Eric Sasono

Sensory Ethnography Lab di Indonesia?

December 18, 2019December 18, 2019 Eric SasonoLeave a comment

Diary of Cattle karya David Darmadi dan Lidia Afrilita (2019) yang berhasil melampaui cara pandang ‘manusiawi’ ketika menggambarkan sapi-sapi yang hidup di tempat sampah di kota Padang. Maka karya ini diberi judul seperti itu karena seakan sebuah catatan harian para sapi di tempat sampah.

Etnografi indrawi atau sensory ethnography dipelopori oleh Sensory Ethnography Lab (SEL) yang berpusat di Universitas Harvard, Amerika Serikat, di bawah pimpinan pembuat film Lucien Castaing-Taylor. Akademisi Scott McDonald di bukunya American Ethnographic Film and Personal Documentary: The Cambridge Turn melihat gerakan ini sebagai bagian dari tradisi panjang perkembangan etnografi visual yang berkembang di kota Cambridge, kota lokasi Harvard berada. Beberapa karya SEL dari laboratrium itu antara lain Sweetgrass (Lucien Castaing-Taylor dan Ilisa Barbash, 2009), Leviathan (Lucien Castaing-Taylor dan Verena Paravel, 2012), Manakamana (Stephanie Spray and Pacho Velez, 2013) dan Foreign Parts (Verena Paravel dan J.P. Sniadecki, 2011). Sedangkan karya seperti ini di Indonesia dipelopori oleh Aryo Danusiri lewat On Broadway (2011), dokumenter pendeknya Flaneur (2011) dan House No.15 (2018), serta Diary of Cattle (2019) karya David Darmadi dan Lidia Afrilita .

Etnografi indrawi berangkat dari etnografi, tetapi pada saat yang sama ia juga melakukan kritik terhadap kecenderungan sinema yang terlalu berpusat pada elemen naratif-verbal. Etnografi, yang pada dasarnya berupaya menggambarkan kehidupan dan pengalaman (orang lain), kerap melakukannya dengan kata-kata, bahkan ketika bentuknya adalah etnografi visual. Ini terjadi karena gambar dan suara dalam karya etografi visual dibuat untuk mendukung penjelasan naratif-verbal. Dalam bentuk ini, suara hadir bersifat verbal – kegunaannya untuk penjelasan dari hal-hal tekstual dalam film. Demikian pula elemen visual, ada sebagai penjelasan naratif – demi untuk “bercerita”. Pendeknya, dalam pendekatan semacam ini, sinema dan elemen-elemennya hanya ada untuk keperluan representasi atau mewakili sesuatu yang ada di luar dirinya.

Etnografi indrawi mencoba menaklukkan rezim ini dengan mengedepankan bentuk sensorial, di mana seluruh indra diberi kesempatan sama dalam menikmati film dan memahami pengalaman etnografis. Maka dalam perlakuan terhadap suara, yang verbal tidak didahulukan dibandingkan yang sonik. Demikian pula soal gambar, yang naratif-verbal tidak dimenangkan dari yang kinetis, kerja kamera untuk menangkap gerak, dan yang optis atau kerja kamera untuk melihat perubahan komposisi gambar. Tujuan dari etnografi semacam ini adalah membuat film menjadi “mesin persepsi” dan tidak bergantung pada interpretasi yang sudah terjajah rezim naratif-verbal tadi.

Dengan demikian, film seperti ini tidak selalu menjadikan manusia sebagai pusat film. Terbukalah kemungkinan sinema yang tidak antroposentris alias tidak lagi menjadikan manusia sebagai pusat semesta. Selain itu, gambar dan suara dianggap pantas berada dalam sinema tanpa harus menjadi utusan dari kenyataan.

Dengan pengertian seperti ini, di mana tempat film etnografi indrawi di Indonesia? Apakah karya etnografi indrawi bisa mendapat tempat terutama mengingat dua hal yang saling berkaitan: karya etnografi di Indonesia kadung masuk dalam rubrik film dokumenter, dan isilah ini sudah dipenuhi oleh imbuhan politik dan ideologis, terutama soal perannya dalam propaganda di masa kolonialisme dan Orde Baru. Kedua,

Dengan melihat perkembangan film dokumenter Indonesia film etnografi sensorial tidak hanya sedang melawan dominasi rezim naratif-verbal secara umum, tetapi juga harus menghadapi pencarian fungsi didaktik dalam film – terutama pada film dokumenter di Indonesia. Tulisan ini ingin menjabarkan hal tersebut.

SK - Bandung LBH Bandung Taman Sari — *Sexy Killers* merupakan bagian dari perjalanan Indonesia Biru yang dilakukan pendiri Watchdoc Dandhy Laksono dan wartawan Suparta Arz. Film ini memecahkan banyak rekor di Indonesia, dan diputar di ruang-ruang ‘non-theatrical’ oleh komunitas – bahkan ketika komunitas-komunitas ini tidak tahu secara jelas apa isi film tersebut karena trailer yang menjadi materi promosi tidak mengungkapkannya.

Di Indonesia, film dokumenter selama beberapa dekade dianggap sebagai alat penyuluhan atau propaganda karena fungsi itu dominan pada masa penjajahan Belanda dan pendudukan Jepang, dan ini berlanjut di masa Orde Baru. Pada masa Belanda dikenal ‘film pes’ atau film yang mengajarkan perilaku bersih dan tata cara menjaga sanitasi kepada rakyat di negeri jajahan (Irawanto, 2011). Film seperti ini dianggap tidak punya nilai artistik dan penyebutannya dimaksudkan sebagai olok-olok.

Setelah Indonesia merdeka, lewat film-film yang diproduksi oleh Perusahaan Film Negara (PFN) yang berbentuk film-film berita (newsreel), dan seri film Gelora Indonesia (sering dirancukan namanya dengan Gelora Pembangunan), rezim Orde Baru menggunakan film dokumenter sebagai promosi keberhasilan pembangunan yang diniatkan agar membuat manusia Indonesia menjadi manusia modern yang sepenuhnya mendukung harmoni politik dan proses pembangunan ekonomi nasional.

Dalam bentuk-bentuk dokumenter propaganda seperti ini, elemen naratif film umumnya tertutup di mana semua jawaban tersedia dalam film dan penonton diharapkan hanya punya satu tanggapan saja terhadap narasi tersebut yaitu mempercayainya.

Di tengah dominasi model penyuluhan-propaganda seperti ini, ‘film etnografi’ muncul di TVRI dekade 1980-an dengan isi berupa penggambaran kelompok suku ‘terpencil’ dan kehidupan sehari-hari mereka yang dianggap unik untuk dihadirkan sebagai tontontan nasional. Sekalipun dikritik sebagai upaya dominasi budaya non-nasional serta melakukan self-othering (meliyankan bangsa sendiri), film etnografi seperti ini bisa dipandang sebagai “hasil karya intelektual yang mampu menjadi perwujudan dari misi film yang kultural edukatif” (Peransi, 1986). Pembelaan Peransi ini bisa dilihat sebagai coblosan (puncture) terhadap puncak intensitas ideologi pembangunan Orde Baru yang tengah melakukan konsolidasi ideologi, sekaligus pencarian ruang eksperimen sambil tetap bicara dalam leksikon yang bisa diterima secara luas ketika itu.

Bentuk ‘etnografis’ seperti ini masuk ke arus utama di pertengahan 1990-an melalui seri Anak Seribu Pulau (Miles Film) yang disutradarai oleh para sutradara terkemuka di Indonesia saat itu seperti Garin Nugroho, Riri Riza, Ension Sinaro dan lain-lain dan disiarkan di enam TV swasta. Seri ini bisa jadi merupakan upaya untuk keluar dari penggambaran anak Indonesia yang berpusat pada Jakarta (Wibawa, 2009) yang bisa dilihat di serial Si Unyil. Namun penggambaran Anak Seribu Pulau dipandang terlampau idyllic dan membuat ruang multikultur Indonesia menjadi tampak steril dari konflik (Strassler, 2006).

