Cinema speaks

Enough is enough, I tell you.

I’m sick and tired of being blamed for every act of violence and mindless, gratuitous sex that plays out on the streets and within the four walls of your home every day of your lives. Every time something like this happens, you rehash the old arguments about reel versus real life. About how I am responsible for the ills of society, and about how impressionable young men and women watch me and are led astray.

Take it from me, people, I’m only a little over a hundred years old. Your record was none too clean even before that.

What I show you is nothing different from what you see around you. The sordidness and the despicableness of life – I don’t make those up. They are real, and if you look closely, you will see instances of them. You may even have experienced that dark side. Or maybe you know someone who has.

But that is not all there is to me. I am also about love, and affection. And joy and happiness. And chasing your dreams in spite of the odds. And fighting against society and the establishment for what you believe in. Your truth, no matter what it may be.

I do not take sides. I let each one of you mould me and make of me what you will. Every viewer receives something different. You put a little of yourself into me. Why do you think no two people have the same experience?

I am, after all, only a medium, a tool in your hands. You cannot blame me for your inadequacies and incompetencies. Ours is a collaborative endeavour. I am nothing without you, you need me.

You can show pulp as well as you can show a great story. Pulp that everyone reads but pretends they don’t. And classics that every one pretends to read and never does.

And then you can do something great that touches every heart, or stings every nerve.

I do hope you believe me.

Believe in me.

I hope you believe in the happy endings I offer. And believe in the sad endings too, because they have the potential to spark off a happy beginning.

Or a hopeful one.

I peddle magic. Infuse the every day with a touch of the extraordinary.

I present a 70mm canvas for your experiences and your simple stories of human drama.

Of ordinary people who are heroes and villains, marred by circumstances and the demons they nurture within their breasts.

I tell stories. I project beliefs. I am your soapbox.

It’s up to you. I’m just a medium.

You could use me to tell a story that slows their breath. Or gets their hearts to beat faster.

Or makes them wish they had left their brains at home.

What you do with me is a reflection of you. Not me.

I am empowered.

I make you want to sit on the edge. Seemingly poised on the edge of the world, unheeding the world around.

I make you want to refrain from coughing, sneezing or as Charlie Chaplin was warned in one exciting example of the best I have to offer -- breathing.

Sitting in the dark, allowing yourself to be consumed by the passion of one person, joining hands with the passions of others.

I live for those of you who enter the dark bowels of the theatre, fumbling for your seats and then allow yourself to be transported into something larger than you, and the others sitting around you, something that draws a kind of kinship among you. Something that makes you feel more vibrant and alive than the others outside.

I am not bound to show you a clean resolution. Why should I? Don’t we all know that there is no black and white in life, and that everything is tinged with shades of grey?

I am a mirror that reflects the colours within you.



I can be truth on display 24 times per second.

I can also be lies on display 24 times per second.

I am, after all, only the medium.