Introductionby Jennifer Peterson and GraiG UhLin, editors
The West thinks it is the sole possessor of the clever trick that willallowit tokeeponwinning indefinitely,whereas ithasperhapsalreadylosteverything.
—Bruno Latour1
A crisis tends to focus attention on the exigencies of the present moment,andourcurrentenvironmentalcrisisisnoexception.New warnings about the dangers of a warming world pass acrosssocialmediaandnewsheadlines,providingdailyremind-
ersof risingsealevels,desertification,defaunation,extremeweatherevents,andthesocialandpoliticalinstabilitythatcomeswiththem.Collective action must be taken immediately, we say; the time forchangeisnow.Butthereisstilltime,wethink.Thecatastrophemaybearrivingmorequickly,butitremainsdeferreduntilsomelatermo-mentof reckoning.Worseyet,climatechangedenialism,particularlyintheUScontext,cynicallydeclinestotakeactionbecauseitrefusesto acknowledge any underlying problem.Howmuchmore difficultis it to imagine and enact long-term solutions to an ongoing crisiswhen,asof thetimeof writingthisintroduction,theterm“climatechange”remainsscrubbedfromtheofficialpolicydocumentsof theEnvironmentalProtectionAgency?2Likeitornot,though,insofarasweimaginethatenvironmentalcrisisisaproblemforthefuture,weareallindenial.
1 We Have Never Been Modern, trans. Catherine Porter (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1993), 9.
2 Lisa Friedman, “EPA Scrubs a Climate Website of ‘Climate Change,’” New York Times, October 20, 2017; Umair Irfan, “‘Climate Change’ and ‘Global Warming’ Are Disappear-ing from Government Websites,” Vox, January 11, 2018, https://www.vox.com/energy-and-environment/2017/11/9/16619120/trump-administration-removing-climate-change -epa-online-website.
IN FOCUS: Film and Media Studies in the Anthropocene
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Wemightconsideranotherpossibility:thecatastropheisnottocome,butinstead,ithasalreadyhappened.The“businessasusual”crowdlikestoimaginethattechnologywillcometotherescue,thatcapitalismcanbemadecompatiblewitha“green”futureinwhichnaturalresourcesarenotoverexploited,evenif whilewewait,mitigationstrate-giesmaybenecessary.NewYorkCityhasproposederectingseawallstoprotectLowerManhattanfromtheoceanincursionseenduringHurricaneSandy.3 Miami is engaged inanarmsracewithrisingsealevels,utilizingwaterpumpsandelevatedinfrastructuretostaveoffinevitabledisaster.4InAlaska,low-lyingtownsarebeingevacuatedonaccountof meltingpermafrost,producingsomeof thefirstUS“climaterefugees.”5Globally,theproblemisworse,especiallyinlocations—Bangladesh,PacificIslandnations,andSyriaamongthem—withouttheeconomicresourcestodefendagainstchangingconditions.Resilience is theenvironmentalismof wealthynations.Resilience strategiesalsodenythattheproblemof climatechange,asRoyScrantonargues,isnottechnocraticbutphil-osophical:thatis,“understandingthatthiscivilizationisalreadydead.”6Thedifficultyinrecognizingthatthecatastropheisalreadybehindusisthatitrequiresustoreconcilethegeologicaltimescaleof Earthwiththereadilyapparentscaleof humanevents.Ineffect,giventhedelaybetweenanthropogeniccarbonemissionsandtheir impactsontheclimate,bythetimetheconsequencesof ouractionsareevident,itisinsomesensealreadytoolatetocorrectourcourse.Thistemporalgapbetweenpastactionsandtheirsubsequenteffectsallowsfordenialtotakehold,buttothedegreethatwe’veknownallalongaboutourirresponsiblestewardshipof theplanet,denialmorecloselyresemblesdisavowal,arefusaltorecognizetheextenttowhichourfootprintextendsoverEarth. Cinemaandmediastudieshasonlyjustbeguntoconsideritsmediumanewfromtheperspectiveof environmentalcollapse,focusingonnarrativesof Armageddonandclimatechangeinarangeof multiplexfeaturesandecologicaldocumentaries.7 But in
3 Christa Marshall, “Massive Seawall May Be Needed to Keep New York City Dry,” Scientific American, May 5, 2014, https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/massive-seawall-may-be-needed-to-keep-new-york-city-dry.
4 Kevin Loria, “Miami Is Racing against Time to Keep Up with Sea-Level Rise,” Business Insider, April 12, 2018, http://www.businessinsider.com/miami-floods-sea-level-rise-solutions-2018-4; Elizabeth Kolbert, “The Siege of Miami,” New Yorker, December 21 and 28, 2015, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/12/21/the-siege-of-miami.
5 Alan Taylor, “Alaska’s Climate Refugees,” Atlantic, July 7, 2015, https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2015/07 /alaskas-climate-refugees/397862.
6 Roy Scranton, Learning to Die in the Anthropocene: Reflections on the End of a Civilization (San Francisco: City Light Books, 2015), 23.
7 A nonexhaustive list would include Nadia Bozak, The Cinematic Footprint: Lights, Camera, Natural Resources (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2011); Jennifer Fay, Inhospitable World: Cinema in the Time of the Anthropocene (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018); Joseph K. Heumann and Robin L. Murray, Ecology and Popular Film: Cinema on the Edge (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2009); David Ingram, Green Screen: Environmentalism and Hollywood Cinema (Exeter, UK: University of Exeter Press, 2004); Brian Jacobson, “Ex Machina in the Garden,” Film Quarterly 69, no. 4 (Summer 2016): 23–34; Pietari Kääpä and Tommy Gustafsson, Transnational Ecocinema: Film Culture in an Era of Ecological Transformation (Chicago: Intellect, 2013); E. Ann Kaplan, Climate Trauma: Foreseeing the Future in Dystopian Film and Fiction (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2015); Selmin Kara, “Anthropocinema: Cinema in the Age of Mass Extinctions,” in Post-Cinema: Theorizing 21st-Century Film, ed. Shane Denson and Julia Leyda (Falmer, UK: REFRAME Books, 2016); Stephen Rust, Salma Monani, and Sean Cubitt, eds., Ecocinema Theory and Practice (New York: Routledge, 2013); Stephen Rust and Salma Monani, Ecomedia: Key Issues (New York: Routledge, 2016); Nicole Starosielski and Janet Walker, eds., Sustainable Media: Critical Approaches to Media and Environment (New York: Routledge, 2016); Alexa Weik von Mossner, ed., Moving Environments: Affect, Emotion, Ecology, and Film (Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2014); and
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additiontoreshapingourunderstandingof contemporarymedia,theAnthropoceneprovidesanopportunitytoreconceptualizecinemaandmediahistory.Theconceptof anthropogenic climate changedoes not exactly provide a theory of history, butasDipeshChakrabartyhasargued, itpushes the limitsof historicalunderstandingand requires us to think across different time scales.8 Film history occupies only atinymomentintheplanetaryperspectiveof Earth’sgeologicalhistory.However,hu-maninterventionshaveacceleratedatypicallysteadyandslow-movingnaturalhistory,resulting in a new time scale of ecological change that is recent and fast enough for cinematocaptureorimagineit.AsthecontributorstothisInFocussectionvariouslyargue,filmandmediahistoriesareinstrumental—empiricallyandideologically—forregisteringthissymptomaticawarenessof humanity’sdiscernibleimpactontheearth’secosystems.Theessayscollectedherepursuehistoricalavenuesandopenconceptualpathwaystoaddressmediahistory’s“Anthroposcenery,”toborrowatermfromKarlSchoonover’scontribution.Theobjectiveistoexaminethewaysthatfilmandmediahistorieslookdifferentfromtheperspectiveof theAnthropocene,whichdesignatesanewgeologicalepochinwhichhumanactivitiesaresignificantenoughtoaffectplan-etaryecosystems.Parallel toclimatescience’s trackingof thestressesplacedon theenvironmentbyindustrialization,filmandmediatextstraceaculturalhistoryof theAnthropocene,chartingthewaysof livingandthinkingthathaveledtothiscrisis. Theterm“Anthropocene”recognizesthathumanitynowcollectivelyfunctionsasageologicalforce,capableof interveninginabiosphericsystemoncethoughtlargeandstableenoughtosimplyabsorbthewasteproductsof humancivilization.Of increas-ing relevance to the environmental humanities, the term “Anthropocene”was firstpopularizedintheyear2000bychemistPaulCrutzenandecologistEugeneStoermertosuggestthatthepostglacialgeologicalepochof theHolocene,whichcoincidedwiththerapidexpansionof thehumanspecies,hasendedandanewepochhasarrived.9 Scientistsare intheprocessof formallycertifyingtheAnthropocene,overseenbyaworkinggroupof the InternationalCommissiononStratigraphy, and ratificationrequiresaclearmarkerinthestratigraphicrecord,a“goldenspike,”asitcalled.Thestartof theAnthropoceneisoftendatedto1945(seeJenniferFay’scontribution),astheinaugurationof boththenuclearageandtheGreatAcceleration,designatinganexponentialgrowthinobservablestressestoplanetaryecosystemsfromtheeffectsof global capitalism.10Locating the transitionbetween theHoloceneand theAnthro-pocenein1945,atthestartof thepostwareconomicexpansion,makescinemaintoawitnessof aturningpointingeologicaltime,andasaresult,thehistoryof filmandthehistoryof climatebecomeexplicable in termsof oneanother.Otherproposeddates link theAnthropocene to a longer history of industrial capitalism beginning
Paula Willoquet-Maricondi, ed., Framing the World: Explorations in Ecocriticism and Film (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2010).
8 Dipesh Chakrabarty, “The Climate of History: Four Theses,” Critical Inquiry 35, no. 2 (Winter 2009): 197–222; Dipesh Chakrabarty, “Climate and Capital: On Conjoined Histories,” Critical Inquiry 41, no. 1 (Autumn 2014): 1–23.
9 Paul Crutzen and Eugene Stoermer, “‘The Anthropocene,’” Global Change Newsletter, no. 41 (May 2000): 17–18, http://www.igbp.net/download/18.316f18321323470177580001401/1376383088452/NL41.pdf.
10 For more on the Great Acceleration, see J. R. McNeill and Peter Engelke, The Great Accleration: An Environmental History of the Anthropocene since 1945 (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2016).
