Date: Mon, 17 Jul 1995 14:14:17 -0400 (EDT)
From: Karen L Houle <khoule-AT-uoguelph.ca>
Subject: Re: Short Cuts




you say that altman never really takes on or disrupts the "standard" 
narrative of causality, though he certainly lets the lines of emanation 
wander and trigger at odd angles. then you make a number of observations 
about the relations between "objects" and "characters" (i.e. paintings 
and the adultery confessional box), including what you take as sloppiness 
on cameraperson's part - their not cleanly differentiating or isolating 
person-events from background objects. You also make much ado about 
noises. With good reason. Given all that, I'm not sure that Altman isn't 
disrupting or taking on the narrative of causality. Here, I won't speak 
about "events without causes" or "causes without events" (two crucial 
disruptions that quantum physics hands us), but rather  the 
challenge that it seems Altman is setting up to  "depictions" of 
cause as exclusively character-generated. That is,  the assemblage of 
the cast here are not exclusively the  
event initiators or mediums for the transferrence of "cause" or affect.  
A multiplicity of mediums of transfer of retaining affect are "set up" 
within causal narratives. This includes your noises and paintings.

karen 



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