In class we were shown some short films by the Japanese film director, Toshio Matsumoto. These films really resonated with me and my current research/creative journey. I can tell that Matsumoto is trying to induce a hypnotic effect in his audiences as he experiments with various filming techniques, speeds, colours and editing arrangements. Below I analyse a few of Matsumoto’s works.

 

Atman (1975)

This film is shot through stop motion, as a camera revolves around a masked figure. The film flashes with different exposures and colours, with an accompanying eerie electronic soundtrack, intensifying as movements become more chaotic. This film is hypnotising, slightly uncomfortable, yet leaves a long lasting impression. The way in which the camera zooms and rotates keeps you staring at the screen as your mind becomes blank.

 

 

Everything Visible Is Empty (1975)

This film rapidly fires imagery of various Japanese characters and paintings. The images flicker in front of you and assault your vision. I am realising that much of Matsumoto’s work is aiming to hypnotise audiences. The effect seems to be both calming and unnerving. The strobing of light, sound and imagery is incredibly effective. This relates to my previous research on inducing trance states, as these rhythmic jolts can physically alter your brain. I assume this is why epileptic people may have an episode when exposed to this type of content. I am also really enjoying the obsession Matsumoto seems to have with eyes. There is something hypnotising about looking into another humans eyes, and Matsumoto has obviously realised this.

 

 

For The Damaged Right Eye (1968)

Upon further researching Matsumoto after class, I came across this film, in which perfectly encapsulates many of the ideas and techniques I am developing for screen project 2. The split screen, trance inducing flashes of imagery and typography, with a focus on music, rhythm and dance. This film compares and contrasts various cultural manifestations throughout the 1960’s.

 

Relation to my Journey

Analysing these works by Matsumoto has been incredibly beneficial for my realisation of screen project 2, as his work is so heavily revolved around rhythm, repetition and trance. I am going to experiment with some of the ideas and effects in which Matsumoto has used, as I feel his style really suites my project. I turned the sound down for these videos and played electronic dance music in the background. Turns out the music complemented the visuals amazingly well.

 

After being incredibly inspired by Toshio Matsumoto, I decided to download his videos which I analysed. Within Final Cut Pro, I conjoined the videos together into a sequence and added a techno sound track. I was pleased with the results and developed my editing techniques in the process. I used blending tools within Final Cut Pro to overlay various segments of footage and changed speeds of the sequences so that they matched the BPM of the music. I find Matsumoto’s visuals compliment this kind of music very effectively and I think it even adds to the hypnotic power of them. I will bring these new ideas and techniques to my screen project. I will use the internet archives to find stock footage and edit it to a similar style of soundtrack, also adding images and typography to further enhance the hypnotic power of the video.