Blue Jay - Narrativising Laughter
Quick Thoughts: Blue Jay (2016)
Estranged exes meet in their small town.
Why do we laugh? It is uncanny that we do not describe laughter as an emotion, that we furthermore do not have an emotion that really describes the state or conditions of laughter. Elation, joy, rapture, jubilation come somewhat close, but ultimately pale in describing not only the true feeling of laughter, but its range, depth and complexity. Laughter is an action, and the English language can only conceive of it as such. Blue Jay, among other things, dramatises this predicament. It is only drama that can do justice to the condition of laughter. Such is profoundly fascinating as it exemplifies the idea that cinema (as a dramatic art) is its own form communication, that it exists as it can enunciate what other forms of communication cannot.
Narrativising laughter in space and time, Blue Jay constructs a deeply touching story of nostalgia and loss. Brought to the screen by the director of Paddleton - a sombre and poignant film - this captures the souls of its characters rather beautifully. Ghostly and incorporeal, the characterisation of Blue Jay emerges from an abyss between present and past, in a realm of possibility and 'what could have been'. The black and white cinematography manifests this realm, making it almost palpable. Somewhat faux and contrived, the black and white cinematography lifts the spaces inside the frame with hints of what I can only describe as melodrama. The black and white aesthetic does not only mute and calm the space of Blue Jay, it layers onto it an intentional and overt nostalgia; perturbing the space ever so slightly, the monochrome spectrum of light produces an ethereal and lost atmosphere. We then do not exist with characters in a town, in a room, in a moment of intimacy and reflection, but between present discomfort and an ambiguous past. Here the 'what could have been' that defines characters so painfully becomes spatial and tangible. It is that which imbues close-ups of Sarah Paulson in particular with warm photogénie. There is an awkwardness surrounding the perfectly cast Mark Duplass that stretches through the temporal aspect of the cinematic space. He is then imbued with a photogénie not of the present, but one that is realised as having briefly passed. How incredible it then is that, between our two characters, we are again lost between present and past. The screenplay understands the predicament all too perfectly, yet does not embrace it fully. It sparks it with life with laughter - the only response to the uncanny, to the unfathomable 'what could have been'. So though I cannot come to describe just how, laughter makes sense of all that is ambiguous, lost and ungrounded in Blue Jay. This is a beautiful film that I cannot help but recommend.
Previous post:
The Strange Thing About The Johnsons - A Student Film
Estranged exes meet in their small town.
Why do we laugh? It is uncanny that we do not describe laughter as an emotion, that we furthermore do not have an emotion that really describes the state or conditions of laughter. Elation, joy, rapture, jubilation come somewhat close, but ultimately pale in describing not only the true feeling of laughter, but its range, depth and complexity. Laughter is an action, and the English language can only conceive of it as such. Blue Jay, among other things, dramatises this predicament. It is only drama that can do justice to the condition of laughter. Such is profoundly fascinating as it exemplifies the idea that cinema (as a dramatic art) is its own form communication, that it exists as it can enunciate what other forms of communication cannot.
Narrativising laughter in space and time, Blue Jay constructs a deeply touching story of nostalgia and loss. Brought to the screen by the director of Paddleton - a sombre and poignant film - this captures the souls of its characters rather beautifully. Ghostly and incorporeal, the characterisation of Blue Jay emerges from an abyss between present and past, in a realm of possibility and 'what could have been'. The black and white cinematography manifests this realm, making it almost palpable. Somewhat faux and contrived, the black and white cinematography lifts the spaces inside the frame with hints of what I can only describe as melodrama. The black and white aesthetic does not only mute and calm the space of Blue Jay, it layers onto it an intentional and overt nostalgia; perturbing the space ever so slightly, the monochrome spectrum of light produces an ethereal and lost atmosphere. We then do not exist with characters in a town, in a room, in a moment of intimacy and reflection, but between present discomfort and an ambiguous past. Here the 'what could have been' that defines characters so painfully becomes spatial and tangible. It is that which imbues close-ups of Sarah Paulson in particular with warm photogénie. There is an awkwardness surrounding the perfectly cast Mark Duplass that stretches through the temporal aspect of the cinematic space. He is then imbued with a photogénie not of the present, but one that is realised as having briefly passed. How incredible it then is that, between our two characters, we are again lost between present and past. The screenplay understands the predicament all too perfectly, yet does not embrace it fully. It sparks it with life with laughter - the only response to the uncanny, to the unfathomable 'what could have been'. So though I cannot come to describe just how, laughter makes sense of all that is ambiguous, lost and ungrounded in Blue Jay. This is a beautiful film that I cannot help but recommend.
Previous post:
The Strange Thing About The Johnsons - A Student Film