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withtheinventionof thesteamengineinthe1780s,ortothehistoryof imperialism(measurableinthe1610“Orbisspike”)inwhichcolonialistviolence,massdeath,andcross-culturalcontact interminglingplantandanimalspecies leftdiscernibletraces inthegeologicalrecord(seeKaliSimmons’scontribution).11Regardlessof thechronologythatscientistsultimatelyadopt,culturalhistorianscanmakeuseof theAnthropocene’smultipleonsetdatestofindparallels,patterns,anduncannysynchronicitiesbetweenhumanactionsandecologicalchange.TheAnthropocene,inotherwords,putsanendtoanyseparationof naturalhistoryfromhumanhistory,andif thereisanyrepresenta-tionalmediumthatbestcapturesnaturalenvironmentsmadehuman,itiscinema. TheseInFocusresponsesofferan invitationtodevelophistoriographicalmethodsthatlocateanduncoverthesepointsof intersectioninordertofindnewwaysof tell-ingfilmandmediahistoryintheepochof theAnthropocene.Thismeansremainingattentive to how media forms both perpetuate and critique the ideologies that under-writetheGreatAcceleration.TheAnthropoceneperspectiveonfilmandmediahis-torymightbecomparedtothefamousreverse-zoomcameratechniqueusedinAlfredHitchcock’sVertigo (1958),zoomingintothepast tocloselyanalyzespecificfilmandmediatextswhilesimultaneouslytrackingouttoconsiderhistoricaltimeonageologi-calscale.Thereversezoomof Anthropocenehistoryinvolvesadizzyingconfluenceof humanandnonhumanperspectives.Situatingmediahistoryinitsrelationtogeologi-calhistoryentailsbridginglargelyincommensurabletimescales,butitispreciselythedisorientingperspectiveof theAnthropocene,wherepreviouslyslow-pacedgeologicalandclimatologicaltransformationsappearacceleratedtothescaleof humanaction,thatmakestheseconnectionsapparent.Eachessayinthissectionisolatessitesatwhichthefocalpointsof thelensesof mediahistoryandEarth’sgeohistoryconverge. Theterm“Anthropocene”isatopicof impassioneddebatethathasgeneratedanumber of competing frameworks for characterizing this epoch.By foregroundinghumanityasaunitaryforce(theanthroposof theAnthropocene)collectivelyresponsibleforecologicalcollapse,theAnthropocenearguablyfailstoaccountforthedispropor-tionateresponsibilityattributabletovariousactors.Thecontinuinginequitiesof fossil-fuelcapitalismandimperialismareintegraltohistoricizingnotonlythedifferentialcausesof environmentaldisastersbutalsotheirunevenlydistributedeffects,aseco-nomicallydispossessedpopulationsareleftvulnerabletoachangingclimatewhiletheeconomiesof theGlobalNorthdevelopmitigationstrategies.TheCapitalocene,analternativeframeworktotheAnthropocenemostcommonlyassociatedwithAndreasMalmandJasonW.Moore,emphasizesthecapitalistextractionof valuefromnatureinpursuitof unrestrictedeconomicgrowth.Thisapproachfaultsnothumanityasawholebutindustrialization’sdependenceonthe“freegift”of nature.12DonnaHar-away’sChthuluceneoffersanotheralternativetothe“toobig” frameworksof the
11 See Crutzen and Stoermer, “‘The Anthropocene,’” 17–18; David Biello, “Mass Deaths in Americas Start New CO2 Epoch,” Scientific American, March 11, 2015, https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/mass-deaths-in-americas -start-new-co2-epoch.
12 See Andreas Malm, Fossil Capital: The Rise of Steam Power and the Roots of Global Warming (New York: Verso, 2016); Jason W. Moore, Capitalism in the Web of Life: Ecology and the Accumulation of Capital (New York: Verso, 2015); and Jason W. Moore, ed., Anthropocene or Capitalocene? Nature, History, and the Crisis of Capitalism (Oakland, CA: PM Press, 2016).
AnthropoceneandCapitalocene, forsakingnarratives abouthumanexceptionalismand capitalist accumulation to take up residence among the chthonic beings of the earth.Their tentacular relationsofferamodel for sustainable livingonadamagedplanet.13Theseconceptualinterventionshavemuchtoofferfilmandmediastudies,whichneednotselectamongtheproliferatingterms. Inreturn,filmandmediastudiesisparticularlywellsuitedtounderstandingtheexperience of the Anthropocene because it has long known how to think about naturemadestrangebyhumanintervention.Thenaturalenvironmentsperturbedandreshapedbyhumanity’shandevermorecloselyresembletheartificialenvironmentscreatedbyfilm.Whatusedtobecalledsimplynaturenowseemslikesomethingmorecinematic, an amalgamof thehumanandnonhuman, continually changing andunsettledthroughtheir interaction.Filmandmediahistoriesoffermany lessons forlivingintheAnthropocene,forunderstandinghowwegothereandwhatistocome.✽
13 Donna Haraway, Staying with the Trouble: Making Kin in the Chthulucene (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2016).
Cinema’s Hot Chronology (5:29:21 Mountain War Time, July 16, 1945)by Jennifer fay
I nthehistoryof filmandmediatherearebannerperiodsinwhichtechnology, aesthetics, and politics collide in especially striking ways.IntheUScontext,wecouldrattleoffyears(e.g.,1896,1927,1946)thatexemplifywhatJamesChandler,borrowingfromClaude
Lévi-Strauss,calls“hotchronologies,”datesthatareoverrepresentedin historical accounts relative to both their duration and as compared withotherperiodsthatare“lesseventful.”The“thermometricmeta-phor,”explainsChandler,hasnothingtodowithactualtemperatures.InLévi-Strauss’s anthropology, hot chronologies emergeout of ad-vanced “hot societies,” those “inwhich timemay be said to countandbecounted”intheannalsof worldhistory.Thisisincontrastto“primitive”cultures,whicharesoseeminglyinvariableor“cold”thatthey“lack internal temperaturedeviations”andthereforeappeartohavean“internalenvironment”resistanttoperiodizationandthere-foretoelucidationbyhistory.1
1 James Chandler, England in 1819: The Politics of Literary Culture and the Case of Romantic Historicism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998), 65.
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Thisessayfocusesonahotchronologyof adifferentandperhapsmoreliteralorderthat takes stock of rising temperatures and radioactive fallout and also connects a hot chronologytothefirst-worldhotsocietymostresponsibleforglobalwarming.Yetthischronologyencapsulatesutterly incommensurable scalesof timeand space, sovastandsosmallthatitshouldfalloutsideof what“counts”ashistoryaltogether.Italsoenfoldsfilm,aparticularfilmthathardlyregistersassignificantinthehistoriesof film,intoanexpansivegeologicalpastandanapocalypticendof humaninnovation.Whatarecinema’shotchronologiesintheAnthropoceneepoch?Howcanwe“do”filmandmediahistoryagainstthedeeptimeof ageologicalrecordandplanetaryfuturethatfarexceedhumanity,muchlesscinema?Iproposeonesuchchronologyhereandconsiderthereadingpracticesandaestheticattunementsthatthisinstantsummonsforth.
Two Epochs, One Instant. Thetimestamp5:29:21MountainWarTime,July16,1945, isetched inbothhistoricalmemoryandtheplanet’sgeologicalrecordas theprecisebeginningof twodifferentepochs: thenuclearandtheAnthropocene,eachproducinganewkindof human,adifferentkindof world,andapeculiarrelationshipof humankindtobothhistoryandthefuture.Atthismomentexactly,theAmericanmilitaryandscientificestablishmentdetonatedthemostpowerfulweapontheworldhadknown.TheTrinitynuclear testmarked theonsetof anew, soon-to-be-globalparadigminwhichweaponsof massdestructionwerearealityof twentieth-centurylife.German-Jewish philosopher and antinuclear activistGüntherAnders summedupthemeaningof Trinityin1956whenheremarkedthatthetesthadgivenrisetoanewontologyof thehumanas“cosmicparvenus...usurpersof apocalypse,”whohadnowreplacedthegodlypowerof “creatio ex nihilo”withitsdemonicother,“potestas annhiliationis”or“reductio ad nihil.”2Theconcentrationcamps,heexplained,expandedthe truism that “allmen aremortal” into a new lethal proposition: “Allmen areexterminable.”Butnuclearweaponsinitiated“anewhistoricalepoch”withanevenmoreexpansivecaption:“Mankindasawholeisexterminable.”3 Previous wars had destroyed“‘merely’people,cities,empiresorcultures,”buthumanityinsomeformalwayssurvived.4Nowhumanityandeverythingthatgrantsthespeciesimmortality,itshistoryandarchives,wassubjecttoimmediateandremainderlesserasure.Likemanymidcenturyphilosophers,Andersenvisionsafuturethermonuclearwarsodevastatingthatiterasestimealtogether,catapultingourdeadplanetintoacosmicno-man’s-landandinhumantemporality.“Allhistory[beforeTrinity]isnowreducedtoprehistory.”Inthis,“theLastAge”(“evenif itshouldlastforever”),humanexistenceissummedupintheparadoxof “notyetbeingnon-existing.”Trinitymarksthebeginningof “thepossibilityof self-extinction”that“canneverend,butbytheenditself.”5
2 Günther Anders, “Reflections on the H Bomb,” Dissent 3, no. 2 (Spring 1956): 146–147.
3 Anders, 148.
4 Anders, 147.
5 Anders, 146.
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subsequentnuclearexplosionsintroducedtotheearthartificialradionuclidesthatarenowembedded in theplanet’s sedimentary record,providingauniquelyanthropo-genicsignal.Inthisnewgeologicalepoch,humanactivitiesontheplanet(e.g.,carbonemissions, largedamconstruction,deforestation)haverisen to suchpreponderantlevelsthattheyhaveintermingledwithandalteredtheEarthsystem,settingtheplanetonaclimatologicalcoursebeyondwhatnaturalsciencecanpredict.TheTrinitytestdidnotcausetheAnthropocene,however;itmerelyservesasastratigraphicallyclearmarker.“Wesuggest,”writestheworkinggroup,“thattheAnthropocene...bedefinedtobeginhistoricallyatthemomentof detonationof theTrinityAbomb.”Andtheyspecify:“5:29:21MountainWarTime...July16,1945.”Althoughthedatecouldbemovedupseveralyearsonthebasisof theevidence,“placingthebenchmarkatthefirstnucleartestprovidesaclear,objectivemomentintime.”6
Never has a geological epoch been coordinated with the human calendar and his-tory,muchlesspinpointedtotheexactinstant.Suddenlygeologicaltime,asarchivedinstone,isalignedwiththemicrochronologyof seconds.Sharingthesameinauguralinstant,however,thesetwoepochspositadifferentthesisforhumanityanditsfuture.Fromtheperspectiveof nuclearism,5:29:21istheinstanthumanitybecameitsmostdestructive, capableof instant self-extinction.From theperspectiveof theAnthropo-cene, itmarkshumanityat itsmostunnatural andona trajectory inwhichhumanlifeeraseswhat’sleftof thenaturalworld.Itsohappensthattheonsetof thesetwoepochsisalsoarchivedonfilm.ShouldtheAnthropocenebeofficiallyadoptedandtheJuly1945startdateaccepted,thiswouldalsobeanotherfirstingeologicalandfilmhistory:amoviemarkingtheexacttransitionwhenonegeologicalepochendedandanotherbegan.
Trinity and the Ends of The Anthropocracy. In Trinity 1945 (US Department of Energy,1945),itisdifficulttoperceivethehistoricimportof thisday.7 Shot in color but silent, the twelve-minutefilmopenswitha seriesof panning shots acrossNewMexico’sChihuahuaDesert.Lowmountainpeaksdottedwithyuccaandmesquitebushesdwarf thefewvehiclesparkedalongadistantroadway.Inthehandsof apro-fessionalcinematographer,thiscouldbeanawesomeview:anear-pristinelandscapeabsentsignsof humanresidency.Butthisisnotaprofessionalfilmoranespeciallyart-fulframing.Fromthetremulouspanningshots,asuddencutplacesusatthebaseof atowerwheremenlaboriouslyunloadfromatruck“thegadget”—thetwo-hundred-ton,steel-encasednucleardevice.Keepingadistance(buthardlykeepingsafe!),thecamerarecordstheeffortandtimeneededtomovethispreponderantweapon,armitbyhand(asitwere),andthen,asseenfrombelow,hoistitupthetower.Roughlyeightanda
6 Jan Zalasiewicz, Colin N. Waters, Mark Williams, Anthony D. Barnosky, Alejandro Cearreta, Paul Crutzen, Erle Ellis, Michael A. Ellis, Ian J. Fairchild, et al., “When Did the Anthropocene Begin? A Mid-Twentieth Century Boundary Level Is Stratigraphically Optimal,” Quarternary International 383 (2015): 196–203, 200.