Seri ini kemudian menimbulkan tema dan motif berulang di TV Indonesia (Petualangan Si Bolang, Anganku dan lain-lain) bahkan bisa dibilang menjadi semacam acuan bagi penggambaran Indonesia yang multikultur dalam film dokumenter dengan menghilangkan tekanan-tekanan struktural di dalamnya. Terutama ini bisa ditemukan pada film-film hasil karya lokakarya Eagle Awards yang didanai oleh Metro TV.

Bentuk ‘etnografi’ yang berbeda muncul pada Air dan Romi (Garin Nugroho, 1991), yang menyempal dari tema dan gaya yang kerap ditemui di masa Orde Baru (Ishizaka, 1998; Hanan, 2004). Para tokoh dalam Air dan Romi dibiarkan bicara tanpa diwawancarai, dan kamera berada dalam ketinggian pandang sejajar dengan mereka. David Hanan bahkan memuji film ini seakan memberi tempat bagi para subyeknya untuk bicara sendiri, dan pembuat film sedang memberdayakan mereka. Film ini dianggap punya potensi politik oleh David Hanan terutama karena fakta bahwa dinas intelijen Indonesia berniat menyita master film tersebut (Hanan, 2004). Melihat hal ini bisa dianggap bahwa film etnografi mampu menjadi perlawanan estetik dan politik di saat bersamaan.

on-broadway-the-fold-03 — On Broadway karya Aryo Danusiri (2010) berisi satu shot jamaah salat Jumat di sebuah ruang bawah tanah di dekat ground zero, New York. Dalam film ini tak ada informasi bahwa ini direkam di dekat ground zero. Ini adalah salah satu contoh narasi yang tidak tertutup.

Air dan Romi dibuat sebagai bagian dari kampanye lingkungan hidup yang dibiayai oleh pusat kebudayaan Jerman, Goethe Institute sebagai bagian dari kampanye organisasi non-pemerintah (NGO) yang merebak seiring pertumbuhan mereka sebagai ‘oposisi semu’ (Aspinal, 2005) pada dekade 1990-an. Sebagai bagian dari kampanye NGO, pemberdayaan menjadi tema utama film-film dokumenter Indonesia 1990-an dan berlanjut ke masa sesudah Soeharto berhenti dari jabatannya sebagai Presiden RI di tahun 1998. Bahkan hingga kini, film dokumenter terus dibuat dengan dana dari NGO untuk penyadaran hak politik, persoalan lingkungan dan berbagai tema pendidikan kewargaan lain untuk menghasilkan warga yang mampu berpikir rasional dan siap terlibat dalam proses pembentukan opini publik serta pengambilan keputusan politik. Melalui langkah semacam ini, film dokumenter sudah memasuki posisi sebagai bagian dari masyarakat sipil di Indonesia – dan menyeret dunia film pada umumnya untuk ikut serta ke dalamnya. Apa yang dimulai oleh Garin Nugroho melalui Yayasan SET diikuti oleh Shanty Harmayn lewat YMMFI (di bawahnya ada In-Docs yang ikut merancang Eagle Awards pada awal kelahirannya) dan Nia Dinata dengan Kalyana Shira Foundation.

Pada film dokumenter seperti ini, upaya penyadaran penonton menjadi warga negara yang sadar akan hak dan kewajiban menjadi tujuan utamanya. Pada umumnya film dokumenter ‘penyadaran’ seperti ini berangkat dari logika yang sama dengan ‘logical framework analysis’ yang kerap menjadi dasar bagi siklus kerja organisasi non-pemerintah: identifikasi masalah – penjabaran masalah – solusi. Dibuat dengan elemen narasi yang umumnya juga tertutup, film dokumenter seperti ini kerap menjadi bagian dari bahan diskusi dan diputar di ruang-ruang bukan bioskop (non-theatrical setting) dan dihadiri oleh pekerja organisasi non-pemerintah yang menjadi narasumber dalam diskusi.

Model kekisahan film dokumenter seperti ini mencapai puncaknya pada film-film yang dibuat oleh Watchdoc, sebuah rumah produksi swasta yang punya kepedulian sosial-ekonomi-politik yang sangat tinggi. Melalui program ‘corporate social responsibility’ mereka, Watchdoc membuat film-film bertema pendidikan publik dengan mengambil tema utama dari Kovenan Sipil dan Politik dan terutama Kovenan Ekonomi Sosial Budaya PBB.

Dengan pendekatan yang menggabungkan metode yang mirip film penyuluhan-propaganda dan tema pendidikan kewargaan, Watchdoc berniat menyodorkan gugatan posisi moral dan ekonomi-politik penontonnya di tengah himpitan neoliberalisme yang semakin menekan manusia Indonesia. Salah satu contoh paling menarik dari pendekatan Watchdoc ini adalah seri Indonesia Biru yang mirip dengan subversi dari Anak Seribu Pulau lantaran menggambarkan ruang-ruang multikulturalisme di pelosok di Indonesia sebagai resultan tekanan ekonomi-politik serta kecenderungan sentralisme dan penyeragaman yang menggerus milik bersama (common), yang merupakan modal utama daya tahan atau resiliensi ekonomi-politik di tingkat lokal.

Fungsi didaktik film dokumenter seperti di atas mendominasi Indonesia pada decade pertama sesudah Soeharto mengundurkan diri. Di tengah situasi itu muncul Lukas’ Moment (Aryo Danusiri, 2006) yang dianggap sebagai sebagai pelopor bagi film dokumenter observasional di Indonesia (Hanan, 2012). Lewat penggambaran anak muda Papua yang mencoba memulai usahanya secara mandiri, film ini melawan berbagai stereotip sekaligus: 1) stereotip tentang anak muda yang tak mampu memulai usaha, 2) tentang warga Papua yang dianggap malas, 3) tentang upaya mencapai kemandirian ekonomi dengan dukungan organisasi non-pemerintah.

Film ini dibuat dengan teknik observasi – teknik di mana kamera dan pemegangnya berusaha untuk sesedikit mungkin terlihat melakukan intervensi dan membiarkan subyek mereka melakukan keseharian dan mengungkapkan dialog untuk menceritakan kisah mereka. Format ini kemudian menjadi salah satu yang menonjol dengan munculnya beberapa dokumenter seperti Negeri di Balik Kabut (Shalahuddin Siregar, 2011), Denok dan Gareng (Dwi S. Nugraheni, 2012) dan Layu Sebelum Berkembang (Ariani Djalal, 2012) yang berhasil menggabungkan antara kemungkinan estetik dan kritik struktural secara bersamaan.

Film-film dokumenter ini menghendaki adanya investasi intelektual dan emosi yang cukup tinggi dari penonton untuk mencoba memahami lingkungan sekitar pada tokoh dalam film dokumenter sebagai bagian dari elemen naratif, dan tidak terpaku pada aspek verbal saja. Gambar dan suara tidak hanya ada untuk mendukung kata-kata dalam film, melainkan bahasa sendiri yang tiba ke hadapan penonton sebagai bagian dari lingkungan yang harus dipahami. Maka posisi politik dalam film seperti ini tidak bersifat didaktik yang satu arah dengan menyodorkan posisi moral yang tegas harus diikuti penonton, melainkan dengan cara membuka berbagai kemungkinan, termasuk untuk respon yang berada di batas-batas antara kesadaran rasional dan emosional.

Jika memang ada landasan bagi etnografi indrawi untuk tumbuh di Indonesia, maka apa yang sudah diupayakan oleh Peransi, Garin Nugroho dan dokumenter observasional ini akan menjadi landasan bagi etnografi sensorial untuk tumbuh di Indonesia. Karya-karya seperti itu sudah memberi kesempatan bagi kemungkinan estetik dan di saat yang sama mengangkat persoalan-persoalan struktural yang besar dan menghimpit. Film-film observasional yang saya sebut di atas bicara soal absennya negara dan perubahan identitas dalam persoalan kemiskinan akibat perubahan iklim (Negeri di Balik Kabut), kemiskinan dan prasangka agama (Denok dan Gareng), dan tekanan neoliberalisme dalam dunia pendidikan (Layu Sebelum Berkembang).

