Unspoken Cinema

  Film at the end of the world, with Ben Rivers | Klassiki Podcast (YouTube) 43'26" (Klassiki Podcast) 4 August 2025 "In this hot seat this time around is prolific British artist and filmmaker Ben Rivers (https://www.benrivers.com/), whose latest feature, the post-apocalyptic tale Mare’s Nest, premieres in competition at the Locarno Film Festival this week. With that in mind, Ben has picked a fascinating quartet of titles for Klassiki: four films that explore the end of the world, whether literal or metaphorical, featuring sci-fi weirdness, nuclear paranoia, and the threat of social collapse. Host Sam Goff sat down with Ben to discuss the appeal of this End Times cinema, the unique nature of Eastern European sci-fi, children on film, and the enduring influence of Aleksandr Sokurov on his work." 

Latest addition to the Bibliography page at Unspoken Cinema:  “Beauty in shadows”: could this simple formula express all we need to know about the Japanese aesthetic? It is true that shadows—and indeed the empty spaces which shadows fill—bear little relation to Western critical theory, which tends to look toward empty and ambiguous spaces only for their ability to be occupied with something, for their status as place holders for the soon-to-be-defined, or for their receptivity to often contrived dialectical syntheses. As Barthes observed: “dialectics only links successive positivities.” We Westerners make it our special mission to chase shadows with some kind of light, to block out emptiness with any kind of material presence. Perhaps the particularity of Japanese vision is actually its ability to dwell within empty space untroubled by its emptiness. Vicari, Justin. Japanese Film and the Floating Mind: Cinematic Contemplations of Being ; 2016

CONTEMPLATIVE CINEMA ARTICLE Convenience vs Contemplation (Cinematic Tropes) ZEN AESTHETICS IN CONTEMPLATIVE CINEMA (AI) The Broken Bowl (a poetic view of contemplative criticism) Zen Quartet Yohaku: Contemplative Filmmaking in Zen Aesthetics (1) Fukinsei: Contemplative Filmmaking in Zen Aesthetics (2) Hei: Contemplative Filmmaking in Zen Aesthetics (3) Miegakure: Contemplative Filmmaking in Zen Aesthetics (4) So: Contemplative Filmmaking in Zen Aesthetics (5) Shibui: Contemplative Filmmaking in Zen Aesthetics (6) Mono no Aware: Contemplative Filmmaking in Zen Aesthetics (7) Zen Concepts in Contemplative Performance (1): Danshari Zen Concepts in Contemplative Performance (2): Iki Zen Concepts in Contemplative Performance (3): Seijaku Zen Concepts in Contemplative Performance (4): Yuugen Ma: Contemplative Editing With Zen Aesthetics (1) Jikan: Contemplative Editing With Zen Aesthetics (2) Jo-Ha-Kyuu: Contemplative Editing With Zen Aesthetics (3) Kire: Contemplative Editing With Zen Aest...

  "...building unheimlich...considerations on refuges and resistances"(english subtitles) Arthur Caria (YouTube) 10'31" (CLIPOEMS) 2 August 2025 Arthur Caria discusses his artistic motivations as a filmmaker, addressing Contemplative cinema, Stasis films, and Minimalist films. (See his complete work at clipoems.com ) Read also (my reviews of 2 Clipoems of Arthur Caria) at Unspoken Cinema: Sidewalk - Exterior : Night (contemplative video) Rooftop under construction (contemplative video)

 In Argentina, since July 2025 and until August the 10th, Schmidt Ocean is casting live its deep sea exploration of the underwater canyon of Mar del Plata, 4000 meters under the surface, off the coast of Buenos Aires. These live streaming on their YouTube channel  for hours on end, have been captivating the Argentine audience, with over a million views per video, commented in Spanish. It reminds of the Slow TV in Norway, or the Great Moose Migration in Sweden.

  Adaptation - Robert Mckee vs Charlie Kaufman scene (YouTube) 4'34" (Outstanding Screenplays) 19 May 2021 ADAPTATION. (2002/Jonze/USA) Nicolas Cage (playing Charlie Kaufman) question to screenwriting guru Robert McKee at a seminar Charlie Kaufman : Sir, What if a writer is attempting to write a story where nothing much happens? Where people don’t change, they don’t have any epiphanies. They struggle and are frustrated, and nothing is resolved. More a reflection of the real world. Robert McKee : The real world? Charlie Kaufman : Yes sir. Robert McKee : The real fucking world. First of all, you write a screenplay without a conflict or crisis, you’ll bore your audience to tears. Secondly, nothing happens in the world? are you out of your fucking mind? People are murdered every day. There is genocide, war, corruption. Every fucking day, somewhere in the world someone sacrifice his life to save somebody else. every fucking day, someone somewhere takes a conscious decision to dest...

Latest addition to the Library page at Unspoken Cinema: "Even though slow cinema intends to have the audience attend to all the details of real life, it by no means tries to submerge the viewer within its mundaneness of it. Just the opposite, it tries to defamiliarize the audience with the images of life they experience. The perspective shaped by the long take fixes the viewer in a designated spot, at which the viewer becomes a bystander and gazer of other people’s life, since this kind of gaze is rare in real life.  The effort to introduce defamiliarization in slow cinema is triggered by the fact that the viewer finds it unattractive to watch something familiar on the screen. As mentioned earlier, according to Bazin, the aim of long-take photography is to preserve the spatial-temporal continuum so that the viewers are involved as much as possible as the duration of the long take is synchronized to the real-time that the viewer is experienci...