7 The film can be viewed at the Internet Archive, https://archive.org/details/gov.doe.0800001. For a discussion of nuclear test films at the Nevada Test Site, see Susan Courtney, Split Screen Nation: Moving Images of the American West and South (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017), 191–254. For a discussion of nuclear testing as a phenomenon of the Anthropocene, see Jennifer Fay, Inhospitable World: Cinema in the Time of the Anthropocene (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018), 59–96.
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half minutesof thisfilmaredevotedtothesepreparatoryactivities,shotwithwhatappearstobeahandheld16mmcamera,inthespiritof ahomemovie,oreventheLumièrebrothers’Embarquement d’une chaudiére(1896).Withthegadgetstillascendingtheshottowerunderblueskiesandabrightsun,thefilmabruptlygoesblack:havewearrivedattheendof theworld,orjusttheendof thereel? Thedetonationof thedevice,signalingtheonsetof anewdeadlyepoch,ismarkedwhenthescreenflashesfromblacktowhite.Adesertfloorisbarelyvisiblewhenatomiclightoverwhelmsthescreen.Secondslateraglowingmushroomcloudforms;thisiswhatwillbecometheiconic,evencliché,imageof thenuclearage.InTrinity 1945,weseethissamedetonationnotonce,butthreeseparatetimes,eachfromdifferent camera positions,filmingspeeds,andexposurerates.Theexplosivesequenceisbothanupgrade to35mmfilmstockandathrowbacktoearlycinema’sattractionaloverlappingediting,a repetition that at once forecasts a regime of nuclear bombing and testing to come but thatalsoprovidesnoreassuringimmediateafter.Afilmthatbeginswithanimagein whichabitof civilizationisoverwhelmedbynaturalformationsendswithanimageof scienceoverwhelmingandreplacingcreation. Time is both condensed in Trinity 1945(toeliminatethedeadtimeof preparation)andexpanded(torepeatandextendtheportentouslyexterminatingeventof detona-tion).Witheachversion,theexplosionbecomesanincreasinglygroundlessabstractionnegatinganydistinctionbetweenforegroundandbackground.Yettheinstant5:29:21,soessentialtomarkingboththenuclearandAnthropoceneepochs,islosttopercep-tionandtoominuteanddiscrete, too fastandcomplex,at thisdistance, forfilmtorecord.8 Richard Rhodes describes this primordial explosion as a series of invisible “millisecondscale . . .events.”Whatweseeare twoblindingbut shortflashes (tooclosetogethertobedistinguishedassuch)atabout5:30.Theshockfrontof theblast“coolsintovisibility,”andonlythendoesthemushroomcloudrise.Thefireballwesee“isseveralthingsatonce:[a]nisothermalsphereinvisibletotheworld;acoolingwavemovinginwardstowardthatsphere,eatingawayitsradiation;ashockfrontpropagat-ingintoundisturbedair,airthathasnotyetheardthenews.”Keepingtimewithnuclearphysics,“thisisaslowprocess,takingtensof seconds.”9
8 Photographs of the detonation are more exact, but they do not animate the transition from the prenuclear to the nuclear age.
9 Richard Rhodes, The Making of the Atomic Bomb (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1986), 671.
10 Erwin Panofsky, Perspective as Symbolic Form (New York: Zone Books, 1991), 66.
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humanstruggleforcontrol.”11 The appearance of perspective as a technique in art wasthe“signof anendingwhenantiquetheocracycrumbled”andthesignof abegin-ningwhen“modern‘anthropocracy’firstreareditself.”12Perspectiveistheur-opticsof humanism that begins with the superimposition of a grid onto a visible world and the production of an onlooker for whom seeing is tantamount to knowing and con-trollingthevisualfieldasprojectedevenbeyondtheframeandperhapsalsointothefuture.AsPanofskydeclares,“thediscoveryof thevanishingpoint...is,inasense,theconcretesymbolforthediscoveryof theinfiniteitself.”13 In Trinity 1945,thecalculation of thisnewatomicscienceoverwhelmsnotonlythenaturalworldbutalsothevisualtechnologywhoseopticsemergeoutof theanthropocracythatnuclearismthreatenstoerase.Thevanishinginthisfilm—thepointatwhichalandscapeappearstodisappearintoaperspectivelessfulguration—isbothinfrontof theviewerspatiallyandaheadof theviewerchronologicallyasanimagenotof infinitybutof theenditself.Whatwesee not once but three times with the repeated detonation is a forecast of a future war thatforeclosesthepossibilityof anykindof future.
A Catastrophe Barring Catastrophe. As a film documenting the onset of the Anthropocene epoch, however,Trinity 1945 also fails to capture the uniqueness of 5:29:21astheonsetof theageinwhichanthropogenicmaterialsfirstsettledintotheplanet.Thefilmistoofast,tooshort,andtooattunedtotheimmediatevisiblelightpatternstocapturetheradioactivity,ortofollowthemushroomcloud(atitspeak,sixmileshigh)thatwouldformanddriftacrossthecountry,depositingsyntheticelementsonto theearth itpassedover.Thefilm is too short to lingerwith surfaces thatwillhardenintostone.TheseAnthropocenetraces, likethenucleardetonation,arealsonotvisibletoacinematictechnologytooattunedtohumanwaysof seeingtheworld.Andwemustrethinkourinterpretationof theendof thisfilminlightof theGreatAccelerationtocome. Indeed, the oft-reproduced socioeconomicmetrics of theGreat Acceleration,reflectingplanetary“humanenterprise”after1945,aresignsnotof adevastatedorevenwarmongeringhumanity.Instead,thegraphsindicatepostwarconsumerconfi-dence,affluence,andevenpeaceassignaledbytheexponentialriseininternationaltrade, travel,andtelecommunications.14Nuclearmaterialsdonot feature inanyof thesesignificantgraphs,andnoneof theenvironmentalscientistsclaimsthatTrinity oratomic testing caused theGreatAcceleration.The socioeconomic trends signaldisasteronlywhensetagainstchangestothe“Earthsystemtrends”thattheyinad-vertentlyandinaggregatecausetospike:risesinnitrousoxide,methane,andcarbon
11 Panofsky, 67.
12 Panofsky, 72.
13 Panofsky, 57.
14 The metrics include population, real gross domestic product, foreign direct investment, urban population, fertilizer consumption, large dams, water use, paper production, transportation, and telecommunications. See Will Steffen, Wendy Broadgate, Lisa Deutsch, Owen Gaffney, and Cornelia Ludwig, “The Trajectory of the Anthropocene: The Great Acceleration,” Anthropocene Review (2015): 1–18, 4, 6.
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dioxide,nottomentiontropicalforestlossandtheexpansionof domesticatedland.15 The socioeconomictrendshavenotonlyalteredtheplanetbutalsomadeitincreasinglyimprintedbyhumandesignandhostile toHolocene life.From theperspectiveof climate science,timesof warandeconomicdepressionmaybegoodfortheenviron-ment,astheyaregenerallyassociatedwithdepressedbirthrates,checksonconsumerspending,andbansontravel.Periodsof relativepeaceandprosperityarefarmoredamaging.16Comparedwithnuclearism’sdeadends,theAnthropocenepositsapro-liferative humanity, a specieswhose capacity tomake and consumematerials risesexponentiallyafterwar. HistoriansJ.R.McNeillandPeterEngelkestateintheirbookThe Great Acceleration that thepostwar trendsareunsustainable.Thereare,afterall, limitsonhowmuchgroundwatercanbepumped,fossilfuelsburned,marinefishcaptured,andsoforth,andthereareonlysomanymoreriverstodamandtreestofell.Yetastheydeclareintheirintroduction,“TheAnthropocene,barring catastrophe,issettocontinue.”17 The trends of the Great Acceleration will have to decline as a result of diminished re-sources,theynote,buttheAnthropoceneepochitsetsintomotionwill“lastlongintothe future,barring somecalamity that removeshumankind fromthe scene.”18 The Anthropocene,thesehistorianstellus,isacatastrophebarringcatastrophe.Itsimage-worldisnotdevastation,butthepersistentroutinesof everyday,first-world,middle-classlifeandthetransnationalindustriesandmilitaryinfrastructuresthatsupportit. TheTrinity test, from this perspective, is just one of many polluting, resource-intensive,highlyunnaturalactivitiescarriedout in thenameof protecting, if notpromoting,thecultureof theGreatAcceleration.Itisthefirstof 1,054nucleartestscarriedoutby theUSmilitary,andTrinity 1945 is thefirstof several thousandUSfilmstobemadeof suchtests.19Thefilmitself performsthecompulsiontorepeattheexplosion,firstonfilmandthenintheworld. Whatisstunningaboutthishotchronologyisthatthereisanamateurfilmcapturingtheonsetof thesetwoincommensurableepochsonEarth.Asanimageof thenuclearend,Trinity 1945 isafilmaboutanapocalypsebarringapocalypse.Inkeepingwith
15 For this graph, see Steffen et al., “Earth System Trends,” 7.
16 The 2008 global financial market crash, for example, produced a measurable reduction in greenhouse gas emission. See the US Energy Information Administration, Emissions of Greenhouse Gases in the U.S. (US Department of Energy: Washington, DC, 2009), https://www.eia.gov/environment/emissions/ghg_report/index.php.
17 J. R. McNeill and Peter Engelke, The Great Acceleration: An Environmental History of the Anthropocene since 1945 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2014), 5. Italics mine.
18 McNeill and Engelke, 208.
19 Of the 1,054 nuclear tests, 24 were carried out in conjunction with the British military. For a list, see US Depart-ment of Energy, National Nuclear Security Administration Nevada Field Office, United States Nuclear Tests: July 1945 through September 1992 (Oak Ridge: US Department of Energy, 1994), xi. For a discussion of the proliferation of US atomic test films and the secret film studio created to make them, see Kevin Hamilton and Ned O’Gorman, Lookout America: The Secret Hollywood Studio at the Heart of the Cold War (Hanover, NH: Dartmouth College Press, 2018). According to Zalaziewicz and colleagues, in “When Did the Anthropocene Begin?” (196), atomic bombs were detonated “at the average rate of one every 9.6 days from 1945 to 1966.” This statistic com-pares with the equally startling fact that large dams were constructed at a rate of one per day over the past sixty years. See Colin N. Waters, Jan Zalasiewicz, Colin Summerhayes, Anthony D. Barnosky, Clement Poirier, Agnieszka Gałuszka, Alejandro Cearreta, Matt Edgeworth, Erle C. Ellis, Michael Ellis, et al. “The Anthropocene Is Functionally and Stratigraphically Distinct from the Holocene,” Science 351, no. 6269 (2016): 137–147, 141.