Film etnografi sensori ingin melangkah lebih jauh dalam membuka kemungkinan dengan tidak menjadikan aspek naratif-verbal menjadi faktor utama, bahkan gambar dan suara tidak dibuat semata untuk representasi dunia nyata. Gambar dan suara dianggap punya nilai yang mencukupi untuk berada di dalam film guna membuka kemungkinan sinema di luar apa yang sudah diketahui manusia.

Ambisi seperti ini sulit karena secara institusional, film dokumenter di Indonesia (dan juga dominan di seluruh dunia) digunakan sebagai sarana penyampaian pesan, baik secara monolog maupun secara partisipatoris untuk penyadaran kewargaan. Model kewargaan yang diharapkan untuk muncul secara umum masih berupa kesadaran rasional yang mengarah pada pembentukan opini publik dan pengambilan keputusan politik. Hingga sejauh ini, posisi semacam ini masih dominan dan dianggap terasa mendesak karena tekanan struktural yang semakin menguat dengan keberpihakan rezim terhadap investasi dan menjadikan warga sebagai kolateral dari pembangunan ekonomi.

Di sisi lain, ketersediaan dana bagi pembuatan film dokumenter masih ada pada model-model didaktik dan kampanye ketimbang pada perkembangan kemungkinan estetik. Sirkulasi film dokumenter di Indonesia juga masih terbatas pada festival-festival dan ruang-ruang khusus. Siaran televisi di Indonesia juga belum memberi ruang pada film dokumenter yang artistik, berbeda dengan di televisi Inggris misalnya yang menayangkan Leviathan (Lucien-Castaing Taylor dan Verena Paravel) atau dokumenter observasi berjudul National Gallery (Frederick Wiseman) yang panjangnya 4 jam. Ketiadaan infrastruktur penayangan film dokumenter menjadikan film-film etnografi indrawi di Indonesia akan beredar di galeri, festival atau penayangan khusus.

Dengan demikian, masih panjang jalan yang harus ditempuh etnografi sensorial untuk bisa mendapat tempat yang luas – bahkan dalam khazanah film dokumenter Indonesia secara khusus.

Referensi

Aspinall, Edward. Opposing Suharto: Compromise, Resistance, and Regime Change in Indonesia. (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2005), 16-18.

Hanan, David. “The Films of Garin Nugroho: Political Documentaries and Essay Films by Garin Nugroho dalam Late New Order and Post ‘Reformasi’ Indonesia.” Spectator, 24, no.2, (2004): 39 – 49.

Hanan, David. “Observational Documentary Comes to Indonesia, Aryo Danusiri’s Lukas’ Moment” dalam Southeast Asian Independent Cinema. (ed.) Tilman Baumgartel (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2012), 105-116.

Ishizaka, Kenji. “An Interview with Garin Nugroho,” Ishizaka Kenji, dalam Docbox Yamagata International Film Festival, https://www.yidff.jp/docbox/14/box14-2-1-e.html.

Budi Irawanto, “Beyond Big Dramatic Moments: Indonesian Documentary Films in 21st Century, in Asian Documentary Today (eds.) Jane HC Yu and Asian Network of Democracy (Busan: Busan International Film Festival, 2012).

D.A. Peransi, “Film Dokumenter di Indonesia (Beberapa Pokok Pikiran) dalam DA Peransi dan Film (ed.) Marseli Sumarno (Jakarta: Lembaga Studi Film, n.t), 43.

Strassler, Karen. “Stories of Culture: Difference, Nation and Childhood in ‘Children of a Thousand Islands,’ an Indonesian Television Series.” Sights—Visual Anthropology Forum 2006 (1996), http://cc.joensuu.fi/sights/karens.htm

Wibawa, Satria. “The Children of a Nation: The Representation of Children in Garin Nugroho’s films”, in Asian Hot Shots: Indonesia (eds.) Yvonne Michalik and Laura Coppens (Marburg: Schuren, 2009), 119.

Refleksi atas Sexy Killers: Penonton sebagai Publik

December 17, 2019 Eric SasonoLeave a comment

Film dokumenter Sexy Killers tergolong istimewa dalam budaya sinema di Indonesia. Selama 5-13 April 2019, film yang disutradarai Dandhy Laksono dan Suparta Arz ini diedarkan dalam bentuk nobar atau nonton bareng, dan selama masa itu sudah terjadi nobar setidaknya di 476 lokasi. Promosi hanya dilakukan lewat akun media sosial Watchdoc sebagai rumah produksi dan Dandhy Laksono sebagai sutradaranya. Ketika film ini diunggah ke YouTube pada 13 April 2019, dalam 36 jam ia mendapat 1,5 juta views. Pada saat tulisan ini dibuat pada 23 April, views-nya sudah 19 juta! Bisa dikatakan tidak pernah ada film yang mencapai tingkat kesuksesan seperti ini sebelumnya di Indonesia.

Poster undangan untuk mengadakan pemutaran film Sexy Killers yang beredar di akun media sosial Watchdoc dan Dandhy Laksono (sumber: Akun Twitter @watchdoc_ID)

Tulisan ini bermaksud melihat Sexy Killers dan sirkulasinya dalam kerangka budaya sinema di Indonesia. Dari sini, dilihat bagaimana sirkulasi film non-komersial ini mampu memunculkan peran sinema sebagai bagian dari budaya publik atau civic culture. Sesudah itu dipandang juga bagaimana Sexy Killers—dan seri Indonesia Biru karya Watchdoc—beserta sirkulasinya itu terkait dengan politik dalam arti luas.

Film dan Publik

Sexy Killers dan sirkulasinya sangat penting dalam kaitannya dengan budaya publik karena beberapa hal berikut.

Pertama, pemutarannya dilakukan sepenuhnya secara swadaya dan non-komersial oleh pihak-pihak yang menyelenggarakan. Mereka relatif tidak terhubung satu sama lain, melainkan unit-unit terpisah dan sebagiannya terbentuk secara spontan untuk keperluan menonton film ini. Mobilisasi sebesar ini, dengan cakupan distribusi geografis yang luas seperti ini, hanya mungkin ditandingi oleh jaringan bioskop komersial raksasa, atau oleh pemerintah dengan aparat birokrasi yang sudah mapan.

Kedua, kebanyakan—jika tidak semua—penyelenggaraan nobar Sexy Killers dilakukan di ruang-ruang yang tidak dimaksudkan untuk pertunjukan film, atau non-theatrical screening. Artinya para penyelenggara harus menyediakan sendiri perangkat mereka seperti layar, proyektor, komputer untuk memainkan film, dan hard disk atau fasilitas streaming dan sebagainya. Perangkat ini dibawa ke lokasi dan mengubah ruang semisal warung kopi, aula, mushola, dan bermacam ruang lainnya menjadi ruang ekshibisi film, di mana aspek naratif film mendominasi dan menentukan karakter ruang tersebut.

Pemasangan layar untuk pemutaran Sexy Killers di kantor YLBHI Jakarta (sumber foto: Akun Twitter @watchdoc_ID)

Ketiga, praktik semacam ini merupakan praktik penciptaan ruang publik, di mana imaji (atau diskursus) publik dihadirkan dan didiskusikan oleh warga negara, terlepas dari asal-muasal ruang tersebut. Ruang komersial seperti kafe, ruang semi-publik seperti ruang kelas dan lembaga pendidikan, bahkan ruang privat, semua berubah menjadi ruang publik (sementara) dengan peristiwa dan narasi yang dihadirkan oleh Sexy Killers.

Hal ini tak terlepas dari karakter film dokumenter yang berbeda dengan karakter film fiksi. Film fiksi umumnya berbicara kepada penonton dalam kapasitas individual dan mengarah kepada aspek psikologis mereka. Sedangkan film dokumenter, seperti ditulis Michael Chanan (2007), bicara kepada penonton sebagai individu dalam situasi sosial-politik mereka. Dengan demikian, peluang film dokumenter untuk membentuk narasi yang mengajak penonton berperan sebagai publik—atau warga negara—lebih besar ketimbang film fiksi yang mengeksploitasi dan memanipulasi kondisi psikologis penonton.

