What is the most important factor in the creation of a movie? Is it a good script, quality acting, or great visuals? Or is it something more? It is my personal belief that it is the filmmaker’s responsibility to create his own world.

Christopher Nolan calls it a “hyper-reality.” One of the reasons his Batman films are so successful is because they exist in a realistic setting. However, this is only true to a point. Strip the cameras away and imagine if this were your world. It is likely that you would be appalled by the actions of Batman.

I like the Clint Eastwood film, High Plains Drifter. It is a surreal Western set in a town called Lago. Eastwood portrays a ghostlike character, almost an angel of death coming to put the sinners of Lago through Hell. It can be argued that this is Eastwood’s cruelest and most amoral character. He rapes women and kills without a thought. Were I to be living in Lago in the 19th century, it’s easy to imagine the disgust I would have for him. However, since it is a very fine film, I accept that it takes place in a world different from my own.

It seems to me that this is the main argument people have when they decry the violence in movies. Most adults realize that films take place in a reality that exists separately from their own. Children aren’t quite able to understand this.

Nevertheless, it must be a reality in the context of the film. Often when films fail, it is because they struggle to form this world. Acting, writing, and cinematography all play individual roles in the creation of this world. Costumes, color palettes, casting, and dialect are all of equal importance. Think about the last film you strongly disliked. Did one of these individual parts fail, thus collapsing the reality? (more…)