“endtimes”critique,nuclearismis theeventafterwhich there isnoafter,andthusthelasteventthatpromisesnorevelationorhopeforredemption.Theonce-knownvisualfieldof theNewMexicodesertsimplyincinerates,andweareleftinthenuclearhazeof nothingness.Byendingwiththeenditself,Trinity 1945 provides this image for apotentialglobalnuclearwarthatwouldendallhumanpotential.Readdifferently,however,Trinity 1945isalsoacatastrophebarringcatastrophe.Therepetitionof theendissuggestiveof whatwouldbecometheongoingregimeof globalatomictesting.Thus,thecatastropheof nuclearism,farfrombringingabouttheendof theAnthro-pocene, projects into a future the almost-daily event of detonation—aneverydaycatastrophe—thatwouldsoonloseallsingularityandassociationwithanyespeciallyhotchronology. ✽
Cinema’s Natural Historyby James Leo CahiLL
I nthenameof recycling,thiscontributionattendstooldfilmthe-oriesandfilmsthatarestrangelyattunedtoalongue durée concep-tualizationof theAnthropocene,orthegeologicalepochinwhichhumans have become a determinant factor in climatological and
ecologicalchangeonaglobalscale.1SelminKarahaswritteninsight-fullyon“anthropocenema”inreferencetoacycleof contemporaryfilmsthatallegorizetheenvironmentaldegradationandacceleratingextinctionof theextremepresentandevenmoreextremefuture.2 In developingnaturalhistory as an anthropocenematic genre, I expand itsfilmhistoricalscopeandshiftemphasisfromataxonomiccategoriza-tionof sharedtextualpropertiestotheconceptualizationof genreasa mode of historical interpretation and perception applicable across arangeof cinematic sources, fromnaturedocumentaries tostudio-producedfictionalnarratives.Thegenericworkof naturalhistoryenablesustorethinkfilmandmediaatthelevelof text,medium,andindustrial practices of expenditure and conservation along historio-graphicalaxesthatoftendisturbandreconfigureourexperiencesof andimplicationinpasts,presents,andpossiblefutures. Naturalhistorycommonlyreferstothestudyof livingorganismsandtheirenvironments,butinthe1920sandearly1930skeysurrealists
1 Paul J. Crutzen and Eugene F. Stoermer, “The Anthropocene,” International Geosphere- Biosphere Programme Global Change Newsletter 41 (May 2000): 17.
2 Selmin Kara, “Anthropocenema: Cinema in the Age of Mass Extinction,” in Post-Cinema: Theorizing 21st Century Film, ed. Shane Denson and Julia Leyda (Sussex, UK: Reframe, 2016), 750–784.
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andcriticaltheorists,includingTheodorW.Adorno,WalterBenjamin,andSiegfriedKracauer (who all followed surrealismwith considerable, if ambivalent, interest),developedparallelpracticesof naturalhistoryasamodeof lookingatandinterpret-ingtheworld’ssigns.3MaxErnst,accordingtoSalvadorDalí,demonstratedthat“thehistoryof dreams,miracles,surrealisthistory,isaboveallandineverysenseanaturalhistory.”4Ernst’ssurrealisthistoryasnaturalhistorywaspreciselyconcernedwiththetraces and signs of extinction and catastrophe of the past as well as their enigmatic addresstothepresent,whichhisworkbroughtintovisibility.In1926theartistpub-lished his folio of frottages (rubbings),Histoire naturelle,whicharthistorianRalphUblconceptualizes as a “ruinwritingof nature andnature’s afterlife.”5 Simultaneouslydocuments and interpretations, Ernst’s frottages discover lost traces of nature inter-mixedwithuncannyculturalsignifiers,suchashisreworkingsof materialfromillustrated prehistoric fauna primers and advertisements. His art gives form to a historicizedvisionof nature thatalsoputshumanhistory intogeological temporalities throughhisattention tocatastrophicevents thatrupture thecyclical temporalitiesof nature(notablyThe Sea and the Rain from Histoire naturelle and his 1933 painting of an inun-datedcontinent,Europe after the Rain).LouisAragon’sPaysan de Paris,alsofrom1926,similarly developed an optic for critically examining twentieth-century commodityculturethroughtheestrangedgazeof anaturalhistorian.Aragonstudiedthe“humanaquariums,” “the cult of the ephemeral,” and “the feeling for nature” inspired bythe living ruins of the Passage de l’Opéra and landscapes of the Parc des Buttes-Chaumont.6Ernst’sandAragon’ssharedfascinationwithbigandsmallprocessesof extinction,throughtheirattentiontodepopulatedlandscapes,outmodedobjects,andtheafterlivesof things,presentedsurrealismasapioneeringpracticeof naturalhistoryforthetwentiethcentury. Benjamindevelopedacomplementaryconceptof naturalhistoryinThe Origin of the German Tragic Drama(1928).7BeatriceHanssenexplainsthatBenjaminused“naturalhistory”todesignate“anotherkindof history;onenolongerpurelyanthropocentricinnatureoranchoredonlyintheconcernsof humansubjects,”andonethatchal-lengedthesystemsof exclusionsoperatinginhumanistmodesof history.8Benjamin’smultifaceted natural history countered the notion of nature as eternal and historyasrationalhumanprogress,byemphasizingforcesof transience,decay,andentropyexemplifiedbyruins,inwhichtheproductsof humanendeavor,nonhumanlife,and
3 See Richard Wolin, “Benjamin, Adorno, Surrealism,” Journal of Comparative Literature and Aesthetics 11, nos. 1–2 (1988): 124–156; Ian Aitken, “Distraction and Redemption: Kracauer, Surrealism and Phenomenology,” Screen 39, no. 2 (1998): 124–140; and Susan H. Gillespie, ed. and trans., The Challenge of Surrealism: The Correspondence of Theodor W. Adorno and Elisabeth Lenk (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2015).
4 Salvador Dalí qtd. in Mikhail Iampolski, The Memory of Tiresias: Intertextuality and Film (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995), 172.
5 Ralph Ubl, Prehistoric Future: Max Ernst and the Return of Painting between the Wars, trans. Elizabeth Tucker (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2013), 75.
6 Louis Aragon, Paysan de Paris, in Œuvres poétiques complètes (Paris: Gallimard, 2007), 1:152, 233.
7 Walter Benjamin, The Origin of the German Tragic Drama, trans. John Osborne (New York: Verso, 2003), 47.
8 Beatrice Hanssen, Walter Benjamin’s Other History: Of Stones, Animals, Human Beings, and Angels (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), 1–2, 10, 25, 48.
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builtandorganicmilieusconverge.9LikeErnstandAragon,hisconceptionof naturalhistoryprivilegedcontingency,chance,andattentiontooutmodedobjectsandresidualpresences,aswellasunexpectedreturns. Adorno,inhis1932lecture“TheIdeaof NaturalHistory,”positednaturalhis-toryasamaterialistalternativetoGermanidealismandthecontemporaryphenom-enologyof Heideggerthatwas,asNicholasBaerwrites,“sensitivetotheconcrete,corporealsufferingbroughtaboutbymaterialconditions.”10 A dialectical mediation of itstwoconstitutiveterms,naturalhistorywas“notasynthesisof naturalandhis-toricalmethods,buta change of perspective.”11 Although Adorno did not cite his former tutorandfriend,SiegfriedKracauermaybereadasprovidingoneof themostlucidaccountsof naturalhistoryasashift inperspectiveandperception,beginningwithhis 1927article “Photography.”12Openingwitha comparisonof twophotographsof youngwomentakensixtyyearsapart—a“demonicdiva”fromthepresentandagrandmotherasayoungwoman—Kracauerreflectedonthehistoriographicalimpli-cationsof photography,developinganatural-historicalmediatheorythroughghosts,garbage,anduncannycreatures.13 As the passage of time or rapid global circulation separates photographic media from their initial contexts of production and recep-tion, thecultural logic thatmaintains theapparentunityof the imageandwhat itdepictsbeginstoerode.Superannuatedphotographsappearincreasinglylikeaspeciesof “homeless images.”14 The coherence of the image becomes perceptible as mere spatialcontiguity,anditscontentsappearascontingentandfragmentary.Initsafter-life,thankstotheanthropologicalindifferenceof thecamera’slens,thelegibilityandcontentof aphotographicdocumentmaybecomeradicallydifferent fromwhat itsinitialuserssawinit.Thegrandmotheroutfittedinaheavycrinolinedressfadesfromthepictureasadistinct individual, andover time she resembles lessaperson thanamannequinuponwhichtodisplaythecuriousfashionsof yesteryear:“[t]hetruthcontentof theoriginalisleftbehindinitshistory;thephotographcapturesonlytheresiduumthathistoryhasdischarged.”Of this“discharge,”Kracauernotes,“photog-raphyappearsasajumblethatconsistspartlyof garbage[Abfällen].”15 The aged or decontextualizedphotographresemblesajunkyard,shipwreck,orhauntedhousein
9 Hanssen, 3; and Benjamin, Origin of the German Tragic Drama, 177–178.
10 Theodor W. Adorno, “The Idea of Natural History,” trans. Bob Hullot-Kentor, Telos: Critical Theory of the Con-temporary 60 (1984): 111–124; and Nicholas Baer, “Natural History: Rethinking the Bergfilm,” in Doch ist das Wirkliche auch vergessen, so ist es darum nicht getilgt: Beiträge zum Werk Siegfried Kracauers, ed. Jörn Ahrens, Paul Fleming, Susanne Martin, and Ulrike Vedder (Wiesbaden: Springer, 2017), 294.
11 Adorno, “Idea of Natural History,” 118. Emphasis added.
12 Siegfried Kracauer, “Photography,” in The Mass Ornament: Weimar Essays, trans. and ed., and with an introduction by, Thomas Y. Levin (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1995), 47–63; and Kracauer, “Die Photographie,” in Das Ornament der Masse: Essays (Frankfurt: Surhkamp, 1977), 21–39.
13 On the natural-historiographic aspects of Kracauer’s media theory, see Jennifer Fay, “Antarctica and Siegfried Kracauer’s Cold Love,” Discourse 33, no. 3 (2011): 291–321; and Miriam Hansen, Cinema and Experience: Sieg-fried Kracauer, Walter Benjamin, and Theodor W. Adorno (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2011), 27–39.
14 Kracauer, “Farewell to the Linden Arcade,” in Mass Ornament, 340; “Abschied von der Lindenpassage,” in Das Ornament der Masse, 330.
which the disintegration of its structures and the growth of new and unexpected forms intermix,presentinganErnst-esque“ruinwriting.” Kracauerimaginedphotographicmediatobesuffusedbyanegativitythatswallowsthegrandmother fromherportrait,producingwhatJenniferFayprovocativelycallsa“significanthole”fromwhichaproductivelyalienated—andevenalien—modeof visionandhistoricalanalysismaybeexercised.16 What we see in old photographs is a“disintegratedunity”inwhichthevariouselementsheldtogetherbyfamiliarityorideologyintheoriginalcontextbecomeestrangedfromeachotherandus,takingonappearancesof an“unredeemedghostlyreality”thatcausesashudder:“[o]ncethegrandmother’s costumehas lost its relationship to the present, itwill no longer befunny;itwillbepeculiar,likeanocean-dwellingoctopus[ein submariner Polyp].”17Kra-cauer’sphrasingtranslates literallyas“anunderseapolyp,”suchasthemicroscopicvariety that takesonaghostly,vampiricappearancewhenmagnifiedby themicro-scopeandcinematographinF.W.Murnau’sNosferatu(1922).Whetherintheformof anoctopusorapolyp,temporalandcontextualdisplacements inviteustoviewtheelementsof aphotographinadifferentlight,asonemightastrangezoologicalspeci-menoranalienlandscape.Inthewordsof Nosferatu’sParacelsianProfessorBulwar,theybecome“ethereal...littlemorethanaphantom.”18 The aspects and referents of aphotographicimage,initsincreasinglyestrangedandestrangingafterlife,begintoresembleuncannycinematiccreatures,castoffs,andcastaways,strangeremaindersthatpossessahauntingpoweralternatelyetherealandobstinatelymaterial. Photographic media render visible the dialectical relationship between nature and history:“Thedisorderof thedetritusreflectedinphotographycannotbeelucidatedmoreclearly than through thesuspension[Aufhebung]of everyhabitual relationshipamongtheelementsof nature.Thecapacitytostiruptheelementsof natureisoneof thepossibilitiesof film.Thispossibilityisrealizedwheneverfilmcombinespartsandsegmentstocreatestrangeconstructs.”19Itisnotjustcostumeandfashionthatphotog-raphycanrevealtobecontingent,butourperceptionsof inhumannature,too,whichnolongerappearasatranshistoricalgiven.Alludingtotheghostlyeffectsof photo-graphsandoldnewsreels,suchasthoseprojectedattheStudiodesUrsulinesinParis,Kracauer’smediaecologyemphasizesthepowerof filmtoanimateandactualizetheproductivenegativityandalienationof photographicimages.Photographssuspend.Kracauer’suseof theHegeliantermAufhebung todescribephotography’s treatmentof therelationsof detritusandmilieusuggestsanabolishingnegation,anovercomingthatisatoncethepreservationandtransformationof whatthecameracaptures.Filmsagitate.Theypotentially “stir up” and set inmotionnew relations amongnature’sheterogeneouselements,particularlythroughthe“strangeconstructs”—thecreative
16 Fay, “Antarctica and Siegfried Kracauer’s Cold Love,” 301.
18 For more on the biological footage in Nosferatu, see, Thierry Lefebvre “Les metamorphoses de Nosferatu,” 1895 29 (1999): 61–77; and Tom Gunning, “To Scan a Ghost: The Ontology of Mediated Vision,” Grey Room 26 (2007): 95–96, 98.