Keempat, kegiatan ini adalah semacam pendudukan (occupation) guna menciptakan ruang publik. Judith Butler (2012) menyebutkan bahwa berkumpulnya orang seperti ini merupakan sebuah tindakan mendaku (claiming) ruang publik, terutama di ruang-ruang yang tidak dimaksudkan secara khusus untuk itu. Ruang publik terbentuk melalui “pendudukan” fisik di ruang-ruang privat, semi-privat, virtual, dan sebagainya. Padahal, wacana publik di Indonesia umumnya hadir melalui media dan diedarkan melalui mekanisme komersial (atau platform yang sepenuhnya bersifat komersial dan melakukan komersialisasi dari atensi atau perhatian para pengguna). Artinya, penciptaan ruang publik fisik seperti yang terjadi melalui Sexy Killers adalah sesuatu yang jarang dilakukan, terlebih dengan skala sebesar ini. Kalau pun ada, umumnya berlangsung dalam skala terbatas dan tidak berhasil menciptakan jumlah nobar sebanyak yang dilakukan oleh Sexy Killers.

Pemutaran Sexy Killers di aula kantor kecamatan Cisauk, Tangerang (sumber foto: Akun Twitter @watchdoc_ID)

Kelima, seluruh pemutaran diiringi dengan diskusi mengenai substansi film, yaitu industri batu bara, energi alternatif, persoalan lingkungan hidup, oligarki dalam politik, dan sebagainya. Ini berhasil membuat film menjadi bagian sekaligus sarana pertukaran gagasan secara langsung. Kegiatan off-screen dalam konteks pemutaran film seperti ini disebut Lyell Davies (2017) sebagai sarana produksi pengetahuan yang memberi dampak lanjutan dari pemutaran film. Kegiatan off-screen dalam pandangan Davies membuat kegiatan menonton menjadi “kurang berjarak” (less distant) karena meminta penonton untuk berpartisipasi memikirkan masalah yang dihadapi oleh subjek di dalam film dan mengambil sikap politik.

Kegiatan semacam ini menjadi tempat di mana para penontonnya “mengambil posisi dan mendaku identitas serta membentuk cara pandang terkait tema yang disajikan oleh media yang ditayangkan, lalu partisipasi dalam gerakan sosial dipertahankan” (Davies, 2017: 42). Dalam kegiatan seperti ini, menonton film tidak semata berupa kegiatan emosional dan psikologis, tapi menempatkan penonton sebagai bagian dari publik, sebagai warga negara, yang disodorkan sebuah masalah yang dianggap sebagai masalah bersama.

Kesimpulannya, praktik sirkulasi semacam ini mengembalikan fungsi sinema sebagai barang publik, bukan semata barang komersial. Dalam melihat sinema sebagai barang publik, penonton tidak hanya dikonseptualisasi sebagai “pasar” atau turunannya seperti “segmen” atau “ceruk”, melainkan sebagai bagian dari warga negara dengan kesadaran sosial politik untuk bersikap terhadap isu yang dihadirkan.

Peran film seperti ini sudah lama tidak hadir di Indonesia, bahkan mungkin tidak pernah dijalankan secara optimal. Sebab, dalam sejarah film Indonesia, film lebih banyak dipandang sebagai barang komersial yang menempuh sirkulasi berdasar transaksi ekonomi, atau sebagai sarana propaganda politik atau materi didaktik yang terkait langsung dengan upaya mempertahankan atau memperluas kekuasaan—yang terakhir ini terutama terjadi di masa Orde Baru.

Sexy Killers telah mengikuti film-film dokumenter Watchdoc sebelumnya, seperti misalnya Jakarta Unfair (Sutradara: Dhuha Ramadhani dan Sindy Anastasia) dan Rayuan Pulau Palsu (Sutradara: Rudi Purwo Saputro), yang membuat film menjadi bagian dari perbincangan publik demi mempengaruhi kebijakan dalam skala yang demikian besar. Ini akan dibicarakan dalam bagian terakhir tulisan ini.

Politik Indonesia Biru

Sexy Killers sendiri merupakan sebuah film dokumenter yang menjadi bagian dari seri Indonesia Biru. Seri catatan perjalanan atau travelogue ini punya peran penting dalam khazanah film dokumenter di Indonesia. Pada dekade 1980-an, travelogue umumnya menggambarkan keseharian kelompok etnis dan masyarakat adat sebagai sesuatu yang perlu dikenal oleh penonton TV nasional. Pendekatan ini kemudian oleh Budi Irawanto dikritik sebagai sebuah self-exoticisation, alias mengeksotitasi bangsa sendiri. Pada masa itu, film dokumenter yang mengandung penggambaran konflik, misalnya film tentang konflik pembebasan tanah di kawasan Candi Borobudur yang dibuat oleh Hadi Purnomo, tidak pernah bisa ditayangkan (Hughes-Freeland, 1992).

Pertengahan tahun 1990-an semacam travelogue muncul melalui seri Anak Seribu Pulau (Miles Films) dan eksotisasi itu terjadi lagi. Kehidupan sehari-hari anak-anak di berbagai daerah di luar Jakarta digambarkan, dan dipandang sebagai bagian dari kekayaan budaya Indonesia. Seri ini memang memberi alternatif dari penggambaran anak-anak yang jakartasentris ketika itu.

Namun seri ini dikritik oleh peneliti Karen Strassler (1996) lantaran dipandang melakukan depolitisasi terhadap multikulturalisme dan keragaman Indonesia. Representasi terhadap ruang-ruang di luar Jakarta adalah representasi yang steril dari konflik. Indonesia dalam travelogue semacam ini selalu penuh harmoni dan tanpa konflik. Model Anak Seribu Pulau ini kemudian menjadi model arus utama seri dokumenter televisi, dengan beberapa seri sejenis seperti Kampoeng Halaman dan Anganku (produksi Studio Samuan), dan seri Bocah Petualang di Trans TV.

Sebagai travelogue, Indonesia Biru berbeda dengan yang digambarkan di atas. Di sini Indonesia tidak digambarkan sebagai ruang yang harmonis, dan multikulturalisme bukan semata pembentuk keragaman. Indonesia Biru bersandar pada dua premis penting: pertama, di balik Indonesia yang tampak indah dan nostalgis, selalu terkandung konflik yang utamanya bersumber dari konflik sosial-ekonomi dan sumber daya alam; kedua, kekayaan budaya tidak hanya merupakan bagian dari keragaman semata, justru merupakan sumber resiliensi ekonomi dan menjadi inspirasi bagi ketahanan lingkungan.

Kedua premis utama ini secara konstan bermunculan di seri Indonesia Biru, dan sesekali dikontraskan dengan kebijakan negara yang mendukung dan menjadi penyedia jalan bagi korporasi besar dalam melakukan penyeragaman (pada The Mahuzes) atau merebut sumber daya alam (pada Samin versus Semen) yang menjadi sumber ketahanan ekonomi di tingkat lokal.

Sexy Killers menggambarkan kelindan politik dan bisnis yang membawa biaya lingkungan dan politik yang besar. Film ini menawarkan premis tentang posisi oligarki dalam politik Indonesia yang mengorbankan kepentingan rakyat dan lingkungan hidup, tak peduli di kubu manapun mereka berada.

Sayangnya, kemungkinan terjadinya perubahan terlihat sangat kecil, mengingat kedua blok politik yang bersaing dalam Pemilu 2019 sama-sama terlibat dalam bisnis itu sedemikian dalam. Maka dengan narasi seperti ini, ditambah momentum Pemilu, mudah sekali film ini dituduh sebagai sarana mobilisasi golput, atau agar para pemilih tidak menggunakan hak pilih mereka dalam Pemilu.

