The Face of Time - POV - Aarhus Universitet

96 p.o.v. number 13 March 2002
camera movement, however, intensifies the viewing process by
creating an expectation that underlines the significance of the scene.
But that is not all. The question that has been "asked" by the film
so far has been a factual or a cognitive question, a question related
to understanding and knowledge. The initial question ("What do the
women see?") has led to other related questions like "What is this
place?" and "What will happen next?" But the questions the hanging
scene raises are questions of a different type. They are questions
about the motives and identity of the people seen. "Who are these
people?", "Who are the hangmen and who are the victims?", "Why
are they doing what they are doing?" Unlike the factual "what"
questions, these new questions – they might be called "why"
questions – remain unanswered. All we get to know is that people
who seem to be peasants are hanging other people who also seem to
be peasants. Why they are doing this is not told. There are no clues,
no emotional reactions that show how to relate to this horrific scene.
Only a matter-of-fact process of hanging that takes place in silence.
The shocking scene doesn't halt the camera. As the hanging goes
on, the camera keeps on moving, indifferently, until it reaches its
original position. This kind of detached approach doesn't, however,
create an indifferent relation to what is happening. On the contrary,
the emotional power of the scene only increases because it is not
emphasized but only seen (literally) in passing.
...becomes an enigma
What happens in the film is thus a movement from a question of
factual understanding to a question that has no answer, to an openended
question. At the end of the film we have the answer to our
original question; we "know." But at the same time we do not really