Thedialecticalperspectiveof naturalhistoryintensifieswiththepassageof time.Bylearningtoattendtoit,onemaydevelopsensitivitiestoperceivingthepresentinmannersthatrevealthecontingencyof whatmightotherwisebemistakenforneces-sary, and the fragility of whatmight otherwise be taken for durable and solid.Aneducation in seeing likeanaturalhistorian is oneof theways thatoldfilm theoryandfilmsofferanentrypointintohistoricalaswellasecologicalinquiry.Butwherecinemahistoryrequiresarigorouscontextualizationof theobjectsof study—makingthemcoherenttothepresent—anaturalhistoryof cinemaprescribesasalutarybitof ghostlyahistoricismforconsideringhowthetracesof thepastwereceiveaddressusaspresent.Drawinginspirationfromsurrealisttechnique,onemust,asadialecticalcomplementtorigoroushistoricalresearch(andnotinplaceof it),experimentwiththevalueof strategicdisplacementandrecontextualizationasawayof makingtextandcontextnewlystrangeandresonantwithoneanother.Thisrequiresawillingnesstoshatterwhathasbeenreconstructedinordertoallowitsshardstorefractotherwise. Astheyage,allfilms—documentaryorfiction—becomepotentialnaturalhistoryfilmsintheFrankfurtandsurrealistunderstandingof theterm.Theirenvironmentsbecomeincreasinglylegibleashistoricallycontingentnegotiationsof thecreatedandthefound,of artificialandorganicecosystems,andof collectiveendeavorstomanageorre-createthem.21Naturefilms,intheirhistoricalafterlives,offeradisquietingad-dresstoapresentmarkedbyecologicalprecarity.Theybecomemorevisiblyhuman,cultural,andexpressiveof thefilmmakers’ fantasiesaboutanimals,milieu,and theworldbeyondthehumanbeing, takingontheappearanceof ecologicalruins—butalso ruins of a mentalitéregardinganimalsandecosystems—astheiroriginalreferentsretreat,becomecriticallyendangered,anddisappear.Fictionalfilmslikewiseaccrueanincreasinglydocumentaryvalueandincreasinglyresemblefilmsof astrangenature.Inturningagazetrainedbycinematicnaturalhistorybackonitsobject,onemayalsocontributetothewritingof anaturalhistoryof cinema,consideringitsdocumentsasspeciesof conservationimageandexpenditureimage(sometimesbothatonce),anditsmyriadconfigurationsof production,distribution,andexhibitionasparticipatinginortransformingwhatJulioGarcíaEspinosa,inthecontextof ananticapitalist“imperfectcinema,”called“thecultureof waste.”22
Theworkof oldfilmsandfilmtheoriesviewedthroughanaturalhistorian’sgazeisfarfromover:itsmostpressingethicalandpoliticalimplicationsmaybestilltocome.Wemust learn to seeourown troubledpresentwith theeyesof naturalhistorians,whichisalsotosay,throughasurrealistoptic.Thismayofferanewwayofhandlingfilmicsources.Butitmayalsobecomeastrategyof survivalinanerainwhichthe
20 Jean Painleve, “Drame neo-zoologique,” Surréalisme 1 (1924): 12.
21 See Brian R. Jacobson, Studios before the System (New York: Columbia University Press, 2015), 24; and Jennifer Fay, Inhospitable World: Cinema in the Time of the Anthropocene (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018).
22 Julio García Espinosa, “Meditations on Imperfect Cinema . . . Fifteen Years Later,” Screen 26, nos. 3–4 (1985): 94. See also Nadia Bozak, The Cinematic Footprint: Lights, Camera, Natural Resources (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2012).
transformations of milieus, ecosystems, and the planet trigger increasingly surrealevents,andinwhichthehellishwastelandsof theComtedeLautréamont’sLes chants de Maldororbecomeprophetic,orworse,merelydescriptive.23 ✽
23 Comte de Lautreamont, Les chants de Maldoror, ed. Daniel Oster (Paris: Presses de la Renaissance, 1977); see also Eugene Thacker’s discussion of Lautreamont in Tentacles Longer than Night, Horror of Philosophy, vol. 3 (Washington, DC: Zero Books, 2015).
The Anthropocene’s Nonindifferent Natureby GraiG UhLin
W ritingof hisarrivalbyshipinNewYorkinNonindifferent Nature,Soviet filmmaker SergeiEisenstein expresses admiration fortheverticalupliftof theManhattanskylineasitappearsoverthehorizon.Theskyscrapersseemtohim“likerocketmissile
explosionsfrozeninflight,”whichdramaticallycapturethe“technical and material becoming”of Americanindustrialprowess.1 The propulsive characterof thecity,nottobelimitedtotheseterrestrialheights,“takesairplanesandhurls theminto thesky toconquer thestratosphere,”as thebluesky“trembles”before this technologicalencroachment.On encountering this sight of skyscrapers coming into view,Eisen-steinnotesthatonefeels“thattheearthisasphere,”astheapparentlylinearhorizonreveals itscurvature.2Onemightnote thatplanetaryboundariesareencounteredhereinovercomingthem,inthelibera-tionfrombeingearthbound.Themodernenvironmentalistmovementutilizedimagesof thewholeearth,asseenfromouterspace,asvisualreminders of the finiteness of the planet’s resources, but inEisen-stein’s anecdote,natural constraints ariseonly tobebreached.Thisshift in attitude toward natural limits captures how remote the modern-istcelebrationof masteryovernature is fromthepressingconcernsof ourcurrentenvironmentalcrisis.TheAnthropocenehasdispelledtheseillusionsof mastery.Industrialsocietyhasaccumulateddebtby
1 Sergei Eisenstein, Nonindifferent Nature, trans. Herbert Marshall (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1987), 379 (original emphasis).
2 Eisenstein, 379.
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exploitingnatureessentially for free,and thisdebt is comingdue;asBrunoLatournotesof thisnewepoch,“thetoneisnolongertriumphal.”3
TheAnthropoceneposesachallengetothemodernistproject,andinthisresponse,I consider what relevance modernist film aesthetics—and specifically, Eisenstein’sconcept of “nonindifferentnature”—mayhave for our current environmental pre-dicament.ForLatour,theAnthropocenerepresentsnolessthan“analternativetotheverynotionsof ‘Modern’and‘modernity.’”4Proponentsof ecologicalmodernizationcontinue to claim that capitalismcanbemadeenvironmentally sound through thedevelopmentof “green”technologiesandsustainableenergyproduction,butitisnotpossibletoliberatethecontinualdemandforeconomicgrowthfromitsconstraintbynaturallimits.5WhateconomistscalltheJevonsparadoxillustratesthepoint:increas-ingtheenergyefficiencyof aresourceonlyacceleratestherateof itsconsumption,cancelingouttheefficiencygainsasitsuseisscaledup.6Despitepersistentadvocacyforgeoengineering,anarticleof faithamongso-calledecomodernists,thereislikelynotechnocraticsolutionforourenvironmentalcrisis.7
Moreover,aestheticmodernismhasnottraditionallybeenasourceforecologicalthinking.Themodernist arts provided cultural responses to industrialization andurbanization,ofteninacelebratorykey,andgenerallydidnotdemonstratesignificantawarenessof theenvironmentalissuesof theirday,includingthreatstobiodiversity,industrialpollution,andwildernessconservation.Modernistevocationsof thepastoraltendedtodramatizeitsdisruptionandtransformationbymodernizingforces,asforexample Eisenstein did with the veneration of the tractor in The General Line,his1929filmaboutagriculturalcollectivization. Recentstudiesof artisticandliterarymodernism,however,arereconsideringtheirrelationshiptoenvironmentalhistories.Inliterarystudies,JoshuaSchusterconsidersAmericanmodernism’sambivalentresponsetoenvironmentalism,its“fail[ure]tofullyunderstandmodernization” for the stresses industrializationplacesonnaturalenvi-ronments.8Situatedbetweenromanticismandmodernenvironmentalism,modernistwritersmaintaineddistancefromnineteenth-centuryideasof natureasself-regenerating plenitude,andasSchusternotes, its representationsof nature tended toward ironyandartifice.Evenif its lackof environmentalistawarenessmeans“modernismwasneververygreen,”Schusterargues thatmodernist aestheticsnonetheless registeredand engaged aspects of ecological change.9 Similarly, BonnieKime Scott’s earlier
3 Bruno Latour, Facing Gaia: Eight Lectures on the New Climatic Regime, trans. Catherine Porter (Medford, MA: Polity Press, 2017), 115.
4 Latour, 77.
5 See, e.g., David Keith, A Case for Climate Engineering (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2013).
6 For a critique of ecological modernization, see John Bellamy Foster, Brett Clark, and Richard York, The Ecological Rift: Capitalism’s War on the Earth (New York: Monthly Review Press, 2010), esp. 121–150.
7 See, e.g., Arthur Mol, Globalization and Environmental Reform: The Ecological Modernization of the Global Economy (Boston: MIT Press, 2003); and Arthur Mol, David A. Sonnenfeld, and Gert Spaargaren, eds., The Ecological Modernisation Reader: Environmental Reform in Theory and Practice (New York: Routledge, 2009).
8 Joshua Schuster, The Ecology of Modernism: American Environments and Avant-Garde Poetics (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2015), 3.
