HC: There's Nothing to See So We Look

The following is an excerpt from Steve McQueen's (2008) film Hunger, about the Irish republican protestors who were arrested and brought to Northern Ireland in the 1980s. Immediately after reading the quote prompt, I thought of this work, specifically a scene in the middle of the film.

To me, "seeing" correlates with understanding, judgement, and perception. Seeing deals with finding a conclusion, inferring from information, or being guided into a singular solution or end. "Looking," on the other hand, seems more objective, detached, and passive. Looking could be illustrated by a person sitting in Washington Square Park, people watching in a casual, objective, distant but interested way.

"Seeing" and "looking" obviously exist in cinema. Certain films may use devices like montage, wardrobe, or score to help the audience "see" or understand what they should take from the film. These films tend to guide the viewer into a focused, singular emotional response or experience. Directors like Steven Spielberg successfully help viewers find a sort of comfort in that feeling that they are understanding and taking what they should from any given moment in a film.

While "seeing" is undoubtedly present and important in film, it is important to note films that promote a more objective, ambiguous sense of "looking" throughout. McQueen in this film seems to reject the idea of having anything to see. There is no "good" or "bad guy," no obvious, expected, easy-to-understand plot. Because of this immediate refrain from being able to see or easily understand and detect major characters or plot lines, the viewer is able - as our prompt quote states - to look.

Because of its ambiguous nature in almost every sense of this film, instead of looking at each shot and trying to spit up its meaning or purpose in the film, the audience is almost given permission to objectively look at the work. Because there are no answers or inferences for the audience to make, the film is seen in a more honest, less judgmental way.

The best example of this looking over seeing concept occurs in a 20 minute scene at the center of the film. While typically during dialogue scenes - or any scene in cinema - there are obviously numerous cuts and different shots covering the central action. If the camera zooms into the main character, the audience is in a way guided into seeing that this character is about to say something emotional or important. If the camera pans to the window the audience knows that something important might happen outside. Each camera cue is almost a "seeing" or "understanding" cue for the audience. This scene in Hunger is a complete rejection of these formalities. The first 18 minutes of the scene is dialogue between two men, shot by one camera, with absolutely no movement. There are no clear conclusions to come to. The viewer has nothing to "see," so instead, the viewer "looks" at the men talking, and takes in the moment of dialogue.

Here is the first piece of that scene.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bq0SETWIO8U