BLUE PLATES, BLUE MOVIES
there's nothing special about
them.
Had an interesting email exchange with everyone's
favorite Barmaid yesterday that, sidestepping the usual
personal and political discussions and skipping right past the prospect of Drink Specials, settled on the subjects of
eating and writing and food and photos and how much she
truly, truly, truly hates tight shots of
food. In books and magazines, on websites and
television shows. Anywhere and everywhere. She hates 'em. And she was trying
to figure out why.
So I stepped up to the plate, as it were, and took a stab at it. And I think I nailed it.
Setting aside both the immediate reactions -- a lack of distance and restraint, a forced perspective that almost seems to infringe upon your own personal space -- and the obvious differences in the way people perceive and process visual information, I think the simplest explanation for why those extreme close-ups of lettuce and lamb chops give her (and me) the willies is that they're just not natural. I mean, really -- when do you ever take such a close look at your food? (Answer: you don't.) Unless you're blind or you're hunchbacked, you've almost surely never been this close to a bowl of borscht:
You sit up straight, and you look at our food on the plate or in the bowl in front of you. You don't bend over and thrust your face so close to your food that your retinas can barely even focus on it. You view it -- and then you eat it -- from an appropriate and appreciative distance in your visual field. But those damned photos do not. They’re supposed to be an appreciation, but they feel more like a violation.
Which brings us, then, to the second and (ahem) more explicit part of my explanation. The Barmaid and I and everyone else who believes that we should be separated from our food by more than just the width of our contact lenses have little stomach and even less patience for such tight shots of food because they are the culinary equivalent of hardcore pornography; they take what should be sensuous and sort of mysterious and make it instead cold and clinical, an overbearing exercise of intimate examination.
I find great beauty in the female form. And, thought it is not nearly so much to my liking, also in the male form. And I believe, in my weaker, soft-core sort of moments, that there can be great, sensuous beauty in images of those forms, with artful angles, lovely lighting, and skillful cinematography, blissfully conjoined. But all those damned, degrading close-ups of straining penises and gaping vaginas -- neither of which, it should be noted, are particularly attractive parts of the male and female forms, and all the less so when viewed from a distance of only a few millimeters -- render sexual activity at best like a never-ending anatomy class, at worst like a gynecological and urological exam. When we long for and lust over and think even the most lustful and lascivious thoughts about our partners, we don't -- or at least I hope we don't -- focus only on penises and vaginas, much less on getting so close to them that they make us cross-eyed. And so all those close-up hardcore porn shots, it seems to me, produce an effect quite the opposite of what they intend, rendering the sensual and seductive as the hard and horribly obtrusive.
Just as all those tight shots of food take something we should want to feel all sorts of physical longings for and, with all the ugly inelegance of the frame, turn it into something greatly repulsive. Like, say, this hot dog:
This photo, with an obviously uncircumcised hot dog and a bun almost certainly suffering from genital warts, is but one small step from those excruciating close-ups of savagely coupling genitals. But even when everything is healthy and tasty, I still do not want, nor do I ever need, to be that close. I suppose I should be aroused, but in both cases, I’m just totally grossed out. And the last thing I want from food or from sex is the feeling that if I don't turn away from it, I may have to throw up.
So I stepped up to the plate, as it were, and took a stab at it. And I think I nailed it.
Setting aside both the immediate reactions -- a lack of distance and restraint, a forced perspective that almost seems to infringe upon your own personal space -- and the obvious differences in the way people perceive and process visual information, I think the simplest explanation for why those extreme close-ups of lettuce and lamb chops give her (and me) the willies is that they're just not natural. I mean, really -- when do you ever take such a close look at your food? (Answer: you don't.) Unless you're blind or you're hunchbacked, you've almost surely never been this close to a bowl of borscht:
You sit up straight, and you look at our food on the plate or in the bowl in front of you. You don't bend over and thrust your face so close to your food that your retinas can barely even focus on it. You view it -- and then you eat it -- from an appropriate and appreciative distance in your visual field. But those damned photos do not. They’re supposed to be an appreciation, but they feel more like a violation.
Which brings us, then, to the second and (ahem) more explicit part of my explanation. The Barmaid and I and everyone else who believes that we should be separated from our food by more than just the width of our contact lenses have little stomach and even less patience for such tight shots of food because they are the culinary equivalent of hardcore pornography; they take what should be sensuous and sort of mysterious and make it instead cold and clinical, an overbearing exercise of intimate examination.
I find great beauty in the female form. And, thought it is not nearly so much to my liking, also in the male form. And I believe, in my weaker, soft-core sort of moments, that there can be great, sensuous beauty in images of those forms, with artful angles, lovely lighting, and skillful cinematography, blissfully conjoined. But all those damned, degrading close-ups of straining penises and gaping vaginas -- neither of which, it should be noted, are particularly attractive parts of the male and female forms, and all the less so when viewed from a distance of only a few millimeters -- render sexual activity at best like a never-ending anatomy class, at worst like a gynecological and urological exam. When we long for and lust over and think even the most lustful and lascivious thoughts about our partners, we don't -- or at least I hope we don't -- focus only on penises and vaginas, much less on getting so close to them that they make us cross-eyed. And so all those close-up hardcore porn shots, it seems to me, produce an effect quite the opposite of what they intend, rendering the sensual and seductive as the hard and horribly obtrusive.
Just as all those tight shots of food take something we should want to feel all sorts of physical longings for and, with all the ugly inelegance of the frame, turn it into something greatly repulsive. Like, say, this hot dog:
This photo, with an obviously uncircumcised hot dog and a bun almost certainly suffering from genital warts, is but one small step from those excruciating close-ups of savagely coupling genitals. But even when everything is healthy and tasty, I still do not want, nor do I ever need, to be that close. I suppose I should be aroused, but in both cases, I’m just totally grossed out. And the last thing I want from food or from sex is the feeling that if I don't turn away from it, I may have to throw up.
Posted: Sat - March 24, 2007 at 10:47 PM
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Published On: Jan 16, 2009 04:50 PM
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Published On: Jan 16, 2009 04:50 PM