9 Schuster, 3.
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studyof VirginiaWoolf gesturestoanecocriticalreadingbycallingfora“greeningof modernism”thatwouldattendtotheoften-overlookedroleof nature’spresenceinmodernistliterature.10Informedbyecofeministtheory,ScottcontrastsWoolf ’sholisticunderstanding of nature to the masculine privileging of culture found in traditional historiesof modernism. In film andmedia studies, emphasis has been placed on cinema’s participationinmodernity’s technological control of nature through the production of climate-controlledenvironments.BrianJacobson,forinstance,tracestheuseof studioarchi-tecturetofreeearlycinemafromitsdependenceonnaturalelements,suchasavailablesunlight.Theearlieststudios,suchasThomasEdison’sBlackMaria,provided“atech-nologicalformof environmentalregulation”thatcraftedartificialspacessuitableforphotographicreproduction.11Environmentalcontrolisalsothebasisforthe“modern-istweather”of BusterKeaton’s slapstick comedies, as arguedby JenniferFay.Themanufacture of weather in Sherlock Jr.(1924)foregroundsitsartificialityratherthanfunctioningasanaturalgiven:“Allwindandrain,sunandcalmneedtobereadasspecificallyproduced.”12
Astheseexamplessuggest,modernistaestheticscanactinserviceof theprinciplesof modernecologyinthatbothcallattentiontobackgroundconditions.Ecologydis-penses with the notion of nature as a transcendental value and instead develops tech-niquesforvisualizinghowanyecosystemdependsontheactiveregulationbetweenan inside andoutside, on thebalancebetween inputs andoutputs across a porousboundary.Astaticandunchangingnaturalworldisreimaginedasasetof dynamicprocesses and interactions that are as capable of degeneration and loss as of growth andevolutionarydevelopment.Themodernistartworksimilarlyoffersacritiqueof representational transparency to disclose the conditions that frame the representa-tion—bydisrupting,forexample,thehierarchybetweenfigureandground.Schusterpointstothequadrat,aspioneeredbyecologistFredericClements,asonesuchdevicethatoffersabridgebetweenmodernecologyandmodernistaesthetics.Thequadratisaone-metersquareusedtostudyenvironmentalchangewithinadesignatedland-scape.Asa“universalminimalecologicalobject,”thequadratuntetheredtheobser-vationof naturefromahumanistframeof reference,asitsemptiedsquareenactsamodernistreflexivitybyfunctioningasboth“asiteforobservationandforreflectingonhowobservationworks.”13Onemightthinkof Eisenstein’s“dynamicsquare”asacinematicversionof an“ecograph”—aninstrumentfornaturalobservation,likethequadrat—because itsmanipulationof aspect ratiodenaturalizes themechanismof observation.Justasthequadratstagesthedynamismof environmentalchangefromwithinaconsistentframe,Eisensteinconsidersthedynamicsquareasanoptimalform
10 Bonnie Kime Scott, In the Hollow of the Wave: Virginia Woolf and Modernist Uses of Nature (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2012), 13.
11 Brian R. Jacobson, Studios before the System: Architecture, Technology, and the Emergence of Cinematic Space (New York: Columbia University Press, 2015), 19.
thatencompasses“everygeometricallyconceivableformof thepicturelimit.”14 For Eisenstein,theequalityof heightandwidthinthesquareimageoffersthedynamicinterplayof theverticalandhorizontaltendenciesinherenttobothnatureandindus-try,presentingthegroundfortheirmutualencounter. These interventionspoint to thepossibility thatmodernistfilmaesthetics,ratherthanbeingwhollydefinedbywhatLatourcalls the“modernconstitution”and theseparationof natureandculture,mayprovidesomeanticipatorysenseof theAnthro-pocene,orevenamodeof visualizingtheentanglementof humanityandnature.15 In lightof thispossibility,IturntoEisenstein’sconceptof nonindifferentnature.Bytheterm,Eisensteinmeantanartworkthatprovides“animageof themutualabsorptionof manandnatureoneintotheother,”adissolutionof theindividualintotheenviron-mentthroughasensationof theirunderlyingunity.16Itssimplestform,heremarked,stemmedfromtheuseof landscapeinsilentfilm,becauselandscapecouldreplicatemusic’sabilitytoconveyemotionalmoods.Itsmorematureform,asaudiovisualcin-ematography,encompasseswhatEisensteinreferstoastheentireplasticconstructionof thefilm.Inproducinganexperienceof pathos,moreover,nonindifferentnature entails“theapparentremovalof thecontradictionbetweennatureandtheindividual.”17 Theterm“nonindifferent”(inRussian,neravnodushnaia),throughitsparticularconjunc-tionof thenegativeprefixtothestemword,capturesEisenstein’sunderstandingof nonhumannatureasdynamicandanimated,matterenlivenedbyspirit.Eisensteinisnotsuggestingtheprojectionof psychologicalstatesontothenaturalworld,norishepsychologizingnatureitself asanentitythatcaresabouthumanity.Rather,nature’snonindifference,asexpressedthroughtheecstaticformof theartwork,describesitsdevelopmentalandevolutionarycharacter.Asmorethanmereinertmatter,organicnatureresistsstaticform.Inadialecticalmanner,formcontainsandprovisionallyuni-fiesthedynamicforcesof naturalgrowth,justasthoseformsinturnarecontinuallyovercomeorbreachedbythevitalityof thoseforces.Eisensteincontrastshisconcepttonaturalism:art isnotnatureviewed througha temperament,but“temperamentburstingthroughnature.”18Nonindifferentnatureoperatesbybreakingapartconven-tionalform,amodernistdeformationof thedepictedspace,suchthattheelementswithinitlosetheirsolidityandinterpenetrateoneanother.Inthisecstaticexplosionof form,relationsbetweenforegroundandbackground,proximityanddistance,areoverturned.Thedisorientingeffectof thesedisruptionsistoimplicatetheviewerinthe“universal feeling”producedby the image.Theex-static formof nature’snon-indifferenceproducesacorresponding“ecstasy” in the spectator,and facilitates themutualattunementof eachtotheother.
14 Sergei Eisenstein, “The Dynamic Square,” in S. M. Eisenstein: Selected Works, vol. 1: Writings, 1922–34, ed. and trans. Richard Taylor (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988), 206–218, 209.
15 Bruno Latour, We Have Never Been Modern, trans. Catherine Porter (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1993), 13–15.
16 Eisenstein, Nonindifferent Nature, 359.
17 Eisenstein, 358.
18 Eisenstein, 360.
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Tobe sure,Eisenstein’s concept is in part a neo-Romantic sentiment of “affec-tivesolidaritywiththelandscape,”asSchustercharacterizestheassumptionsof thatnineteenth-centurymovement.19Nonetheless,Eisensteindrewoncontemporaneousideasaboutnature that recognize itshistoricaldimensionandprovide someof thefoundations for the environmental sciences that would generate the concept of the Anthropocene.FrederickEngels’sThe Dialectics of Nature,whichappearedinRussiantranslationin1925, isonesourceof influence.20Inthatunfinishedwork,Engelsextendedtheprinciplesof dialecticalmaterialismbeyondthescopeof humanhistorybyapplyingthemtothephysicallawsof nature,rejectinganunderstandingof natureasstaticandimmutable.Importantly,forEngelstheorganismisanagentinitsownevolutionary development, asmuch adapting its environment to its own compara-tiveadvantageasbeingshapedbythatenvironment.Alsoappearingatthistime,in1926,RussiangeochemistVladimirVernadsky’sThe Biosphereprovidedoneof thefirstscientificaccountsof Earthasaself-containedspherefortheregulationof thepres-enceof life.AnticipatingtheGaiahypothesisof JamesLovelockandLynnMargulis,Vernadskyclaimedthattheenvelopeof livingmatter,thebiosphere,istheessentialagentintheconversionof solarenergyintoactivechemicalprocessesonearth.21 The biosphereisadynamicsystem,a“harmoniousintegrationof parts,”inwhichorganiclifeactsasageologicalforceintegraltothemaintenanceof thesystem,ratherthan“an external or accidental phenomenon of the Earth’s crust.”22
TheAnthropocene retains this image of Earth as an ecosystemof interlockingelements, including theactive contributionof livingmatter,but its version isnotaharmoniousone.Fromtheperspectiveof theAnthropocene,whereveronelooksin“nature”—a term that, in its separation from culture, is increasingly an obstacleto theorizing—onefinds thedisturbances andperturbationsof humanity’s actions.Earth,inotherwords,registersourtouchandrespondstoourinterventions.Itis,asEisenstein says, “nonindifferent” to our actions. ForLatour, this iswhatmakes theAnthropoceneachallengetothemodernconstitution’snature-culturedivide,asitmobilizesandactivatesanEarthpreviouslyconceivedof as“deanimated,”as inertmatterlackingtheagencyascribedtohumansubjects.ThisdeanimatedEarth,Latournotes,hasmovementbutnotbehavior:itmovesbutisnotmoved,exhibitingsensitiv-ity.TheEarthof theAnthropoceneisdifferent,heargues.Nolongerthestable,un-changingbackgroundtohumanaction,oraself-regulatingspherecapableof simplyabsorbing the shocks to its system, this animatedEarth is instead“anactive, local,limited, sensitive, fragile, trembling, and easily irritated envelope.”23My interest inEisenstein’sconceptof nonindifferentnature—asamodeof artisticcreationthatren-dersactivewhatwasotherwisemerebackground,thatenlivensnaturalformswithout
19 Schuster, Ecology of Modernism, 11.
20 Frederick Engels, The Dialectics of Nature (New York: International Publishers, 1940).
21 James Lovelock and Lynn Margulis, “Atmospheric Homeostasis by and for the Biosphere: The Gaia Hypothesis,” Tellus 26, nos. 1–2 (1974): 2–10.
22 Vladimir Vernadsky, The Biosphere (New York: Copernicus, 1998), 39, 58. Emphasis in original.
necessarilyanthropomorphizingthem—isasamodeof visualizingtheresponsivenessof theEarthtoourimpacts. ArthasasignificantroletoplayintheAnthropocene.WhatmodernistfilmaestheticsmightoffertotheAnthropoceneisanantihumanistmeansof imaginingenvironmentsandof registeringoureffectsonthem.ForEisenstein,thereconciliationof humanityandnaturethroughtheconstructionof pathospresents idealizedimagesfreeof con-tradiction,butevenastheyappearasharmonious,theirutility,heargues,isthat“theyincandescethestrivinginherentinthepeopletocreateasimilarharmonyintheactualrealityof theirsocialexistenceandenvironment.”24ButEisensteinisultimatelyanam-bivalentfigurefortheAnthropocene,asforhim,likeothermodernists,naturerequiresthecreativeproductivityof thehumansubjecttoactivateitselementsandtounleashitscapacities.Eisensteinretainsthetriumphalismof humanity’stechnologicalmasteryovernature.If thehubrisof modernitywasthatittriedtoliberateitself fromnaturallimits,then what we are called to do in the Anthropocene is to make ourselves aware of when thoselimitspushbackorretroact.Latourcallsthisdeveloping“sensitivity”—feelingthefeedbacksof one’sownactions.DonnaHarawaysuggests“cultivatingresponse-ability,”whichentailsavoidingan“unprecedentedlookingaway”or“ordinarythoughtlessness”by concerning oneself with themessy entanglements of our troubled present.25 For Eisenstein,artisa“seismograph,”aremotesensingof theearth,anattunementbetweenhumanityanditsenvironment,andcantherebyregisterthegeologicalorclimatologicalforcesthatmightotherwiseexceedournarrowperceptualandsensorygrasp.26 ✽
24 Eisenstein, Nonindifferent Nature, 369.
25 Donna J. Haraway, Staying with the Trouble: Making Kin in the Chthulucene (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2016), 35–36.
