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POP CULTURE: What Is Cinema For? — Transcript · YTtoTranscript

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POP CULTURE: What Is Cinema For?

The School of Life · 1,381 words · 7 min read · EN-ORIG

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Below is the complete, readable transcript of POP CULTURE: What Is Cinema For? by The School of Life on YouTube. Read the full text, copy any part you need, or generate a transcript for any video with our free tool.

[Music] it is recognized that you have a funny sense of fun

Cinema is the most prestigious cultural activity in the modern world it is for us what theater was in the age of Shakespeare or painting was in the days of Leonardo D Vinci the art form with the biggest impact the largest budgets and the most widespread audiences collectively we recognize that film has an astonishing power to induce emotion

but it would sound weird to stop and ask what film was really for what purpose it serves in our societies and why we spend so much time in its presence we don't generally think of films as serving any very strenuous or serious cause we ask for a lot of nice but not terribly

lasting things of films to Wi away the hours of a long flight to keep the family together on the sofa to give us a bit of a thrill this is a great loss for us and for Cinema itself we should try to pin down more accurately what what films actually do for us then make sure

we're reliably making and finding our way to seeing the best that is the most useful kinds of films we would ideally accept that film like all the other art forms best reveals its power when we conceive of it as a kind of therapy let's consider five key problems and how films can help us with

them we're understandably prone to self-pity we get ground down and frustrated by the problems life throws at us and we tend to react by getting ever more Stern and serious certain films can beautifully address this natural tendency when they show us people not too different from ourselves in difficult situations except very much

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unlike us these films play our pains for laughs [Music] they seek the Absurd side of the exact things that we normally greet with excessive seriousness no I'm making time at their best there's nothing trivial about these comedies at all they take on the momentous task of sweetly edging us towards being slightly nicer people to

live around you have 3 seconds to get back to your seat you can't get anywhere in 3 seconds well you better try you're setting me up for a loss already ready okay thank you whatever you say stove it's Steve stove what a kind of name is that sometimes in life an action that

seems quite small goes on to have enormous consequences you tell a little lie you steal a tiny bit you're a bit dishonest with someone you get a bit lustful and carried away just once and then from this a catastrophe ensues films can help us by speeding up time and showing us in a matter of hours the

Fearsome result of what we might originally have thought of as small failings a film can push the consequences to the maximum by witnessing horror and disaster it can make us want to be the kind of person who is a touch more forthright a little more honest and moral reier to face an unpleasant moment now and thereby head

off a distant disaster we leave the cinema less inclined to be self-righteous about the failings of others scared for ourselves and more respectful towards things we hold dear it might sound odd but it's usually very healthy and helpful to feel that one's life is a bit special deserving of admiration and respect a little

glamorous but very often the opposite is the case glamour lies elsewhere in the lives of the famous in swankier parts of town in activities and jobs far removed from our own film has an enormous power to GL mamor eyes it can put in front of our eyes delightful images many meters in size shot in extraordinary colors

Vivid and immediate because so many films glamorize the wrong things we're used to thinking that an element of alienation and Corruption is a generic rather than an incidental danger of Cinema but in fact film is well able to show us the less obvious but real charms of an everyday life whereas the worst

sort of films eject us back into our Liv Lives full of longing and disenchantment the best ones leave us ready to re-engage with circumstances with which we'd unfairly grown born Cinema can help us love and appreciate what we already have it's not entirely our own fault the media is to blame for much of it because

it tells us about categories of people we want nothing to do with places that seem frightening bizarre unre tingly depressing we grow to think we're not at all interested in people in Iran or Venezuela our disenchantment may get expressed as racism or arrogance or just plain coldness ultimately what we suffer from is a denial of our common Humanity

Cinema can perfectly compensate us for this withdrawal of emotional energy by showing us the appeal of people far away we'd otherwise be completely uninterested in with the highest Artistry we're reminded of an obvious but so easily forgotten fact our membership of the family of humanity we've gone so far down the track of teaching ourselves about the

importance of gentleness and compromise many of us have unwittingly developed problems around courage and self assertion decent people have learned so well to suppress their own appetite for a fight their own desire for a victory but in a world where conflict is unavoidable good people sometimes need to strengthen their willingness to face

down opposition not always to compromise and play it safe but to take risks and to get out and fight to relish Victory and to be a bit more ruthless in the service of noble and deeply important ends but we must March we must stand up we must make a massive demonstration of our moral certainty sometimes it's not

enough just to be right you also need to win so some of us might well benefit from seeing films that tell Tales of heroism that follow someone who has to navigate the world kill a dragon outwit some bad e the film shouldn't ideally leave us just in a at the daring of another person it should do that far

more valuable thing educate Us by example so that we too become just a little bit more heroic and brave where we need to be Cinema as we currently know it is not a million miles away from doing wonderful things but in order to help with the real business of living we need this hugely compelling and Powerful

art form to set out in a more determined and systematic way to offer us the help we really need the way we categorize films should ideally get a little bit more subtle rather than say something was merely a thriller or a comedy we'd put the accent on what these jars might achieve for their audiences instead of

suggesting that one needs to be above a particular age to watch a film the government classification board would see its primary task is that of helping a film to reach the audience it could best help thus a film might be rated a meaning that it was regarded as being particularly good at getting us to

address and cope with anxiety or it could have an MC rating meaning that it was of benefit to those experiencing marital conflict films can do so much for us they better direct our feelings of sympathy they offer comfort for our unmanageable fears they correct an unworkable sense of what is normal they Edge us towards Good Conduct they

caution us and arm us against our Folly and vices we should as societies be ready to see them as more than just entertainment they are at their best guides to life and pieces of spectacular applied philosophy at the end we show the great French film The Red balloon [Music] I've shown it many times but never

before have I seen kids reaching up trying to grab the onscreen balloons and then we show [Applause] ET films about love solidarity and loneliness I've never heard such cheering at the movies [Music] ha [Music]