Peter Greenaway

[grouchobeer]

Ken & Roger: you should try to have him on after the judging of the 48 HFP. (Maybe Chantal could ask him?) He has had a multi-faceted career and he has views on machinima.

[Killian]

Now, this would be a coup I'd like to listen in on! :)

[thebiz]

Yes please.

[WarLord]

Basically... what I got from Mr. Greenaway was his opening line... something about machinima and cinema being a dead medium. I fell alseep shortly there after or lost conciousness... not sure which but aT gave me oxygen an hour later and he was still droning on... you guessed it... everything went dark again.

[animatechnica]

lol mr greenway the parched sphincter addled crag tainted waste heap as gonedeaf might have said...did not like dialog in a lot of movies, liked the artsy, meaningless, non sensical random thoughts rather than a narrative. Most famous for doing 8/12 weeks, thought a fraps capture of halo game was due to excellent animation by the movie maker


Basically... what I got from Mr. Greenaway was his opening line... something about machinima and cinema being a dead medium. I fell alseep shortly there after or lost conciousness... not sure which but aT gave me oxygen an hour later and he was still droning on... you guessed it... everything went dark again.

[Uber]

Well, he cured my insomnia, now if only we could bottle him; we'd have a money making cure.

[JohnnyEx]

lol mr greenway the parched sphincter addled crag tainted waste heap as gonedeaf might have said...did not like dialog in a lot of movies, liked the artsy, meaningless, non sensical random thoughts rather than a narrative. Most famous for doing 8/12 weeks, thought a fraps capture of halo game was due to excellent animation by the movie maker

bravo!

[alonzo11208]

Peter Greenaway? I thought he was Sir Buzz Killington...hmm how quaint...no one wonder decided to shutdown before his speech...

[ToxicMenges]

I had the pleasure of working for Mr Greenaway and his lovely wife for a real life project involving machinima, which involved travel to their studio in Amsterdam to work as well as some filming which I did on my own rig.

I had the opportunity to have a f2f chat with him about his views on film (including machinima). Yes he has some specific views, and I wasn't party to hearing what he said at the 48hrfp, but what he said to me I found interesting, made a lot of sense, and was pretty inspirational.

We are at the very bleeding edge of machinima, and we are all learning.

He cares enough to take an interest - I don't see many other major film makers doing that.

Probably not made myself a whole lot of friends with this post, but hey ho :)

[WarLord]

This is one place you will find divergent views are welcome even if you are trying to make people angry or disagree. Thats the great thing about this community... it embraces everyone.

As someone that works on the fringes of this industry and been subject to many self-important people with visions I find that there are many ways to get that vision across. The ones that can do so without an overly inflated self image are usually the ones I gravitate too and the ones I listen too. That's just a personal preference. I have also been subject to many extremely cruel individuals that the average film viewer has never heard of... even if they have a long and diverse history of films... but I remember being told by a very open minded creative director that if the majority of viewers has never heard of them then what is their true impact and what have they actually accomplished.

Insulting an entire audience has never been appealing to me so that is why I tuned out Mr. Greenaway. One of the workgroups I was in used to have a betting pool as to how many of the writer or directors "original ideas" where not original at all. Examples were required and to this day I am sorry to say I never got to work on anything truly "original" but have got to pay the bills with the grunt work I've done and still enjoy it even with the self importance of some creative people.

I believe in being inspired but I also believe that thinking for ones self and being respectful to others in the process has some place in the world of machinima or cinema. Because I have a "vision" does that make it the right vision for you or anyone else? The market usually answers that question.

I will also freely admit that while being a "B" team modeler and animator... I am completely immersed in the commercial aspect of the industry not the artsy part as commercial is what pays my bills or makes a bonus on a project. I also have to admit to liking action-adventure movies but don't see many awards handed out for that even though some are tremendous commercial successes compared to many artsy commercial failures.

It's all relative to what one holds important but I will say that common decency and respect in the industry is getting less and less which is starting to take some of the fun out of it for us old timers.

[Evan Waters]

lol mr greenway the parched sphincter addled crag tainted waste heap as gonedeaf might have said...did not like dialog in a lot of movies, liked the artsy, meaningless, non sensical random thoughts rather than a narrative. Most famous for doing 8/12 weeks, thought a fraps capture of halo game was due to excellent animation by the movie maker

The one thing I do actually agree with him on is that film doesn't just have to be for storytellers. There are pictures like FANTASIA and ERASERHEAD and UN CHIEN ANDOLOU which aren't about narrative but simply provide an experience for the viewer, and even in movies with a story the story isn't always the main focus.

It's not too different from what Andrei Tarkovsky said, which is that in his view film was the means to make an impression of time. Whether that had a story or stars was not the main issue.

I mean, I like to focus on story and so do a lot of writers and filmmakers and machinima makers, but it's not the only option.

Can't speak to anything he's said on machinima in specific.