Namun bagi saya Sexy Killers punya agenda lebih jauh daripada sekadar politik elektoral. Persoalan yang dibawanya adalah persoalan nyata yang harus mendapatkan penjelasan publik lebih jauh daripada sekadar apa yang dikatakan oleh Luhut Panjaitan: “pembuatnya kurang kerjaan”. Pola komunikasi yang disampaikan oleh Menteri Kordinator bidang Maritim yang juga pengusaha batu bara itu masih memperlihatkan pola komunikasi serupa dengan masa Orde Baru, di mana opini publik tidak diperhitungkan sebagai bagian dari pertimbangan politik, apalagi sebagai dasar pengambilan keputusan atau political deliberation.

Kesimpulan

Pemutaran Sexy Killers berhasil membuka kemungkinan penciptaan ruang publik di ruang-ruang yang tadinya privat dan semi-privat. Namun, berharap bahwa pemutaran itu akan berhasil membawa perubahan adalah sesuatu yang berlebihan. Sejauh ini film dokumenter yang membawa akibat langsung pada kebijakan ada dua: pertama film Jalanan (Sutradara: Daniel Ziv) yang berhasil membuat pejabat Gubernur DKI Basuki Tjahaja Purnama memperbaiki penampungan di panti sosial Cipayung, dan kedua, janji Presiden Jokowi untuk membersihkan sungai Citarum sesudah viralnya sebuah film dokumenter (lebih mirip entri vlog sebetulnya) buatan Gery dan Sam Bencheghib.

Kedua kebijakan tersebut bisa dibilang kebijakan pinggiran dan tidak terkait kelindan bisnis raksasa dan politik tingkat istana seperti yang digambarkan Sexy Killers. Kedua kebijakan di atas relatif tanpa risiko politik dan bisnis yang tinggi sehingga bisa dilakukan dengan mudah—apalagi ada imbalan popularitas dari tindakan semacam itu.

Hal ini memperlihatkan keterbatasan model pembuatan opini publik dalam political deliberation, yang mungkin dilakukan oleh organisasi media dan produk media seperti film dokumenter. Hal ini sama sekali bukan hal baru, karena opini publik tidak selalu berubah menjadi kebijakan.

Namun yang lebih penting dari film seperti Sexy Killers dan film-film lain dari seri Indonesia Biru terletak pada keberhasilannya dalam memungkinkan munculnya cara pandang alternatif dalam memandang kesejahteraan di tengah paradigma pembangunan neoliberal di Indonesia saat ini. Sexy Killers dan seri Indonesia Biru memungkinkan adanya usulan bahwa kesejahteraan sebaiknya tidak diiringi dengan agresivitas dalam mengejar pertumbuhan, yang artinya merusak sumber daya alam dan memandang korban jiwa sebagai kolateral semata dalam keseluruhan proses itu. []

Daftar pustaka

Butler, Judith. (2012). “Bodies in Alliance and the politics in the street” dalam Sensible Politics: The Visual Culture of Nongovernmental Activism, (eds.) Meg McLagan and Yates McKee. New York: Zone Books.

Chanan, Michael. (2007). The Politics of Documentary. London: BFI.

Davies, Lyell. (2017). “Off-screen Activities and the Documentary Film Screening” dalam Activist Film Festivals: Towards A Political Subject, (eds.) Sonia Tascon and Tyson Wils. Bristol: Intellect.

Hughes-Freeland, Felicia. (1992). “Representation by the other: Indonesian cultural documentation” dalam Film as Ethnography, (eds.) Peter Ian Crawford dan David Turton. Manchester and New York: Manchester University Press.

Irawanto, Budi. “Beyond big dramatic moments: Indonesian Documentary Films in the 21st Century”. Diakses di: http://www.goethe.de/ins/id/lp/prj/dns/dfm/ind/enindex.htm

Strassler, Karen. (1996). “Stories of Culture: Difference, Nation and Childhood in ‘Children of a Thousand Islands,’ an Indonesian Television Series.

Pertamakali terbit di Remotivi, 26 April 2019: http://www.remotivi.or.id/amatan/520/Refleksi-atas-Sexy-Killers:-Penonton-sebagai-Publik

The Night Comes for Us: Redefining the action film genre

December 5, 2018 Eric SasonoLeave a comment

Despite bad reviews, Timo Tjahjanto’s latest film, The Night Comes for Us, the first Indonesian film to get a global release on Netflix, deserves credit for re-establishing Indonesia’s action genre film on the global cinema industry map.

The Night Comes for Us should be appreciated for reviving the Indonesian action film genre along with its successful predecessors, The Raid: Redemption and The Raid.

Following The Raid’s success recipe

It is hard to not compare The Night Comes for Us with The Raid. The former seems to follow the latter’s styles and recipes for success. It is not a surprise as The Raid’s director, Gareth Evans, was also involved in writing the script.

The Raid series built its success on two important elements. First, compared to their contemporaries, the action scenes are more direct and full contact, with high intensity. Fighting scenes take place in cramped lower-class apartment blocks, creating an atmosphere of claustrophobia and immediate danger that appeals to the audience.

It’s the kind of intensity sought by fans of the action film genre. These fans value this kind of sensation, so the coherence of narratives may no longer be as important.

Second, as part of this appeal to sensation, The Raid did not disclose Indonesia as its geographical and social setting. Instead, it makes the location a generic manifestation of a world infused with crime. It means the setting of The Raid could be anywhere.

This kind of “de-territorialisation” made film critic Roger Ebert shrug off the setting: “What country are we in? The movie never tells us,” he writes. His question emphasises the movie’s success in creating a general setting for the audience.

The late Ebert then acknowledged the importance of stripping the territory from the movie to achieve the film’s generic success.

Enter Timo

Timo Tjahjanto has made various thrillers and horror movies like Macabre, Killers and Headshot. Like Evans, Timo is really good at directing fighting scenes or portraying bodily wounds, gore and injuries in his films. He has even intensified the action with blood, wounds and crunching acts, as if he has been granted full licence to transfer an online campaign, Dumb Way to Die, that trivialised injuries, into a movie.

Timo’s filming style focuses more on the intensity rather than the narratives. And it has proven to have its own appeal. The same appeal can be seen in the work of Japanese directors Takeshi Miike and Sion Sono with their visceral portrayal of human emotion. These directors sometimes show the human body being carved, convincing the audience about the pain.

The Night Comes for Us has also upgraded Evans’s “generic territorial approach” by adding elements that are familiar enough for international audiences to recognise as Asian (or Southeast Asian at best) without having to check their stock knowledge.

These stereotypical elements of Asian-ness play an important role in asserting the authentic aesthetics of local settings. The film uses the concept “triad”, or a Chinese secret crime organisation, in its main plot. Conversations in English, Indonesian and Chinese take place interchangeably in this film.

Responding to critics

Film critic Makbul Mubarak has said The Raid series films are perceived by many Indonesians as not Indonesian. The series has been lambasted for showing off “bad images” of Indonesia and not representing Indonesian peace-loving culture.

The Night Comes for Us may receive similar comments, knowing they belong to the same genre laden with excessive violence.

In this case, it might be important to remind people that graphic violence has been dominating Indonesia’s film industry since the 1980s. The Jaka Sembung series and other action genre films were full of scenes with chopped heads, body parts and blood.

I can say that The Night Comes for Us is an upgrade from Jaka Sembung. It offers more sensation and higher intensity in film-watching experiences.

Some actors of the new genre have slowly become household names for action films. Iko Uwais, Joe Taslim (both star in The Night Comes for Us) and Yayan Ruhiyan (The Raid) have been involved in numerous Hollywood productions. It is just a matter of time for Julie Estelle (who appears in The Night Comes for Us) to get the same offers.

Critics have argued that the The Night Comes for Us was badly written and has poor character development. Film critic Leila S. Chudori has spotted flaws in the dialogues as a result of poor translation from English.

I agree that stronger story development and better Indonesian translation would have improved The Night Comes for Us. Nevertheless, The Night Comes For Us and other films within this trope have put Indonesia on the map of world cinema. After The Raid, The Night Comes for Us has made Indonesian martial arts (pencak silat) the new lexicon in the action genre.

The Night Comes for Us is a success story for Indonesian films which creates a new benchmark for others to follow. Maybe we even should entertain the idea that the film has redefined the action genre in global cinema.

