Mission Chinese, an incredible short by Sunday Paper.
“This powerful new trend in ads toward the iconic image has greatly weakened the position of the magazine industry in general and the picture magazines in particular. Magazine features have long employed the pictorial treatment of themes and news. Side by side with these magazine features that present shots and fragmentary points of view, there are the new massive iconic ads with their compressed images that include producer and consumer, seller and society in a single image. The ads make the features seem pale, weak, and anemic. The features belong to the old pictorial world that preceded TV mosaic imagery.
It is the powerful mosaic and iconic thrust in our experience since TV that explains the paradox of the upsurge of Time and Newsweek and similar magazines. These magazines present the news in a compressed mosaic form that is a real parallel to the ad world. Mosaic news is neither narrative, nor point of view, nor explanation, nor comment. It is a corporate image in depth of the community in action and invites maximal participation in the social process.”
-Marshall McLuhan, Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man , which I should have read way more thoroughly freshman year.
Oakland’s Old Theatres
A few weeks ago Daniel asked why I thought Oakland had so many beautiful old theatres still standing. Because he’d enjoy it being the case, I looked for some sort of relevant activism; that doesn’t seem to be the case.
Using some data from cinematreasures.org, I found that Oakland isn’t destroying its theatres at any greater rate than San Francisco or New York. If there were some correction for a change in demographic or population density, we’d see it here.
Of Oakland’s 9 theatres running presently, 5 were built before 1935. I’m not going to count for the other cities but I can tell you the ratio certainly isn’t that high. There is no way Oakland has some sort cultural demand for old theatres; the Easy Bay has a great artistic vibe but no more than San Francisco or New York.
So, likely, it’s just that they don’t have the money. Oakland is infamous for poor business investment over the last 50 years. As much as we love the aesthetic appeal, there are probably roaches running around and awful popcorn. Consumers want iMax and nice seats, they do. It’s a stall in Creative Destruction that our artistic sensibilities reap the benefits of, similar to the brownstones in Crown Heights (as opposed to the ones in Park Slope). It’s Shea Stadium before it was torn down, not Fenway Park. It would be nice if they were actually wanted, wouldn’t it?
I learned much from this film. Unbelievable.
If he weren’t ready, I wouldn’t have made him go. So I gave him a gentle push and told him, ‘There’s no turning back. You must make your own way.’ When I was in the first grade I was told, ‘You have no home to come back to. That’s why you have to work hard.’ I knew that I was on my own. I worked hard. That has never left me.
