timischl’s expansive multimedia installations combine personal notes from the buzz of everyday life with found and self-produced materials to build narrative structures. Balancing between documentation and fiction, between the private and public spheres, they play with intimacy and self-reference. Major themes in his art include the lasting influence of our roots, exclusion, and queerness in relation to social classes as well as the power dynamics between art, artist, and audience.

Artworks For All Age Groups, the exhibition Timischl has created for his show at the Secession, is an orchestrated installation of photographs, collages, and sculptures.

The photographic series shows a conspicuously glamorous female figure; it is the artist himself in drag. Accompanied by a muscular young man, she is taking a private stroll through the Secession’s deserted galleries, secret corridors, and offices. Yet her appearance and bearing suggest a misconception of what is normally considered appropriate in this setting. If Timischl relies on an exaggerated impersonation of heteronormativity, humor, and artificiality, it is not to invest his work with the aesthetic allure of camp. Rather, he seeks to spotlight a form of feigned self-confidence prompted by insecurity, marginalization, and being torn between milieus and classes. The protagonist’s color-coordinated makeup and outfit in fact suggest that she took great care to mimic the institution’s aesthetic and the figures in the Beethoven Frieze. Still, she apparently misread the unspoken rules on how to be and act that are in effect even in a liberal space such as the world of contemporary art.

Didier Eribon’s Returning to Reims, an autobiographical meditation on the nexus between his sense of shame over his roots—he was born to a French working-class family—and his homosexuality, is a central reference for Timischl. The question, then, is whether familiarity with cultural techniques such as a visit to a museum can be learned. Complicating its inquiry into the underlying social distinctions, Artworks For All Age Groupsinterweaves this issue with the aesthetic qualities of the work of art. As Paul Clinton notes in his essay for the publication accompanying the show, “A Class Act”:

“There’s a big difference between the experiences of an educated freelancer with an unreliable wage and those of unskilled workers with few prospects. Whereas the au courant term ‘precarity’ focusses on conditions of income and job security, it does not account for the other forms of exclusion experienced by working class people. These include psychological and cultural barriers or those relating to education and taste. It is these ignored forms of class division, and their relationship to queer identity, which play out through scenes of seduction and alienation in Philipp Timischl’s photographs for ‘Artworks For All Age Groups’. […] Most pointedly […] two additional and seemingly opposed forms of alienation occupy the same space in Timischl’s photographs: fashion photography and Marxist art-making. Fashion photography is generally aspirational rather than inclusive. The model poses and struts, just like the woman in Timischl’s photographs, as if she were the object of her own desire isolated from the viewer. When she does look at the camera, her gaze is cold or even appears to look right through the viewer. However, given the critical edge of Timischl’s pictures, this distancing effect would better fit the aims and techniques of Brecht and socialist art history. If Brechtian alienation in this instance is redirected through the medium of fashion photography, then in these images both would seem to hold the same status. Indeed, appreciation of the techniques of artistic modernism is just as much a sign of social distinction as owning designer clothes, and this is perhaps the most radical challenge posed by Timischl’s images. Artists whose work is about class must acknowledge that art and culture themselves remain mechanisms for distinguishing between the classes. They must recognize that their own work is caught up in the very same oppressive systems that they seek to address. Artists and the queers caught between the classes are all too aware of these tools of distinction.”

The installation expands on the photographic series to make the tension between desire and lack of access physically palpable. Rather than supporting artworks, toppled pedestal sculptures scattered throughout the room address the visitors and interfere with their exploration of the show, forcing them to make detours or impeding and even obstructing their view of the individual pictures. The two TV sculptures play a similar game in the temporal dimension. Hybrid towers combining a flat-screen monitor with a photograph mounted directly atop, they are activated by the interaction between static and time-based digital images. For the longest time, a countdown raises the spectators’ expectations of some sort of revelation, but then the complete motif is shown for no more than a split second before the countdown starts over.