Originally published at: The Conversation.

Wiro Sableng: a revival of Indonesian martial arts genre?

October 28, 2018October 27, 2018 Eric SasonoLeave a comment

After being wowed by western superheroes from Marvel and DC universes, Indonesia finally gets its own hero on the big screen.

A film about a local hero clad in all white costume from the 16th century, Wiro Sableng (Crazy Wiro), hit Indonesian theatres on August 30. It will be released in Singapore on October 11 following Malaysia’s release on September 27.

The film mostly received positive reviews from media and audience. Reputable US magazine Variety called the film a breakthrough in Indonesia’s film industry for being the first film backed by Hollywood’s 20th Century Fox.

Despite the hype, Wiro Sableng has left a big question about genre filmmaking in the local cinema industry. Many consider Wiro to be a superhero movie, but from its cinematic elements and style, Wiro Sablengis closer to martial arts or silat genre.

What is genre?

Genre is a reference tool for filmmakers and audiences alike. Film professor Barry Keith Grant explains that genre classify commercial feature films that “tell familiar stories with familiar characters in familiar situations”. These references are useful for both filmmakers and audience to provide a pool of cinematic elements that they can work on as points of departure for film consumption, as well as for promotional purposes, so both sides know what to expect from a film.

The genre convention also refers to culture and social contexts surrounding the movies. It is very common that a genre can disappear or getting significant revisions in its elements when the culture supporting it is no longer dominant. One example is western genre. Once this genre dominated the screen worldwide from the 1950s to the 1970s, but now it has been revised to cope with new society’s values.

Wiro Sableng’s case

Since its production, many consider that Wiro Sableng is a superhero movie. Some websites even speculate that Wiro will join the Avengers, a franchise from Marvel Cinematic Universe, whose parent company, Disney, owns 20th Century Fox. The appearance of Wiro in Deadpool 2trailer, one of Marvel Studio’s films, also strengthens this speculation.

‘Wiro Sableng’ in ‘Deadpool 2’ trailer.

The assumption that Wiro Sableng is similar to Hollywood superhero movie is inevitable. This is because there have been no reference in Indonesian films whose main characters have superhuman abilities.

Local martial arts genre

From its cinematic elements and style, Wiro Sableng is closer to martial arts or silat genre. Indonesian silat genre is akin to wuxia genre in Hong Kong cinema. Both genres have historical settings with corresponding costumes, properties and architecture. Important elements in this genre are the characters’ ability to do choreographed fighting with “high-kicks” and “flying swords”. Sometimes superhuman abilities are featured to add entertainment values.

Indonesian silat genre dominated the screen in the 1980s. Jaka Sembung series (The Warrior) – the third top earner film in 1982 according to Film Indonesia website – and Si Buta dari Gua Hantu series (The Blind Swordsman) are among the successful ones. After that, the genre fell into obscurity. The Jaka Sembung and Si Buta series are now circulated in low quality VCD format, and have lost their appeal to a new generation of filmgoers.

Attempts to revive silat genre occurred in 2014 with the production of Pendekar Tongkat Emas (Golden Cane Warrior, but to no avail. The film flopped and received bad reviews, with one saying the film lacked fresh ideas.

The superhero genre has not been produced for a while in Indonesiawhile the martial arts genre, which once dominated the screen, has also all but disappeared. No wonder, then, that people associate Wiro Sableng with the Hollywood superhero genre, which has dominated the global film industry.

Technology for silat genre revival

Technological development in moviemaking has opened many possibilities for featuring superhuman abilities on screen. This has become a new standard in the film industry. Any films laden with special effects to portray superhuman abilities always bring with them the expectation of an enjoyable watching experience.

Chinese films in the Wuxia genre have undergone an upgrade. We can see how visual effects play its magic in Ang Lee’s films such as Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon (2000) or Hero (2002). The special effects has helped these films create better film narratives for audiences in the new century.

Indonesia’s success story with visual effects can be found in the remake of a classic horror film, Pengabdi Setan (Satan’s Slave, 1982) into the 2017 version.

Film critic Hikmat Darmawan has praised Wiro Sableng for its “luxury special effects against the benchmark of Indonesian fantasy pictures”. He also says Wiro Sableng belongs to the silat genre, hinting at the possibility of the genre’s revival in the local film industry. But again, the revival of silat genre will depend on creating convincing special effects that can woo millennials who have grown up on the slick special effects of Hollywood superhero movies.

https://theconversation.com/wiro-sableng-a-revival-of-indonesian-martial-arts-genre-101692

Gender and Sexualities in Indonesian Cinema: Constructing Gay, Lesbi and Waria Identities on Screen

September 12, 2018 Eric SasonoLeave a comment

Murtagh, Ben. Gender and Sexualities in Indonesian Cinema: Constructing Gay, Lesbi and Waria Identities on Screen. New York, NY: Routledge, 2014. ISBN: 13-978-0415536318. xiv + 216 pp. / Eric Sasono

<1> Fluidity of gender construction is often apparent in media and popular culture analysis, and Ben Murtagh’s volume on Indonesian cinema poses the notion against a very interesting backdrop. The volume entitled Gender and Sexualities in Indonesian Cinema: Constructing Gay, Lesbi and Waria Identities on Screen is part of a series “Media, Culture and Social Change in Asia.” In this volume Murtagh offers his analysis of popular films in Indonesia, interesting not just because Indonesia has the largest Muslim population in the world, but also because in 1998 the country and its people were freed from an authoritarian regime who had proliferated order and enforced ideological conformity of developmentalism during its reign (1966-1998). Murtagh’s examination spans the period from the decade of the 1970s into the 2000s, providing powerful yet sympathetic insights into the construction of gender and sexualities against changing social and political backdrops. He focuses on the subject position that is generated by gender construction rather than merely affirming the “positive” or “negative” constructions of non-normative genders and sexualities, even as he argues that following the “negative” construction of female homosexuality the empowerment of lesbian viewers might ensues.

<2> In examining the subject position, Murtagh employs Richard Dyer’s notion of “that’s me factor” as a pivotal point in the viewers’ engagement with the films, suggesting that non-heterosexual individuals’ needs are such that they find information and ideas about non-normative genders and sexualities in the media, rather than within their social circle. In the case of Indonesia, the notion of this mediatized identity formation finds a solid ground, given that the state’s promotion of heteronormative ideology has ostensibly isolated non-heteronormative individuals both from their peers and from each other.

<3> Murtagh begins his exposition of non-heteronormativity in Indonesia with gender transgression, specifically of a man who becomes a woman, waria as he is recognized in the Indonesian colloquial term (chapter 2). Although the wariais positioned as an object of ridicule in many commentators’ explanation about their construction in Indonesian films, Murtagh sees this situation differently. He asserts the importance of viewing waria as a strategy in (re)positioning gender subjectivity. Examining two Indonesian films from the 1980s, Murtagh concludes that some films have, in effect, served to enable many present-day warias (who are mostly come from less-educated and working-class backgrounds) to project themselves into the protagonist subject position. Adopting the idea of “dewigging”-whereby the man-who-becomes-a-women protagonist reveals his/her identity without conforming to the gender binary-as a narrative strategy, warias confront the dominant view of gender rigidly underpinning Indonesian state ideology from 1970s to 1980s. Murtagh’s anaylsis emphasizes the subject position of such empowered gender “in-betweeners” in the construction of waria in Indonesian films of 1970s.

<4> Indonesian gay subjectivity is discussed in chapter 3, where Murtagh provides examples of films that portray homosexuality either as symptomatic of a larger moral decline or as representing the patholigally foreign nature (and origins) of the concept. The films were released in the 1980s, a decade during which the campaign orchestrated by the Indonesian state (both in the dominant narrative and physical oppressions that ensued) reached its zenith as the state required ideological conformity from its citizen. In this context, non-heteronormative sexuality was considered within a social and moral vacuum, requiring that it be condemned. Most filmic portrayals of gay this era underscore that gayness is foreign to Indonesians or that it poses a threat to idealized family structure and to susceptible Indonesian youths. Nevertheless, representations of gay sexuality managed to engage audiences with the marginalized but uplifting gender fluidity inscribing campy portrayals of warias, thereby providing mainstream Indonesians an opportunity to discuss gay identity publically.

