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Qatsi Trilogy to be Completed
Karl_Hungus writes "Koyaanisqatsi and Powaqqatsi, the first two installments of Reggio and Glass' trilogy are to be joined by Naqoyqatsi, due out next month. Naqoy.com has some stills, and some fascinating Flash. A brief discussion of the technical side includes the figure of 3.5 terabytes of images collected in the making of the film."
I don't know how many of you have actually seen any of these films, but in my opinion, the first film Koyaanisqatsi is one of the finest films ever made. It has no plot, no dialogue, simply 90 minutes of footage set to a brilliant score by Philip Glass. They finally released the first two films in the series on DVD September th 29th, and you'd better believe I had them preordered weeks in advance. I highly reccomend that anyone who has not already seen them do so, but be sure you have time to devote to REALLY watching them, trust me, it is worth it.
In my opinion, everyone should watch this movie once a year. It really puts things in perspective. And besides that, the visual and audio artistry are incredible, although Philip Glass isn't everyone's cup of tea.
Koyaanisqatsi is partly about the modern lifestyle, but in the more general sense, it is about humanity itself. It takes the us out of our routine life, up into a wider viewpoint, where individuality loses its meaning and we can see our lives as closer to what they are. Individual movements blend grossly to show the patterns of life. We are not unique. We follow the same routine. We swarm.
There are great visual ironies to the film. After showing clips of people rushing around like mad, it shows a person playing Robotron like mad. After showing a bird's eye view of a city, it shows a circuit board.
Some say that this movie is an environmentalist, or leftist in some way. I think the movie trancends political viewpoints. Watch it once a year to get back your sense of scale. We are statistics.
The interesting thing about Koyaanisqatsi, though, is that it doesn't really preach anything, as it doesn't have any words. Well, there's a little bit at the end, I suppose, but the point is that you're shown a bunch of images from which you can draw your own conclusions.
Certainly those images that are chosen are there to make you think about particular things, but it's not like Reggio's got Tom Cruise up on the screen yelling "won't someone please, please think about the environment!?!"
Also, while it may be propaganda, I would argue that no one had really showed things from that perspective before Koyaanisqatsi, or at least, they hadn't done so nearly as effectively. And while it may be one-sided against consumerism and technology (which is a debatable point), it's only an 87 minute movie. I'm sure I probably see 87 minutes of Dell commercials in any given month. I don't see them giving equal time to folks like Reggio.
Personally, I think Koyaanisqatsi is more than just propaganda on one side of some issue, for the simple reason that if you asked a dozen people what Koyaanisqatsi is about, they'd all give you different answers. When I watch it, there are certain technological aspects that I find quite beautiful and natural (the shots of clouds reflecting off glass-and-steel buildings, the speeded-up shots of city traffic at night that look a lot like a circulatory system).
It makes you think, is all, and shows you the world in a way you probably haven't seen it before. The reaction you have to those images probably tells you more about yourself than it does about the movie.
Monkeytreats