26 Eisenstein, Nonindifferent Nature, 289.
T heAnthropoceneisaconceptthatrevealsmonsters.Amongitsmanyhorrorsisthecatastrophicrealizationthatclimatechangeis an unintended consequenceof industrialization.Anotherhorrorisits unpredictable time frame,withtraumaticbackstoriesandimpend-
ingdeadlineslurchinginandoutof view.Thenthereisthedreadof uneven suffering:theterribleknowledgethat,whileeveryonewillbeaf-fected,thoseharmedfirstandworstarenotthehumanswhoaremostresponsible for creating this condition.These aremonsters of such
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vastproportionswecanhardlycomprehendthem,andwewouldnotbeoffbasein observingthatsomeof theirqualitiesarecinematic.Indeed,althoughtheAnthropo-ceneismorethanaspectacle,asadiscourseitbearsstructuralandaffectiveresemblancetobothhorrorandmelodrama.AsIarguehere,wecanevenfindtracesof theAnthro-poceneintheHollywoodmusical.TheAnthropoceneisakindof narrativestructure:fromitsperspective,weunderstandthathumanstoriesarenotautonomousbutboundupwiththehistoryof earthandtheenvironment.Fromthisperspective,anthropocen-trismisknockedonitsside,andsetting(orhabitat)becomesnewlyprominent. Itisthecontentionof thisshortessaythatfilmhistorycanhelpusunpacktheideaof nature as it developed in theAnthropocene epoch.How has cinema produced“nature”?Notjustinstoriesaboutnaturebutinitsmostbasiccharacteristicof ren-deringtheworld,cinemaconstructsasenseof theenvironment.Filmssetoutdoors,particularlythosestagedinwilderness,frontier,orruralsettings,havedefinedarangeof possibilityfor imaginingthenaturalenvironment.Eachfilm’sdiegeticworldcanbe thoughtof as adramatic ecosystem,andfilmcanbe consideredamachine forenvisioningaseriesof ecosystems.Itiswellknownbynowthatnaturedoesnotstandoutsideof history.Whatweunderstandasnature—adenselysignifyingwordthatcon-ventionallyreferstothenonhumanrealmof plants,animals,mountains,oceans,stars,space—hasbeendisplacedfromitsonce-securedefinitionaspurematerial(subjecttoanalysisbyscience)andhascometobeunderstoodasacategorythatisbothmaterialandaproductof culture,orwhatBrunoLatourcalls “nature-culture”andDonnaHaraway refers to as “natureculture.”1 It has become a task of the environmental humanitiestodestabilizethiscombine. Intracingthehistoryof naturevisualizedonfilm,wecanobservehowconventionalideas about nature changed across the twentieth century.Although a clear break isnotdiscernible,onemeasurablechangeistheshiftbetweennaturerenderedaseternaltonaturerenderedassomethingendangered.SciencehistoriansFernandoVidalandNéliaDiascallthisthe“endangermentsensibility,”whichisa“particularlyacute”wayof understandingtheworldthroughanattitudeattunedtopreservation,loss,anddis-appearance.2Theendangermentsensibilitycanbetracedthroughthehistoryof filmstyle, specificallyby focusingon thehistoryof mise-en-scène.Following the leadof climatescientists,wecanbegintomeasurehowthevisualizationof nonhumannatureshiftedfrometernaltoendangeredduringtheGreatAccelerationafterWorldWarII.3
The Scenography of Nature. Generallyspeaking,wecanidentifytwobroadten-denciesintherepresentationof natureinfilmhistory:theanalogicalandtheartificial.Thesetendenciescorrespondroughlytofilmsshotonlocationversusfilmsshotona(sound)stage,althoughtherelationshipbetweenrealisticnatureandartificialnatureis
1 Bruno Latour, We Have Never Been Modern, trans. Catherine Porter (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1993), 7; Donna Haraway, Companion Species Manifesto: Dogs, People, and Significant Otherness (Chicago: Prickly Paradigm Press, 2003).
2 Fernando Vidal and Nelia Dias, “Introduction: The Endangerment Sensibility,” in Endangerment, Biodiversity, and Culture, ed. Fernando Vidal and Nelia Dias (New York: Routledge, 2016), 2.
3 J. R. McNeill and Peter Engelke, The Great Acceleration: An Environmental History of the Anthropocene since 1945 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2016).
Shootingonlocationisafundamentalcinematicstrategyforcreatingthesenseof aconcrete,objectiveworldof landscapes,bodiesof water,vegetation,andsoforth(aswellascities,streets,andthebuiltenvironment),andthehistoryof thispracticecanbetracedtotheemergenceof cinemainthe1890s.5 Alongside location shoot-ing, though, there isaparallelhistoryof artificial renderingsof natureon studiosets,whichwemightcallthetraditionof stagednature.6 Cinematic renderings of artificialnatureare indebtedto thehistoricalpracticeof representingwoodlands,rivers, andmountains on theatrical stages, and the entire tradition leans heavilyonartisticandtechnologicaltools.7 Although critics and audiences alike have long praisedtheanalogicalorrealist tradition for itsfidelity tonature, the traditionof artificialnaturehasbeenmuchmaligned.The timehas come tohistoricizebothcinematictraditions.Byanalyzingthescenographyof nature—orecodiegesis—Iamnotinterestedinthewaysinwhichafilm’ssettingbecomeslikeacharacter;infact,Imeanquitetheopposite.Ecodiegesisisnotnatureinananthropomorphizedform;rather,itistherenderingof anenvironmentorhabitat,usuallyasabackdropforahumandrama(butnotalways—sometimesthecharactersareanimals).Thestageof nature is the place where the nonhuman material that constitutes the environment is envisionedasacinematicecosystem. OftenintheclassicalHollywoodera,thesetwotendencieswereusedtogetherinthesamefilm.Take, forexample, themoment inDuel in the Sun (KingVidor,1947)whenJesseMcCanles( JosephCotton)drivesPearlChavez( JenniferJones)uptohisfamilyranch,andthefilmshiftsbetweenlongshotsfilmedinArizonaandclose-upsfilmedinthestudio.Thespatialdisjunctionishighlynoticeable,whichcontributestothefilm’sheightenedmelodrama.LauraMulveyhasdescribedthetechniqueof rearprojectionascinema’s“clumsysublime.”Mulveywritesthat“theimageof acinematicsublimedependsonamechanism that is fascinatingbecauseof, not in spite of, itsclumsyvisibility.”8The“clumsiness”of theseeffects—aresultof availabletechnology,stylistic convention, and budgetary constraints—calls attention to the rendering of naturethroughartificialmeans.Moreimportant,theartificialnaturetradition(whose
4 Timothy Morton, Ecology without Nature: Rethinking Environmental Aesthetics (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007), 31–36. Tobias Boes and Kate Marshall have also used the term “ecodiegesis” in their essay “Writing the Anthropocene: An Introduction,” Minnesota Review 83 (2014): 64.
5 See Jennifer Peterson, “The Silent Screen, 1895–1927,” in Hollywood on Location: An Industry History, ed. Joshua Gleich and Lawrence Webb (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2019).
6 For an ecologically attuned history of early film studios, see Brian R. Jacobson, Studios before the System: Architecture, Technology, and the Emergence of Cinematic Space (New York: Columbia University Press, 2015).
7 John Earl, “Landscape in the Theatre: Historical Perspectives,” Landscape Research 16, no. 1 (1991): 21–29. Cinematic conventions of artificial nature can also be traced to nineteenth-century landscape painting, panoramas, and dioramas.
8 Laura Mulvey, “A Clumsy Sublime,” Film Quarterly 60, no. 3 (Spring 2007): 3.
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techniquesincludemorethanrearprojection)wasnotalwaysclumsybutcouldalsoproduceself-consciouseffects. AndréBazin famously describes cinema’s essence as “a dramaturgy of nature”inhis1951essay“TheaterandCinema—PartTwo.”9AlthoughBazinexpresseshisdisapprovalof whathecalls“filmedtheater,”proclaimingThe Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (RobertWiene,1920)andDie Nibelungen(FritzLang,1925)failures,hiscomplexun-derstandingof the“scenicessence”of drama(whethertheatricalorcinematic)islessabout the relative naturalism of a decor and more about the handling of setting and itseffectonthespectator.BazinpraisesGrandGuignolplays,forexample,forpro-ducinginthespectator“self-awarenessattheheightof illusion,creat[ing]akindof privatefootlights.”10Whileanexplorationof Bazin’sideasaboutnatureandcinemaliesbeyondthescopeof thisbrief essay,hisnotionof the“dramaturgyof nature”canhelpusunderstand thatahistoricizationof cinematicnature in thecontextof an-thropogenicclimatechangeneednotfocusonthehumandrama,butshouldlookforplaceswherethehumandramaissubordinatedtothesetting.IamendBazin’sformu-lationslightlybyusingtheterm“scenography”(whichcanbedefinedas“thetotalityof visualcreationinthestagespace”),whichiscloselyrelatedto,butdistinctfrom,thetheatricalconceptof dramaturgy(whichrefersmorebroadlytothedramaticshape
9 Andre Bazin, “Theater and Cinema—Part Two,” in What Is Cinema?, trans. Hugh Gray (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967), 1:110.
10 Bazin, “Theater and Cinema—Part Two,” 113.
Figure 1. Set reference still, Brigadoon (Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, 1954). From the collections of the Margaret Herrick Library, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
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of aperformedstory).11TherearemanyplacesinwhichtotracetheAnthropocene’smarkersinfilm(includingnotonlyinlocationshootingbutalsoinnaturedocumenta-ries),butmydiscussionhereoffersabrief considerationof theforegroundedartificialityof cinema’stheatricalizednature.
Brigadoon, an Anthropocene Musical. Oneof the last andmost fabulous of Hollywood’sstagednaturesetscanbefoundinVincenteMinnelli’s1954MGMmusicalBrigadoon.WhatcouldbemoreunnaturalthantheScottishHighlandsre-createdentirelyonMGM’svastsoundstagesinCulverCity?Andyetwhatcouldbeamorestrangelyevocative exploration of the postwar predicament of human dwelling on the planet than Brigadoon?It is through its scenographythat thisFreedUnitmusicalpresentsavisionof postwarartificialnatureatitsheight,asshowninFigure1.Brigadoon constructs an entirelyartificialnaturalworldthatresidesoutsideof historicaltime,aplacetowhichwemightliketoescape,butaplacealwaysendangeredbythethreatof suddenannihilation. Brigadoon beginswith amagnificent two-minute sequenceof trackingand craneshotsthatluxuriatesinthefilm’sset.Mise-en-scèneisforegroundedthroughtheuseof numeroustheatricaldevices:mistsblowgentlythroughtheset,birdsflyacrossit,water tricklesunderthebridge,andstagelightsglideacrossittoindicatedawn.Thetwo humancharacterswhoappearbrieflyhereareancillarytothesetting.Notuntilwehavebeenthoroughlyacquaintedwiththefilm’sdiorama-likelandscapedoesthenarrativebegin. Thefilm’splotconcernstwojadedexecutivesfrom1954NewYork(Tommy,playedbyGeneKelly,andJeff,playedbyVanDouglas)whogetlostinthewildernesswhileonahuntingtripinScotland.Stumblingthroughthemist,theycomeuponaremotevillage calledBrigadoon,whichmagically appears for a single day once every onehundredyears.Twentieth-centuryTommyfallsinlovewitheighteenth-centuryFiona(CydCharisse)astheygatherheatheronthehill.Tommylearnsthetown’ssecret:aspellwascastsothatBrigadoonwouldremainuncorruptedbytheoutsideworld,leav-ingthevillagestuckinthe(pre-Anthropocene)year1754—onlytwodayshavepassedsince the “miracle” happened.The catch is that nobody can leave: if any villagercrossesbeyond itsboundaries,Brigadoonwillvanish forever.Tommycan staywithFiona,buthewillhavetoleavehisworldandshifttoBrigadoon’stime.Despiteseveralromanticdancenumbersandaprofessionof love,Tommyreluctantly leavesFionaandreturns toManhattan.Urbanmodernityoffersnoescape,however,asTommyandJeffdrink theiralienation intooblivion inacrowdedbar.Tommyfliesback toBrigadoon,wheretheloversarereunited,destinedtowakeforonedayeveryhundredyears,forevermore.Tommy’sdecisionispresentedasareturntopremodernnature(andsexualconsummation)thatresemblesakindof death.Natureherebecomesthesiteof refuge,aplacewherewemightliketorest,if onlywecouldfindit.Brigadoon’swoodlandartificialityisnotamarkof itsridiculousnessbutamarkof itsimpossible
11 Pamela Howard, foreword to Theatre and Performance Design: A Reader in Scenography, ed. Jane Collins and Andrew Nisbet (London: Routledge, 2010), xxiii. Bazin’s writing anticipates contemporary debates about scenog-raphy, a term that has gained critical attention in recent decades.
