Reviving the Cinema Experience

By Jay DeLancy, 10.11.06

In a not-quite-a-movie movie, Mikel Rouse becomes more of an artist than a filmmaker.

“The End of Cinematics," with seven video projectors synchronized to a own musical score started out like any other film.

Cinematics is defined as “the art or technique of making films or movies.” Internet buzz on this event suggested that Rouse’s message was that “corporate greed” that was killing the cinematic art. But rather than hitting his audience over the head with Marxist dogma, he used a subtlety more along the lines of “Adbusters” magazine.

The result was a dream-like, multi-media experience that dazzled some and bored others who walked out during the performance. When asked if the walk-outs bothered him, one of the show’s producers, Michael
Mushalla, said,
“
No. I think art polarizes people and that’s what it’s all about.”

In distinct style, Rouse started the program in classic movie-theater fashion: “Please turn off your cell phone” flashed across the massive screen, followed by previews of sure-bet films coming soon. The first two previews were of the fantasy films, Spiderman 3 and a CGI remake of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles that could have been called “Turtles on Steroids.” The third and fourth previews featured more serious fare, but all will reap megabucks.

Then the gag was over. This wasn’t movie night.

Rouse pulled back a curtain behind the screen to reveal another world. The original screen turned out to be a cheesecloth-like wall called a scrim. Behind it were actors and six other video screens stacked like
the set of the old Hollywood Squares television show.

For the next hour, he bombarded the senses to the sound of Beatles flavor and (imagine this) Michael Franks singing disco. All the while Rouse treated the audience to a visual puzzle with layers of meaning.

When he really wanted to hammer home a point, he would flash the message across the big screen like a foreign film subtitle. At other times, he said the same lines for emphasis, while three actors were lip
syncing the lines as they appeared to be using American Sign Language.

The whole event was an artist at work. A multitude of communication techniques to make points that were, in his words, “open to interpretation.” So, while fans of fine arts were dazzled, movie
lovers were not.

As one disgruntled 20-something music major at UNC Chapel Hill said,

“If Rouse wants us to decide between commercial movies like he showed at the beginning or the original work that he gave us at the end, I’ll take the commercial stuff,” he said.

Visually, it’s safe to say the show sparked the imagination of artists and communicators. It harkens back to the earlier work of NASA, Artist in Residence, Laurie Anderson (sans the violin) and her multimedia
performances.

Lyrically, when Mikel Rouse's songs give us lines like, “Intel inside the entire nation,” and, “Too much TV. Too many bars. Women are men. Men are from Mars,” he appeared to be more the poet than, say, the next Billy Joel.
In one of his cryptic lyrics, he declared, “God out of control this world.” And in Q&A after the show, he told the audience of upcoming works already titled, “The Gospel of Thomas,”
and “The Devil’s Chaplain.”

With such faith-provoking prose, one might wonder: Is he looking for new ways to articulate outrage at God? Or is he looking for affirmation from people too cool to admit they don’t understand what he
is saying?

In either case, he is a talented visual artist and poet… but he didn’t kill cinematics.