In the past decade digital media have progressively become the major forms of memorialising figures and events of the past. Memory itself, in the manner by which it is encoded, stored and accessed, has developed into an increasingly digitised medium due to advancing technologies and the proliferation of digital archiving. This article considers the impact of digital filmmaking and digital media forms on contemporary biographical narratives, as well as how digital filmmaking practices have been applied to the biographical film for unique aesthetic, thematic and narrative purposes. The examination of divergent applications of digital techniques in the representation of both recent and distant pasts will allow for greater insight into the modern biographical subject. I focus on The Social Network (2010) in order to investigate the framing of a biographical subject within events of the recent past. I consider the manner in which the film exploits its pastness for unique aesthetic and narrative purposes, highlighting particularities of the generational zeitgeist through its non-linear narrative structure and its employment of what I describe as an “internet aesthetic” that serves to memorialise a previous technological era. This approach examines the film’s emphasis on visual composition and engagement with technology in its representation of its biographical subject. In this manner, the digital can be viewed as adding further forms of stylistic expression as well as having the potential to involve viewers more directly with figures and events of the past. This article also examines how digital representational strategies allow for a more temporally-specific engagement, reflecting the development of new ways in which audiences access and interact with history through biographical narratives. Viewing The Social Network alongside films such as Che (2008), Public Enemies (2009) and 127 Hours (2010) I illustrate how contemporary biopics construct different ways of experiencing their historical figures, with digital aesthetics lending qualities of presentness and propinquity to past events. Digital is frequently employed to enhance the immediacy of the past in order to align the spectator more closely with the experiences of a film’s subject(s), and the issues raised by these representational strategies need to be considered when looking to the future of the biographical film.
Jointly hosted by the Institute of Advanced Study and the Department of Film and Television Studies at the University of Warwick, the Watching Politics symposium brought together a range of disciplines to explore the social, cultural, aesthetic, historical, theoretical and political impacts of visual cultures on politics - and vice versa. With such a wide remit, it was interesting to identify how links between the various papers were established, frequently relating to this interdependence of influence and transmission between the two systems. Devoting attention across a diverse range of contemporary and past media, culture and politics opened up the event to consider a variety of interdisciplinary approaches and methodologies, encouraging a more holistic view of the relationship between visual cultures and politics.
This special issue of Networking Knowledge addresses several aspects of change in the media by exploring a range of debates about the temporal and the technological across several disciplines and research areas. In doing so, it contributes to the ever-increasing scholarship concerning technological advancement and application, as well as how time is viewed, constructed and experienced.
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