From: tglatz-AT-mosquitonet.com
Date: Thu, 11 Dec 1997 09:26:16 -0900
Subject: Re:  Irony and film


>I'd like to focus a little more on this word *irony* that keeps getting
>thrown around and especially the status of irony in Deleuze.
>
>Irony and metaphor are both words that don't fit in with Deleuzian
>thought, because both require a priveleged language or meaning to exist.
>This is easy to see in metaphor: a word has a metaphoric meaning when it
>is not used how "it is supposed to be used."  Deleuze makes clear that all
>of his "lines of flight," "becomings-animal," "nomads," and "rhizomes" are
>not metaphoric.  Although the words may normally be used a certain way,
>there is no law that can keep them from being used differently.  When used
>differently they are not being used metaphorically because there is no
>reason to privelege the customary use.
>
>Likewise with irony.  An ironic reading of a text priveleges the implicit
>meaning over the explicit.  More importantly, for irony (or metaphor) to
>work at all, a transcendent meaning must be maintained.  Hence, all this
>talk of "ironic films" has made me uncomfortable.  Any talk of what the
>movie is "really" about seems something the state worries about, not
>Deleuze.   In Deleuzian terms, these movies can all be used to say
>different things, some perhaps more eloquently or more completely than
>others.  In the recent discussion, Starship Troopers and Independence Day
>have both been called ironic and non-ironic, and both seem to work
>although one has to work harder to call Independence Day an ironic film.
>
>If a film truly is ironic, it would have to be both aesthetically and
>politically/metaphyysically ironic.  Aesthetically, it would have to
>appear to say one thing but actually say something else.  Politically and
>/or metaphysically, it would have to buy into a transcendent system that
>would validate the priveleging of its ironic meaning over its apparent
>meaning.  Hence, an ironic film would always be in need of an immanent
>critique.
>
>The alternative to an ironic film is a humorous (this is a technical
>Deleuzian term) or immanent film.  I realize that "irony" is used
>generally where Deleuzian "humor" is what one is really after.  Deleuze
>gives an example of the difference (if anyone knows where this comes from
>please let me know, I have only heard this example second hand): in France
>there was a postal strike.  Deleuze was disappointed with the decision to
>strike because striking is an ironic gesture -- it depends on the economic
>power structure for its effectiveness.  As a result, the outcome is always
>tainted.  Deleuze suggests that a humorous response would be better, e.g.,
>the workers could have taken the guidelines they were suppose to follow
>quite literally -- reading each address carefully to avoid sending it to
>the wrong location would have drastically hampered mail delivery.
>
>Not being paricularly adept at interpreting films (but enjoying reading
>the interpretation of others), I'm not sure what effect the humor / irony
>distinction has on the previous discussion.  It seems to me that by
>calling a movie ironic, one is stuck in a simple reversal, e.g. opposition
>to violence rather than glorifcation of it.  Humorous interpretation
>allows more creativity and a proliferation of uses, and it is more
>Deleuzian.
>
>Edddddd      
>

I heartily agree with this.  But there is a final step involved in Deleuzian
critique and that is, to make the film say something else by bringing
something else into it, make those two things resonate, resulting in a third
thing.  In other words, to break through the standard bilateral oppositions;
thinking as creating.  In the Deleuzean sense, it is not enough to deconstruct.

Tglatz