Link: Philipp Timischl at Secession

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from Contemporary Art Daily http://bit.ly/2LUG8vM

[the-connection]

Lees satirical 70s funny about a black policeman who infiltrates the Ku Klux Klan is unsubtle and broad, however strikes its targets efficiently

S pike Lee's BlacKkKlansman is a broad satirical funny of the 70s American race war, and a parable of passing for black and passing for white-- based upon the real story of Ron Stallworth, the black Colorado law enforcement officer who masterminded the seepage of a regional KKK chapter by impersonating a white bigot over the phone and sending out in white officers for in person work.

With Lee's knockabout treatment, this stranger-than-fiction story illuminate like a barroom pinball maker, flashing and pinging and clattering with N-bombs, blaxploitation tropes, tactical metachronisms and unsubtle premonitions of the New Trump Order. It's a rephrasing gag-tactic that indicates that at one point somebody in fact discusses discovering "the ways for America to recover its previous achievement".

The motion picture really begins with a shrill, harrumphing cameo from Alec Baldwin, the excellent SNL Trump ventriloquiser himself, playing a white-power extremist. The movie's acrid, patchily preserved funny lastly provides method to direct rhetoric as Lee changes his duration drama with video footage of the contemporary Charlottesville reactionary violence, and the president's later claim to discover "extremely great individuals" in their ranks-- rather in the method that Lee started his Malcolm X biopic with the notorious Rodney King pounding. The director might well want us to keep in mind this, and contemplate how little has actually altered in a quarter of a century.

John David Washington plays Ron, a young black male in Colorado Springs who wants to sign up with the police, motivated by a state-wide affirmative action drive. After an embarrassing stint in the records department, where officers consistently ask him to pull the file on "toads", Ron is relocated to undercover work, where he needs to spy on a Black Power conference, using a wire, and disliking himself, even as he succumbs to an extravagantly afro-ed and lovely activist, Patrice (Laura Harrier).

The experience embarrasses him, however strangely radicalises him, motivating him to utilize the undercover technique in a brand-new instructions. Utilizing his unusual skill for imitating the sonorous voices of white guys, and with a have to challenge his coworkers with exactly what their unconscious bigotry seems like when stated aloud, Ron calls the KKK chapter, pretending to be a bigot and rashly utilizes his genuine name. Partially from humiliation, the authorities feel they may too provide Ron's KKK-infiltration strategy a shot and send out in a white Jewish officer Flip (Adam Driver) to win their trust. Flip is barely less conflicted than Ron.

The paradoxes, integrated with the relentless nauseating racist talk, produces an unusual miasma for this motion picture, like an animated tattoo, or decal. There are punchy minutes that do not think twice to develop thumpingly considerable contrasts. As the hour of a prepared racist fear outrage versus black individuals draws nigh, Lee intercuts in between a scene where Harry Belafonte has a cameo as a veteran activist resolving his audience, and a series where the KKK hold a scary sub-Masonic event to induct brand-new members. It concludes with clearly juxtaposing weeps of "White power!" with "Black power!" It's an implied equivalence that makes the drama really uneasy.

BlacKkKlansman in some cases appears to be pursuing a smart bizarreness not unlike David O Russell's American Hustle-- however likewise for a sort of Brechtian alienation, a Lehrstck that specifically utilizes clips from Gone With the Wind and Birth of a Nation.

Topher Grace has an ominous bit part as KKK chief David Duke, thought of as a minor desk-bound pen-pusher-- although this movie definitely provides this absurd guy lots of oxygen promotion, in both his accurate and imaginary companies.

Lee strikes his targets efficiently enough - once again and once again. They keep popping back up like the targets in a fairground shooting gallery, and get shot back down once again with a clang. In this film, amusing and major clash into each other like knowledgeable WWE wrestlers. It's an amusing phenomenon however the dazzling tonal balance in something like Jordan Peele's satire Get Out leaves this looking a little discovered. It reacts increasingly, contemptuously to the vulgarity at the heart of the Trump routine and happily pays it back in its own coin.

- This post was modified on 15 May to remedy the spelling of Ku Klux Klan.

Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/us