[rgr]

The one thing I do actually agree with him on is that film doesn't just have to be for storytellers. There are pictures like FANTASIA and ERASERHEAD and UN CHIEN ANDOLOU which aren't about narrative but simply provide an experience for the viewer, and even in movies with a story the story isn't always the main focus.

It's not too different from what Andrei Tarkovsky said, which is that in his view film was the means to make an impression of time. Whether that had a story or stars was not the main issue.

I mean, I like to focus on story and so do a lot of writers and filmmakers and machinima makers, but it's not the only option.

Can't speak to anything he's said on machinima in specific.

I think for many people PG is a turn off because he comes across like such a pretentious elitist. Maybe he's not really like that in real life, but he certainly doesn't seem to mind playing the part.

I remember seeing his early films when I was much younger, thinking maybe there was some "cheap thrill" value (like many european "artsy" films :) ) but found his work to be at the same time visually astonishing and in every other way silly or just plain bad. It may also be that I'm too pedestrian to "get it", but I'm OK with that. :)

As far as I can tell, both from his talk at the machinima event, and one of his interviews at a night club where he is apparently a VJ (really?), his views on machinima seem to be a bit unusual. He seems to want to have real time story telling using game engines such that every time a group of people "experience" the story, they interact with it and it becomes a living unique event. He doesn't seem to get the fact that playing a modern multiplayer video game is already exactly that. Maybe he should get involved with a gaming company and evolve that idea even further. Then his talk at the 48hour contest would almost make sense. (I say "almost" because he went on several tangents in that talk that were really "out there").

Of course, I could also be completely wrong.

rgr

[WarLord]

He seems to want to have real time story telling using game engines such that every time a group of people "experience" the story, they interact with it and it becomes a living unique event.

rgr

This has always been a very interesting concept. In the early days of Flash technology I worked on a story with multiple storylines depending on the choices the viewer made. The writer came up with a great story in the sci fi genre where the viewer became one of the astronaut/explorers much like games as you describe.

I only provided the interface but it was a very rewarding and fun project that I still remember fondly. It brought many viewers to the website if I remember correctly as it was somewhat unique on the web at the time. The scifi channel was going to do more but then their entire direction as a company changed... the website was revamped and a lot of the original content... including audio plays... went to the wayside. This involved still images instead of animation as it was the early days of the web. I think it had to be netscape and ie compatible which was a challenge then.

[animatechnica]

First of all no worries about making friends here - no one will begrudge you your opinion so feel free to post views that may not be mainstream here- that is how we learn and grow

but you do raise a good point in that he does take an interest which can lead to many doors down the road.

I guess the impressions i got was based on his 48 hour talk which originally left a sour taste in my mouth. First take on it was it was overtly negative to the artists that participated in the event - however after few days, i circled around to the thought that perhaps it was a challenge to the community to look at other ways to use the artform





He cares enough to take an interest - I don't see many other major film makers doing that.

Probably not made myself a whole lot of friends with this post, but hey ho :)

[mr_chatnoir]

I thought Mr. Greenaway's opening speech at the 48hfp was really a fun one. I found him to be an interesting professorial character, and I believe he was just trying to poke the machinima world into doing some more experimental and exploratory stuff.

Personally I am confident that his claim about the demise of Cinema, or "narrative films" as he would describe it, is greatly exaggerated and biased. His rallying call against the hegemony of writers feels to me quite feeble and lacking appeal. The truth is that human beings enjoy a good story, the human brain's link with language and the written word is a strong and enduring affair, and that cinema is a magic and explosive combination of audiovisual media and narrative writing. Cinema will continue to evolve, incorporating new technologies on its path. It's not dying.

It seems Mr. Greenaway is really interested in seeing some sort of visual interactive art game-like exhibit, and less interested in machinima or cinema.

[Chris62]

Gaeeze gang... It was only play time... Ya.. its me Liberty... too meny Chiefs.. Not enough Indians... lmbo

[thebiz]

It seems Mr. Greenaway is really interested in seeing some sort of visual interactive art game-like exhibit, and less interested in machinima or cinema.

An interesting assumption.

In this vein of thought, check out this recent exhibit here in NYC from Mr. Greenaway. (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/06/arts/design/06armory.html?scp=1&sq=greenaway&st=cse)

From The New York Times...
"The show, “Leonardo’s Last Supper: A Vision by Peter Greenaway,” is now on view in the Armory’s hangarlike drill hall, and there is no reason to be excited anymore. It’s a dud. It is, however, a big, expensive, technological-bells-and-whistles-to-the-max dud, which is something."

Theres some more shots here:
http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-527137?hpt=Sbin

It kinda looks from the image on the NYTimes article like something out of Second Life...no?

[ashe5k]

Might be interesting to experience, but it gives off the same vibe as when they do a laser show of the Wizard of Oz set to Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon.

Not sure I'm all that interested, but I like his overall idea.