Who is Godfrey Reggio:
Godfrey Reggio is an American film director, while he has made many movies the one that stands out the most and the one he is most known for is his movie, “Koyaanisqatsi”. Which is a documentary movie made in 1982 and is an hour long observation of the man-made world that features no commentary or words, only simplistic music to go in the background. It makes heavy use of time-lapse, jump cuts, multi exposure, freeze frames, match cuts, split screens and slow-motion shots of several cities in America. The movie took inspiration from other movies such as “Man with a Movie Camera” – (1929 by Dziga Vertov) which also used the same cinematic techniques, believed to be the first time in cinematic history.
More on the meaning and the details of the movie, The title “Koyaanisqatsi” means “life out of balance” in Hopi. Additionally, The reason for the lack of dialogue was explained by Reggio, when he said “it’s not for lack of love of the language that these films have no words. It’s because, from my point of view, our language is in a state of vast humiliation. It no longer describes the world in which we live.”
This movie is not the only one of it’s kind, it is actually the first entry in the “Qatsi film trilogy” – It was followed by two more movies, Powaqqatsi (1988), which means “Life in Transformation”, and Naqoyqatsi (2002), which means “life as war”. The trilogy is supposed to depict the relationship of nature, humans and technology. In the future, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress for being “culturally, aesthetically, or historically significant”.
Personal Response
I want to make a film project on the Storm Ciaran aftermath too, I can visit places in Jersey that are still damaged/being repaired and document each site into a non-commentary movie. With fitting music in the background. Another choice I can take is documenting St. Helier in a more similar fashion to the movie, with the same type of music in the background. Things I could have in the movie could be time-lapse footage of the busy roads like Victoria ave., time-lapse footage of the sun setting or rising, rainy days, busy streets full of people etc.. Another thing I can experiment with is setting up a camera pointing at me sitting on a bench sitting still, then having time-lapse of people walking past, almost to make it look like I’m literally observing everyday life. A certain music genre I have in mind is synthwave, to bring out the more abstract and unusualness of life – to make it more interesting.
