Pedro Nunes

Pedro Nunes has several Indy productions and he's a Professor of Communication in Alagoas Federal University (Brazil). He's also an invited professor at Barcelona Autonomous University (UAB), where he finished his Electronic Cinema Phd thesis

In your recent research you draw an analysis about the image and the text in cyberspace. What are your comments on this subject?
The hypermedia systems incorporate, in more flexible manner characteristics, of the supports of production and creation of image, text and sound. Photography, cinema, radio, television, writing, painting among others are carried into the cyberspace with new characteristics, pertinent to the digital medium. It is all about a dialogue of convergence and mixtures between the supports based on the non materiality of the process of codification of information, speed, not linear real time, bigger capacity of storage and more complex levels of interactivity. In this context, image and text embraced by sound are reconfigured in the digital background both from the viewpoint of production, creation or access to different information. In cyberspace the verbal, visual and sound dimensions are continuously reinvented by the fluidity of distinct proposals in the industrial, investigative, creative or even leisure fields. Local experiences by small groups or the work developed in peripheral countries gain visibility before the great economic proposals on the web. Proposals set forward in education, co-operation, health, artistic creation all over the world, find in the digital technologies an open field of possibilities that set forth the dynamics of life. In a way, the developments and technological changes also re-inform, little by little, culture, social dynamics and ever changing knowledge itself.

In your book "As Relações Estéticas no Cinema Electrônico" ("The Aesthetic Relationships in Electronic Cinema") –not yet translated in English– you speak about the adaptation of the cinema to the new technologies. What can the 7th art gain with these new development?
Originally the cinema derives from a photochemical matrix. In a dynamic way it has also established connections with the analogical electronic technologies. This necessary dialogue is a form of survival (cost reduction), of speeding up production, of creativity and innovation of the narration. In the cinema many pictures have been developed on low definition electronic systems but with a high creative quality. In HDTV (High definition T.V.), we have, for example the film "Prospero’s Books", of Peter Greenway. Others have totally been recorded and edited on digital processes and reconverted to the cinema. This represents a change for the cinema, which absorbs distinct contemporary technologies. It is a progress to be able to view DVD movies or video films in other private spaces than the cinemas. This is what we call conceptually "expanded cinema" or "digital electronic cinema". The developments result from this technological conversation that can be reflected on the narrative structure, image treatment, visual effects, etc. In some instances, the pictures are taken on 35 mm. and immediately digitally treated for post production and reconverted to a photo chemical basis.

Internet is perhaps the most visible of the signs of the technological evolution in everyday life. Can it also influence the cinema?
Yes, Internet influences the cinema and other supports of representation and storage of ideas. Cyberspace is a new collective field, not yet pinpointed and which operates with singularities that process-wise, interferes through the creators on other forms of artistic expression. It has very peculiar fractional logic, all-at-once-ness, diversity of cultural voices, fragmentation, simultaneity, multiple interactions preformatted courses, heterogeneity of proposals that are always up dated and reinvented. Those mutating and creative characteristics on the cyberspace end up by flowing on to other forms of expression, such as the movies. Some cinema scripts present as the main theme the digital universe (Matrix of the Wachowski brothers) or absorb traits from the hyper textual structure.
Cinema is now also pervaded by the digital aesthetics, even though we can think of these influences as a two-way dialogue where cinema and video are also incorporated by Internet. Presently sequences from films are more visible, art experiments by teleconference, videos and Cartoons in 3D made for the dynamics of the net. But also, conversely, we have already films, videos, spots, books, clips and magazines that incorporate aspects of the Internet logic in their narrative constructions, be it on the design, graphic aspects, fragmentation or even cutting conception/edition, that intensify the action of thought... Perhaps we can also say that cinema and Internet are forms of language or of the distinct structuration. There are intercourse either of the hypermedia design or Cyber thematic on films and also the presence of the cinema on the net.

Does that mean that tomorrow we can record the movies directly from the net without having to go to the video club, to the cinema or pay the satellite?
Presently to record a movie via the net is an exercise in patience. The technological changes, the industrial advancements in the field of storage, image compression, data decompression, super computers, digital signal transmission, the optical fibre, the equipments of sound and image recording in high definition will undoubtedly speed up this process which is still slow. There are experiments, Spain included, carried out in this field with rapidity, quality of image and sound. In these projects the economic viability is foreseen in the short term.
However in the field of technological advancements, everything changes rapidly and the utilisation of technologies spread though society with other purposes which include artistic creation and the access of culture to the Internet users.
Yet we must point out that on the net there is room above all for films and videos meant for the web itself. Through internet it is possible to copy movies of doubtful quality even before their opening, simply for curiosity, or otherwise. The Internet dynamics in relation to the cinema are nevertheless different. Audio visual creations for the net will have to display more agility in their temporal rhythm as well as in their narrative conception. The interactivity process is a major point for the new productions expressly made for the cyberspace whence the user will be able to select destinations, establish combinations among characters and build free association in what regards the screen script.
This is indeed the "new cinema" in which the advantages of technological advancements with image quality and digital process characteristics are incorporated.

What films would you advise to the Barceloca readers?
Under the perspective of cinema transmutation and the dialogue with new technologies, it is possible to establish a course intimate with movies that present a very creative artistic aesthetic dimension. In these films, video, HDTV and digital systems are present in narrative creation, production methods, postproduction, etc. I therefore suggest 10 tittles of electronic cinema for the Barceloca users:

1. II Mistero di Oberwald, [Michelangelo Antonioni '80]
2. Videodrome [David Cronenberg '82]
3. Ladri di Sapone [Maurizio Nichetti '88]
4. Sex, Lies and Videotapes [Steven Soderberg '89]
5. Les Nuits Fauves [Ceryl Collard '92]
6. Benny's Video [Michael Haneke '92]
7. Love and Human Remains [Dennis Arcand '93]
8. Anjos da Noite [Wilson Barros '86]
9. Prospero's Books [Peter Greenaway '91]
10. Lucía y el Sexo [Julio Medem '01]

To know more about Pedro Nunes’s works, take a look into Projecto Multirreferencial [in Portuguese].


Ricardo Nuno ::
Friday, May 17th '02