<5> In chapter 4, Murtagh examines the presence of female-on-female sexuality in films from the 1990s. He employs the term lesbi (rather than lesbian) to highlight the specific experience in an Indonesian context. Rather than asserting the terms (including the term gay and waria, not coincidentally italicized throughout the book) as a means to exoticize their representation, Murtagh accentuates specific historicity and, in doing so, defamiliarizes the concept, especially were we to have knowledge of Euro-America contexts. It is in this regard that Murtagh’s usage with its acknowledgement of the particular social and political contexts of the historical moment comes closer to the actual Indonesian experience. In observing the lesbi, Murtagh quickly recognizes that many negative portrayals oflesbi sexuality emanate from a central patriarchal position within which men construct the predominate expectations and accepted expression of women’s erotic motivation. In this context, lesbi are the passive consequence arising from an absence of men; policing against lesbi could be justified, vindicated by the prevailing notion that women being dependent on men represented the idealized heteronormative role of women, embraced by the dominant masculine Indonesian state of the 1990s. Homosexuality, and especially lesbi sexuality, therefore, can exist only outside of, beyond the shared national experience of “belonging.” Regardless of construction, however, Murtagh asserts that the negative representations of female homosexuality suggest the presence of such lesbian individuals and serve to empower such female viewers.

<6> The “positive” construction of gay men that becomes apparent in films from the late 1990s and early 2000s is the focus of chapter 5. Here, Murtagh demonstrates the dual nature of homonormativity and gay sexuality within the Indonesian context, emphasizing the degree of exclusion (akin to that seen the representation of warias in the 1980s). It is with such a film as Arisan (The Gathering, 2003), in the hands of award-winning Indonesian director Nia Dinata (b. 1940), Murtagh argues, that a “positive” gay storyline, influenced by Western neoliberal notions of domesticated and depoliticized privacy, comes to the fore. However controversial, just such a construction is necessary step toward a larger acceptance of gays within mainstream society. Put differently, such representations result, relatively speaking, assert a sense of “no contest” towards dominant heteronormative assumptions and institutions. Instead, they uphold and sustain them. Gay constructions in this era are mostly privatized, desexualized and depoliticized, and they are sufficiently anchored in domesticity and consumption. The other side, the “soft” rejection to the effeminate, lower-class and campy waria, keeps them in arm’s-length as it positions them among “unwanted” queers. Comparing the construction of waria subjectivity from the 1970s, Murtagh implies the prevalence of neoliberal lifestyle in any contemporaneous depictions of homonormativity.

<7> In chapter 6, Murtagh returns to his analysis of the lesbi in the new millennium with an observation that the construction of lesbi did not change much in the 2000s. Currently held representations reflected a larger either resulting from weaknesses or presenting as a transitional “phase” for woman before reaching a more decisive sexual orientation conforming to mainstream heteronormative values. Murtagh, however, sees a possibility of a differentlesbi sexuality, one that pose a serious question to older constructions. When analyzing Nia Dinata’s dramatic comedy, Love for Share (Berbagi Suami, 2006), Murtagh recognizes that lesbi sexuality is in this instance constructed as multiple, interrelated narrative challenges to the stereotypical portrayal of female-on-female sexuality. In Murtagh’s view, this expression of sexuality is a much more advanced, certainly far more nuanced representation, ascribing a sense of intimacy independent from social acceptance. By doing so, he reads the emerging subject position defined by intimacy rather than by degree of social acceptance.

<8> In chapter 7, Murtagh offers a resounding conclusion, important on at least two accounts. First, he asserts that the proliferation of non-heteronormative characters and storylines in Indonesian cinema serves to open discussions of non-heteronormative sexuality as recognized sites within which audiences might impose their subjectivity both upon representations and on their diegetic environment. Second, and more important for this reader, Murtagh exposes the importance of a viewing strategy that entertains the possibility of alternative subjectifications based on intimacy and sexual expression in the obvious absence of larger mainstream notion of social conformity. In this sense, this remarkable volume offers rare insights into representations of genders and sexualities constructed within broader Indonesian contexts.

http://reconstruction.eserver.org/Issues/162/Sasono.shtml

Source Citation (MLA 8 ^th Edition)

Sasono, Eric. “Murtagh, Ben. Gender and Sexualities in Indonesian Cinema: Constructing Gay, Lesbi and Waria Identities on Screen.” Reconstruction: Studies in Contemporary Culture, vol. 16, no. 2, 2016. Academic OneFile, Accessed 12 Sept. 2018.

Sound and public space in China: the People’s Park

June 2, 2018 Eric SasonoLeave a comment

zhengstillfinal This film consists of one single shot produced by a camera ‘walking’ around a public park in Chengdu, China. For 78 minutes we were brought by the filmmakers, Libbie D. Cohen and J.P Sniadecki, glancing from one crowd to another, who gather in open air doing their activities, mostly dancing, singing karaoke or just strolling the park.

I am interested in discussing this film in two different ways. The first one is a relatively ‘conventional’ way to ‘read’ the film as a ‘text’ that tells a story of post-socialist China. This brings me into an elaboration of ‘crowds of people’ and it’s variations, (i.e. the public) in particular social and political transitions, not merely as a story of a unidirectional evolution of political change but rather to open up a discussion on multiple meanings of congeries of individuals in a certain social and political setting.

The second is to review this documentary as an audio visual work that is not bound to any scopic regime and allows the ‘visuality’ to speak for itself (Haraway, 1991) rather than implying a particular scopic regime as if it is universal in nature. By this way of approaching the visuality, I expect to come into revealing the triptych relations of reality, filmmakers and audience (Nicholls, 2001) that enable me to argue for the role of this particular documentary film (and its technical apparatus, i.e. camera) to mediate the viewers to the reality, rather than immersing them into the narrative.

For me, this latter ‘reading’ would make the narrative and its claim of the factual reproduction of reality – as a documentary film avows – no more interesting than the diegetic environment it produces. This way of commenting to the film potentially opens a possibility of asserting a post-narrative cinema without having to rely on digital manipulation of its diegetic environment and digital characters (as asserted by Cubitt, 2002), but through the awareness of the filmmakers, the film’s subjects and the audience on the presence of camera as implied by the record of the diegetic world.

chenstillfinal

Public?

In ‘reading’ the film as ‘text’ and putting it in certain social and political contexts, regardless of the film’s title that mention ‘people’ as being attributed to the park, the crowd in the people’s park is closely related to the ‘public’ in a post-socialist context that closer to its connotation to the ‘common’, related to their activities in sharing resources that are made available by the state. This is a new lexicon that is relatively safe to use in comparison to ideologically-charged terms such as “masses” or “people” for the new political imagination of the congeries of individuals, considering the aptness of the term ‘public’ in the new (or post-socialist, if you like) settings. In this park, individuals gather around their own activities, as mentioned earlier, dancing, singing karaoke and strolling around the park, and the camera glancing at them evading to make any categorization. This is the new public, where the crowd is established without any urge to be categorized in any way.

Compared to activities such as political protests in Tiananmen Square, Beijing or Istiqlal Square, Istanbul or any other protest happened in the main squares of the major cities in the world, what happened in the documentary are relatively apolitical. Judith Butler (2015) calls the earlier type of congeries as ‘assemblies’, in which their very existence might instigate an interrogation to neoliberal structure that caused precarious life to these subjects. These assemblies for Butler are political in nature, posing question to the ethical aspects of cohabitation. Compared to those, no ‘political messages’ critical to the government are brought about in the dancing and singing; neither does political mobilization of the people based on any particular ‘collective spirit’ exist in these congeries as portrayed in this documentary. They crowd gather, or stroll, based on their interest in music, dance or just by being in the park. The ‘people’ in the ‘people’s park’ – that used to be heavily imbued with political mobilization – becomes ‘public’ related to the function of the park as a shared-space that is being commonly used together.

