Realism(s) #6, or: hands

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Cinema is not a medium of touch, but of vision. Cinema translates most sensations of touch into glances.

--Harun Farocki, Der Ausdruck der Hände, 1997.

Hitchcock poses the question: what is death? How can it be portrayed? Can it be portrayed at all? It must be visible, for visibility is the foundation of the cinema. The audience believes it has seen a murder, but it has not taken place; no injured body, no wounds. Hitchcock operates with a cinematography of deception. He cannot show the murder, even though we think we've seen it. From the drain the image fades over to Marion Crane's eyes. They are rigid and unseeing. Seeing is, at the same time, seeing nothing. Not-seeing is the closest approach to death that Hitchcock can conceive of.

--Hartmut Bitomsky, Das Kino und der Tod, 1988.

Psycho, 1960 / Das Kino und der Tod - Hartmut Bitomsky, 1988, video

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North by Northwest, 1959 / Der Ausdruck der Hände - Harun Farocki, 1997, video

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The dead pile up, under attack. No one is left alive. A hand sticks out of the bodies. Where to turn to in this godforsaken place?

A landscape was chosen that exposes the man as if served on a plate. Without knowing it, he's being used. He has stumbled into an identity that was constructed by the C.I.A., and brought to a place where he does not belong. The film suggests that any identity is false, but nonetheless he runs for his life.

--Bitomsky, Kino Flächen Bunker, 1991

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North by Northwest, 1959 / Kino Flächen Bunker - Hartmut Bitomsky, 1991, video

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There are two types of dead in films. One has a destiny which the film is trying to communicate, the other(s) are nameless and faceless. They are numbers, indicating the extent of the losses. If you count up all the scenes; the killing, the dying, then there is a gigantic civil war going on.

--Bitomsky, Das Kino und der Tod, 1988.