  Béla Tarr, Hungary’s maestro of melancholy (YouTube) 19'56" (Klassiki) 21 juillet 2025 "Today is the seventieth birthday of one of the true greats: Béla Tarr, Hungary’s maestro of slow cinema melancholy. So, to celebrate, host Sam Goff is reading from our companion to the life and times of this icon of eastern European film – from his early days as a schoolboy anarchist to his position as a grandee of world cinema." Klassiki Journal 

(Illustration by Benoit Rouilly) Thanks for following this 5 months-long series of posts on Zen aesthetics in Contemplative Cinema! Here are all the links, first the main series by chapters: Contemplative Filmmaking in Zen Aesthetics  (1 to 7) Contemplative Editing With Zen Aesthetics  (1 to 5) Zen Concepts in Contemplative Performance  (1 to 4) Zen Aesthetics through Contemplative Spectatorship  (1 to 9) Then, each individual post, broken down by chapters: FILMMAKING Yohaku: Contemplative Filmmaking in Zen Aesthetics (1) Fukinsei: Contemplative Filmmaking in Zen Aesthetics (2) Hei: Contemplative Filmmaking in Zen Aesthetics (3) Miegakure: Contemplative Filmmaking in Zen Aesthetics (4) So: Contemplative Filmmaking in Zen Aesthetics (5) Shibui: Contemplative Filmmaking in Zen Aesthetics (6) Mono no Aware: Contemplative Filmmaking in Zen Aesthetics (7) EDITING Ma: Contemplative Editing With Zen Aesthetics (1) Jikan: Contemplative Editing With Zen Aesthetics (2) Jo-Ha-K...

Otro enlace en la página de la  Biblioteca de Unspoken Cinema: "[..] Tuttle termina su argumento afirmando que si queremos comprender el cine contemplativo contemporáneo necesitamos ir más allá de la herencia del neorrealismo y el cine moderno: “Hasta ese momento, no aprenderemos nada nuevo de estos cineastas innovadores”." "[..] Nosotros partimos de esa vacilación, de esa incertidumbre que suscita este cine interesante más allá de la narración con la intención de crear un marco analítico, teórico, pero también crítico, con el que buscamos comprender, describir e interpretar un cine interesante. Siendo conscientes de que para comprender las transformaciones estéticas de las obras de estos cineastas debemos ir más allá, no solo de la narración, “sino del territorio de la cinefilia, para dialogar con el mundo del arte, de la filosofía, de la literatura o del teatro contemporáneo”" Posnarrativo, el cine más allá de la narración Horacio Muñoz Fernández, 2015

 Claude Sonnet 4.0:  These essays explore how ancient Japanese aesthetic principles illuminate the art of contemplative cinema. Through pregnant silences, intentional asymmetries, elevation of the ordinary, strategic concealment, natural authenticity, understated refinement, and bittersweet impermanence, we discover how Zen wisdom transforms the moving image into a vehicle for deeper seeing and mindful presence. Each principle offers filmmakers and viewers alike a pathway to cinema that contemplates rather than consumes, revealing profound truths through patient observation and aesthetic restraint. 物の哀れ MONO NO AWARE Bittersweet awareness of impermanence Mono No Aware, literally meaning "the pathos of things," represents the aesthetic principle that finds beauty in the transient nature of existence and the bittersweet awareness of impermanence that underlies all experience. Unlike Western philosophical traditions that often view change as loss or failure to achieve permanence...

Latest addition to the Library Page at Unspoken Cinema: Time and the Everyday in Slow Cinema examines the phenomenon of Slow cinema, a style defined by its lingering focus on quotidian activities and extended durations. Rosa Barotsi argues that while the style emerges from a tradition of durational filmmaking and resonates with movements advocating for deceleration, it is also deeply entangled in the structures of late capitalism, creating a dynamic tension between radicalism and conservatism. This book situates the trend between artistic innovation and institutional commodification, ultimately raising critical questions about spectatorship, cinematic time, and the politics of cultural value. Time and the Everyday in Slow Cinema ; 8 july 2025 Rosa Barotsi / Germany

Claude Sonnet 4.0:  These essays explore how ancient Japanese aesthetic principles illuminate the art of contemplative cinema. Through pregnant silences, intentional asymmetries, elevation of the ordinary, strategic concealment, natural authenticity, understated refinement, and bittersweet impermanence, we discover how Zen wisdom transforms the moving image into a vehicle for deeper seeing and mindful presence. Each principle offers filmmakers and viewers alike a pathway to cinema that contemplates rather than consumes, revealing profound truths through patient observation and aesthetic restraint. 渋い SHIBUI Understated elegance Shibui, often translated as "subtle" or "unobtrusive beauty," represents an aesthetic principle that values restrained elegance and understated sophistication over obvious display or immediate impact. Unlike Western concepts of beauty that often emphasize dramatic effect and instant recognition, Shibui celebrates qualities that reveal themsel...

"Slow Cinema stands as a radical act of defiance [..]  Gen Z viewers are turning to this form of cinema—not despite its slowness, but because of it. [..] The endurance of Slow Cinema suggests that it offers something modern audiences still need, a space for contemplation, a break from the hyperactive rhythms of digital culture, and an opportunity to experience time differently.  [..] Cinematic theorists argue that films embracing time and perception will always have an enduring appeal."  The slow revolution: how Gen z is falling in love with stillness on screen (Rocio Canabal Cerqueiro ; 18 March 2025; Pac Mag)