Interestingly however, the space within the film’s diegetic is ‘divided’ along the activities and lines of interests, at least as defined by the auditory element that goes along the inverse square law, in which the space inhabited by particular sub-public is defined by the range reached by the diegetic sound. As the camera moves further away from one crowd, the sound of that crowd becomes weaker, while the sound from the next group becomes stronger as it comes into the frame, implying a movement from one ‘space’ to another, as if there are multiple porous inner-spaces within the diegetic park as a ‘public space’.

Is this film suggesting a naturally depoliticized collective life in a shared-space totally regulated by the laws of acoustics? Is contemporary China a massive depoliticization of collective lives, and its society in the process of making a new political imagination in an urban setting? Those are reasonable conclusions, but a closer examination of space and places will bring us into a question of political struggle in which power relations could be further revealed in discussing the space and place and how they are formed by these power relations. This would be a discussion for another occasion since I am more interested in keeping this piece in a different direction in discussing this film.

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Sensory

The second ‘reading’ is more esoteric, which involves untying the film from the socio-political context, making the narrative less interesting than the diegetic world it produces. The film makers are part of the well-praised Harvard University’s Sensory Ethnography Lab who intend to produce works that are more ‘sensorial’, and relies more on human sensory capacity to reveal whatever content or other “narrative elements” based on the recording of the factual world. I have mentioned the auditory element in making a distinction of the multiple cinematic space within the diegetic. In this light, the soundscape element is not meant to become an accessory that merely supports the narrative, rather it stands to build a cinematic perception of its own (but also always in conjunction with the visual) to create a compression of multiple spaces and time rather than putting the two categories separately in a Cartesian-esque manner.

The visual element in cinema is considered to be synthetic since it consists of three distinct yet sequential cinematic times: the past, the present and the future (Cubitt, 2002) and this has generally been known to run in linear fashion, creating the three-act structures of cinematic events. In this documentary, time progresses (as the cinema reveals its narrative) going along with the spatial movement (as the camera strolls) and these are signified by the changes in the diegetic soundscape – as captured by the microphone (and mixed fabulously by Ernst Karel). The cinematic time overlaps with the cinematic space but with spatial transition kept intact through the transitions in the auditory element. The cinematic event in this documentary is construed through the transition of cinematic space, not solely through actions or whatever is revealed through the cinematic time.

Camera and mediated experience

Now I’d like to move into the role of the camera in this film. Surely the camera work is the main technology producing visuality but in this documentary, it is special since it has recorded people that were not prepared to be on camera. They were fully aware that the tool and its operator, a white-American man in the form of Chinese-speaking J.P. Sniadecki, (see his other film, Iron Ministry) is among them. This made these ‘social actors’ looked into the camera, turn their face and gave a reaction. Sometimes people, especially children, waved their hands into the camera, gesturing the existence of the cinematic apparatus. Some others, mostly adult male subjects, assumed flat expressions which could easily be interpreted as uneasiness of being recorded without their prior and proper consent.

To me, this camera work implies two important thing: the tangibility of the recording apparatus and its ‘honesty’ regarding the recording it produces.

Firstly, the camera becomes a tangible technical apparatus of the cinema. Regardless of its invisibility in the diegetic it is tangible through the people’s reactions. This is more than the “breaking of the fourth wall” in a Brechtian manner, but a robust statement on the role of the medium (film and its technical apparatuses) in connecting the triptych in documentary films: subjects, filmmakers and audiences. By putting the camera that way, watching this film becomes a mediated experience rather than being immersed sensationally to the narrative world.

This does not mean that mediated-experience is better than the immersive one, only that it is different. More importantly, this could be a denaturalization of immersive experience in film-watching to provide an important break from a particular format that has been prevailing and regarded to apply to most films and all types of audiences.

Moreover, in a film that claims to be a ‘documentary’ or ‘non-fiction’, this mediated experience is particularly interesting because when a film claims (and is expected by its audience) to represent reality, most of the time, it keeps the camera hidden and hides the filmmaker from its diegetic world, thus asserting the ‘objectivity’ of its narrative.

Of course, the film makers sometimes appear in the diegetic and their recording apparatuses can also be seen, and in those cases, both the film makers and the audience play performative roles where they act out their identity to the audience (Bruzzi, 2012). In examining the never-steady relations of subject, filmmakers and audience in documentary films, the mediated experience that had been brought by People’s Park is interesting in opening up a possibility of seeing a documentary film as a result of interactions between reality-filmmakers-audience, rather than seeing those elements as constantly separated one to another. Departing from this point, People’s Park advocates the mediated experience on the tripartite relations rather than on the narrative (as in Griersonian style of documentaries) or on the performativity of the film maker (as in Michael Moore’s and Nick Broomfield’s works).

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Secondly, on the subject of the honesty of the camera. Is the camera always honest? This sentence most often comes as a matter of conviction rather than a question, asserting the immanent objectivity of the cinematic technical apparatus outdoing the film maker’s personal egotistic claim about their personal and subjective importance as an artist. For me, rather, the camera has their own bias and this is inevitable. In the case of People’s Park, I might be oversensitive but I can sense something in Sniadecki’s camera work that shows this bias. For instance, the camera is reluctant to linger its ‘gaze’ toward adult male subjects who stare back at it, but it is more relaxed in recording females and minors. Even at the pedestrian level, camera ‘has chosen’ their preference in treating reality, let alone in ‘big topics’ such as corporate crimes or genocide. Related to film makers’ venture to produce a sensorial underpinning of a cinematic world, recording as an act and as a product becomes an ethical problem at the first place. This is a topic that I would gladly explore in another occasion (I have been thinking to do this extensively on Joshua Oppenheimer’s The Act of Killing and The Look of Silence).

Eventually, documentary, despite its claim of factual truth, cannot escape its nature in showing life as being narrativized. In the case of People’s Park, the narrative is not separated from the medium; instead, it happens within the medium and its technical apparatus. Hence, the experience of watching the film becomes a mediated one rather than an immersive one.

Works cited

Bruzzi, S. (2012). The performing film-maker and the acting subject, in Winston, B. (2012). Documentary Film Book. London: BFI.

Butler, J. (2015). Notes Toward A Performative Theory of Assembly. Cambridge and London: Harvard University Press.

Cubitt, S. (2002). Digital filming and special effect, in Harries, D. (ed.) (2002). The New Media Book. London: BFI.

Haraway, D. (1991). Simians, Cyborg and Women: The Reinvention of Nature. New York: Routledge.

Nicholls, B. (2010). Introduction to Documentary. Montana: Indiana University Press.

Photos: http://peoplesparkfilm.com/

(Thanks to Hatta B. Sasono for editing this essay)

The Raiding Dutchmen: Colonial Stereotypes, Identity and Islam in Indonesian B-movies

May 29, 2018 Eric SasonoLeave a comment

This paper intends to examine the portrayal of Dutch colonialism in Indonesian B-movies, which were prevalent in Indonesian screens in the 1970s and the 1980s. The portrayal is full of stereotype, in which the Dutch officials, as the colonial authority, are portrayed as “immoral” and unjust Westerners who have insatiable appetite for financial accumulation. This portrayal is always coupled with the depiction of the films’ arch-protagonists as heroes who fight colonialism, and are equipped with religious justification and self-righteousness that enable them to acquire superhuman strength.

The stereotyping of the Dutch in these films should be seen in relation to two main reasons. First, this modern-day stereotype should be seen in postcolonial discourse as an effort to popularize Indonesian national identity. Secondly, it is not a coincidence that the portrayal of Indonesian heroism in the colonial resistance movements is done in conjunction with national and religious (particularly Islamic) identity since there has been an overlap between national and Islamic identity in the development of postcolonial discourse in Indonesia. In the light of examination of popular narratives in Indonesian B-movies, especially the “colonial actions film genre,” this paper will provide insights into the formation of national identity, religious tension, and postcolonial situation.
Keywords: post-colonial, stereotype, Islam and cinema, b-movies, Indonesia, identity formation

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