Chap 3 from LIFE AS PLAY. Audio and full text. Reading time: 5 minutes
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DREAMS AS PLAY
We watch films and series for the fun of the experience. What about dreams? Why do we dream?
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We know that sleep deprivation leads to mental breakdown and psychosis. All beings require slumber; i.e., a combination of rest and play.
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Films and dreams are both playful illusions. Could our lives also be considered as such? ‘No, because in life, I could get hurt, I could lose everything, I could die. In life, the stakes are real.’ That’s exactly what the character in the dream would say, isn’t it?
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Let’s look at this through the lens of cinema.
DIEGETIC AND NON-DIEGETIC
Movies cross cut between various protagonists and storylines. As spectators, we experience the film through identification with characters as they are presented to us.
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Essentially, that’s exactly what children do as they play with their toys. They’re switching points of view, orchestrating the plot and living vicariously through plastic entities brought to life through imagination.
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In filmmaking, diegesis refers to the world set up by the film. Everything within the story is diegetic — it shares the same nature, the same essence. A diegetic sound, for example, is a sound that the characters can hear. It exists within the world of the story.
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A voice over, on the other hand, is non-diegetic: characters can’t hear it. Non-diegetic elements lie outside of the film’s world. It’s a level ‘above the characters’, one designed by the author and addressing the viewer. Music, for example, can be diegetic or non-diegetic, depending on its nature (within the story or added as an overlay for the spectator).
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Diegesis thus implies two levels. On the diegetic level, within the story, all beings share the same attributes and rules. On the non-diegetic level, the viewer’s level, it’s all play: shadows on a wall, pixels on a screen.
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Certain reflexive films combine both levels: diegetic and non-diegetic. They blur the conventional separation between stage and public. In such films, characters are conscious of their fictional nature. They may look into the camera, address the viewer, and explore the two-dimensionality of the screen. A reflexive film is a film with self-awareness. For the characters, their diegetic stakes become relative once they realize that there’s another level at play.
THE UNIVERSE AT PLAY
Let’s apply those concepts to our day-to-day lives as humans. What’s our diegesis? Doesn’t the same life force run through everything in our time space reality: the human, the plant, the fish, the ocean, the clouds? Don’t we all share the same molecular essence? Aren’t we all subject to the same physical laws — birth, change, decay and passing?
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So what’s the non-diegetic level of human existence?
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In a film, we experience ourselves through the characters. This is achieved by a process of identification orchestrated by the film’s mise-en-scène.
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If we translate that identification process to our daily lives, couldn’t we say that the all-pervading life force is experiencing itself through us all — the human, the plant, the fish, the ocean? Why would it do that? For the same reason we watch films and children play with toys: for the fun of play.
OUR PLAYFUL ESSENCE
How cruel! Are we merely puppets of a greater force? I have agency. I’m in control of my life.
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Claiming that ‘life is cruel’ assumes that we identify with the characters in the film. In reality, the cinematic analogy provides two options. OPTION A — We could be the shadows on the wall, the puppets suffering the whims of a cruel narrator. OPTION B— But how about if we were the viewer experiencing itself through the myriad of fictional characters? Doesn’t identification enable us to become all the protagonists in a film?
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Before labeling life as cruel, let’s start by asking ourselves: who do we identify with? What is our essence? The essence of a wave is the ocean. Waves are simply manifestations of the ocean. Could we thus infer that the human’s essence is the life force running through all physical forms?
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All stories require conflict. Characters must undergo some ordeal and evolve; they must experience pain, either physically or psychologically. This makes the story enjoyable to watch and kickstarts the identification process.
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As viewers, we ‘suffer’ with the characters. How is that fun? Are we masochistic? What makes the emotional torment enjoyable? The double level of the diegesis. We know that whatever happens, it’s all play and we’ll return to our lives once the film ends.
CONCLUSION
So what’s our playful essence? Through identification, the viewer becomes the characters. When the character self-reflects, who/what does it find? It finds the viewer/witness/spectator experiencing itself through it. What’s the purpose of this process? The same reason we watch films, dream at night, and children play with toys: it’s all for play. That is our playful essence.
