Syndromes of indirect communication: A functional analysis of the static long-take technique in Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s feature films

Abstract

This article discusses the functional potentialities of the static long-take application, as an alternative filming method to the coverage approach, in the film-making style of Apichatpong Weerasethakul. By employing stylistic analysis on Sang Sattawat/Syndromes and a Century (2006) and Sud Sanaeha/Blissfully Yours (2002), the study argues that the patterning of the static long-take technique in handling lengthy conversation scenes sacrifice narrational clarity to foreground the expressivity and nuances of interpersonal interaction. An important facet of this expressivity is the deliberation of indirect communication, that is ‘the means in which one meaning is conveyed indirectly through utterances or non-verbal behaviors in order to achieve certain goal, or the means in which one’s intent is revealed in a roundabout way’. But acting more than a creative exercise in the poeticization of human communicative behaviour, this foregrounding of indirect communication opens up a wider socio-historical framework that Apichatpong’s film-making taps into.