All film is manipulation

8. 7. 2010 / Ema Čulík

One reader wrote to me this morning asking why I didn't think that Hřebejk's film was also manipulative. I fact, I have to admit that this occurred to me while I was watching it, not only because of Hřebejk's frequent succumbing to sentimentalism in the past, but also because at times I thought that maybe this film was too perfect. However, as the film went on, I tried to test this theory, I analysed everything carefully and I found I couldn't poke a hole in it.

Nevertheless, though, Kawasaki's Rose is manipulative. A bit. This is because all film is manipulative. A filmmaker uses all the techniques of cinema -- composition, light, colour, style, editing, music -- to make the viewer feel a certain way. Creating an atmosphere is manipulating emotions. A movie should make you think, or otherwise it's not worth watching.

What makes the difference between pure manipulation and the mild manipulation involved in art is the aim and the intention. In Son of Babylon you could tell that the director wasn't personally involved with the characters, he was using them for his higher aim -- the petition that was waiting on a table outside the screening hall. In Hřebejk's film he is not coercing us to do one thing. He is examining a situation, asking questions about something that people have lived through. Yes, he uses emotions to get us involved in the situation, but here the subject of the film is the personal -- of course emotions will be of utmost importance. Besides, sentimental does not always mean 'manipulative'. There is a difference between being overly emotional and bypassing the brain, going straight to the lowest common denominator, and consciously using a film in order to achieve some concrete aim.

Every filmmaker has the same means at his disposal. The sincerity of a film lies in the prioritisation of ideas and effects. For Al-Daradji the main aim was obviously his humanitarian purposes (a fact I am not condemning of course) more so than making a beautiful film with a story that rings true spiritually and characters who are relevant for viewers.

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