Film Comment (2006) - Spellbound

Details

• magazine article: Spellbound
• author(s): Geoffrey O'Brien
• journal: Film Comment (01/May/2006)
• issue: volume 42, issue 3, page 36
• journal ISSN: 0015-119X
• publisher: Film Society of Lincoln Center
• keywords: Entertainment technology & design, Motion picture criticism, Motion pictures

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Abstract

Movies are of course neither magical nor accidental in origin. They are the deliberate product of scientific experiment, no less than the railroad or the telegraph. They are a crucial part of the huge prosthetic initiative that began to achieve its goals by the middle of the 19th century, the project to extend the reach and capabilities of the human body so as to go faster, to keep going longer, to communicate at great distances, and--through photography--to fix the gaze and make a record of what is seen. O'Brien discusses the paradoxical nature of movie magic.