The threatof Brigadoon’sevaporationhangsover theplot.Merelycrossing thebridgecantriggerakindof nuclearreactionthatwillvaporizetheplace.Whenadisaf-fectedyoungmannamedHarryBeaton(HughLiang)proclaims“I’mleavingBriga-doon!’Tistheendof allof us!Themiracleisover!”thevillagers’fearof annihilationmotivates a chase number that concludeswithHarry’s death but saves the village.WhenTommycriesout“Oh,Fiona!WhenIthinkwhatcouldhavehappened!Yourwholeworld...goneforever!”hemightaswellbedescribingthethreatof nuclearapocalypse—orfromaretrospectiveperspective,climatechange’scivilizationalthreat.RaymondBellourhaswrittenaboutanelementhecalls“panic”thatcanbefoundacrossMinnelli’s body of work.Bellour argues that inBrigadoon, two special formsof panicaredefined:“the territorial limit that can’tbecrossed”and the“made inAmericahorror”of modern-dayNewYork.13Afurtherpanicarticulatedbythefilm,Iwouldadd,isthefearof nuclearwar.Madeintheeraof nucleartestingandclassroomduck-and-coverexercises,Brigadoon’sghostlyexistenceseemstohoveraroundtheedgesof nuclearannihilation. Brigadoon wasoriginallyenvisionedasalocationshoot.GeneKellylaterremem-bered:“Thiswasourhope:thatwewoulddoBrigadoon as an outdoors picture the wayJohnFordwoulddoapictureasaWestern.WewoulddoitasaMinnelliandKellymusical,butdoitoutdoors.”14WhenKellyandproducerArthurFreedreturnedfromascoutingtripinScotlanddiscouragedbythegloomyweather,theywereassuredthat theycould shootona substitute location in themountainsaboveCarmelonthecentralCaliforniacoast.15Butultimately,MGMproductionheadDoreScharydecidedthefilmwouldbeshotentirelyonthestudio’ssoundstages.Thiswasdonetomaintaincompletetechnicalcontrolovertheproductionandtosavemoney,butitalsoallowedMinnelli—aformerdepartment-storewindowdresserandtheatricalsetdesigner—tocarryhishighlytheatricalstyletoitsextremerealization,alongwithhisteamof studiocollaborators,includingartdirectorsCedricGibbonsandPrestonAmesandcinematographerJosephRuttenberg.16Oneof themostimportantcom-ponents of the Brigadoon set was a giant scenic backing that curved around the stage like a nineteenth-century panorama, created by scenic painterGeorgeGibson.17 Through theuseof forcedperspectiveandother trompe l’oeil techniques, scenic
12 “Highland Flingding: Bonnie Brigadoon Has Moors Indoors,” Life, August 9, 1954, 95.
13 Raymond Bellour, “Panic,” in Vincente Minnelli: The Art of Entertainment, ed. Joe McElhaney (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2009), 412.
14 Ronald L. Davis, Oral History with Gene Kelly (unpublished manuscript, Margaret Herrick Library, 1974), 49, qtd. in Murray Pomerance, The Eyes Have It: Cinema and the Reality Effect (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2013), 196.
15 Davis, Oral History, 49, qtd. in Pomerance, The Eyes Have It, 197.
16 Ansco Color film stock was also used, instead of Technicolor, as a cost-saving measure.
17 See Pomerance’s account of George Gibson and Brigadoon’s scenic backing in The Eyes Have It, 209–218.
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backings provide a convincing illusion that the diegetic landscape continues as far as theeyecansee.18
Numerouscriticsandspectatorsthenandsincehavebeendispleasedbythefilm’sartificiality.Timemagazinecomplainedthat“everyplasticdaisyonthevillagegreen[was] set inbyhand, the sheepmarcelled like chorus girls.”19Thefilmearnedaless-than-impressive$2.25million,comparedwiththe$4.75millionearnedbySeven Brides for Seven Brothersthesameyear.20 Brigadoon was out of step with its time in shoot-ingentirelyon soundstages,and theartificialityof its setshasoftenbeenblamedfor itsunderperformanceat theboxoffice.21Whilefilmmusicalscertainlyhavearobust traditionof theatricality,duringthepost–WorldWarIIera locationshoot-ingbecameanincreasinglyimportantproductionstrategy,eveninmusicalssuchasThe Harvey Girls(GeorgeSidney,1946),On the Town(GeneKellyandStanleyDonen,1949),andOklahoma(FredZinnemann,1955).BythistimemostHollywoodmusicalsutilizedacombinationof locationwork,soundstagework,andprocessshots. AndyetthereisarguablymoreatstakeinBrigadoon’sartificial illusionismthanafailedattempttoreproducenature.WhilethedecisiontoshootonMGMsoundstages15and27mayhavebeeninstrumental,ithadpowerfulaestheticeffects.Brigadoon tells usthatthatpostwarnatureisakindof fantasyspace,anchoredinrealgeographybutdistortedandidealized;thatnatureispreciousbutendangeredandcoulddisappearatanytime;andthatfilmisamediumthatfabricatesandfreezesnatureinitsidealform,likeaterrariumorasnowglobe.ThisColdWarrenderingof artificialnaturecanbeseenasanambivalentcelebrationof film’sabilitytofabricatenature.Brigadoon’scon-trolledoutdoorworldfeelslikeamemorial:cocooning,denatured,sweetlymelancholy,justthekindof habitatonemightcraveinthewakeof thenucleartraumacastingitsshadowovertheAnthropocene. ✽
18 Scenic backings were so large that they were often painted simultaneously by multiple artists; additional scenic painters who worked on Brigadoon included Wayne Hill, Clark Provins, and Duncan Spencer. See Richard M. Isackes and Karen L. Maness, The Art of the Hollywood Backdrop (New York: Regan Arts, 2016), 6.
19 “Cinema: The New Pictures,” Time, October 4, 1954, 103.
20 “1954 Boxoffice Champs,” Variety, January 5, 1955, 50.
21 See also Colin McArthur, “Brigadoon,” “Braveheart,” and the Scots: Distortions of Scotland in Hollywood Cinema (London: I. B. Tauris, 2003).
A problemof scaleplaguespopulartextsthattrytovisualizetheenvironmental impact of humans.The harbingers of Earth’simminentecologicalapocalypseoccupyspacesandtemporali-ties immeasurable within the idioms of conventional screen me-
dia. For example, the vast reach and submicroscopic effects of thedioxinsresultingfromtrashincinerationaren’teasilyrenderedbythemoving image.1Environmentalcatastrophedoesn’t fall intodiscreteparameters and thus challenges visual media with various phenom-ena that can’tbenarrativized in linear time-space trajectories.Thelimitlessandtheabysscollideinthespacesof theAnthropocene.Inthiscontext,aresponsetotheproblemof scalehasopenedupinthespectacleof thesinkhole.Acontemporary“anthroposcenery”seemstobothproduce sinkholes andfixate on themas images. Sinkholespopup(ordown)everywhereandanywhere,indenseurbanityandintranquilsuburbs. The sinkhole possesses the qualities that ecotheorist TimothyMorton assigns to “hyperobjects”: viscosity, nonlocality, temporalundulation, phasing, and interobjectivity.2 Thinking of sinkholes as hyperobjectsalsoexposesMorton’scriticalresistancetothesublimeasausefulmeansof describingphenomenathat,duetotheirscaleorduration,overwhelmhumanperceptualcapacities.Thebracketingof the sublimehasapolitical edge forMorton.Ecological catastropheguideshisinquiry,asdoeshiscommitmenttodisallowingdepictionsof disastertoplayintowhathecalls“endof worlddiscourse,”whichhefeelsdoesmoretopromoteanihilisticapocalypticismthanitdoesto forward ameaningful awareness of theAnthropocene. SinkholefootagemaybehelpfultothisprojectforhowitparticipatesinMorton’saim“toestablishwhatphenomenological‘experience’isinabsenceof anythingmeaningfullikea‘world’atall.”3
Whensinkholesarrive tousonscreens, theycarrycharacteristictraits.Asmallchunkof timeisoftenreplayedonaloopinthecontextof an otherwise linear temporality, depicting the sinkhole swallow-ingandswallowingagain,theimageframingandholdinginplacean
1 Karl Schoonover, “Documentaries without Documents: Ecocinema and Toxins,” NECSUS: European Journal of Media Studies, no. 4 (Autumn 2013): 483–507.
2 Timothy Morton, Hyperobjects: Philosophy and Ecology after the End of the World (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2013). In descriptive passages (115, 192), he mentions sinkholes twice in the book but does not treat them as hyperobjects head-on.
3 Morton, 3.
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endlessvisualabyss,adarkholethatadmitsnomeasureof durationordepth.Thislooping has meant that the GIF supplies one of the most prominent sites for marvel-ingatsinkholes—thatis,itissinkholefootage’sidealvenue.TheGIFhasbroughttheaestheticregimeof thesinkholetoprominenceinourcontemporarymediascape,inwhichsinkholesarepopularonGIFaggregatingsites,suchasGIPHYandTumblr.IargueherethattheGIF’saffinityforthesinkholetellsussomethingaboutwhatitmeans torepresent thisphenomenon.AsIpresson thehistorical specificityof thisconcordance,ItrackthestructuralaffinitiessharedamongGIFsontheonehandandecologicaldisasterasdepictedinmid-twentieth-centuryfilmsontheotherhand.IaskwhytheGIFistodayoneof thepreferredmeansof pursuingasinkhole,evenasGIF-nesscanbefoundforeshadowedinthesinkhole'spredigitaldepictions. Whentheearthsuddenlygiveswayunderourstreetsandhomesandinfrontof ourcameras,thesinkholeopensachallengetoconventionalecologicaldiscoursesandthe capacity of those discourses tomanage the scale of humanity’s environmentalfootprint.Howthesinkholeelicitslimitlessnessiskeytounderstandingtheinfectiousnatureof itsvisualspectacle:theparametersof timeandspaceasweknowitdissolvebeforeoureyesinthesinkhole’ssuddeningestionof pedestriansandautomobiles,intheundertowof itsvoid.Assuch,thesinkhole—anditsvanishingvanishingpoints—demandsthatecopoliticsrethinkhowtorepresentendgames. Sinkholesappearonstandardfactualtelevision:theNationalGeographicchannel,PBS’sNova(1974–present),andtheBBChaveallproducedone-hourdocumentariesonthesubject.Inpopularmoving-imagecultures,thesinkholeappearsasaportalnotonly to theunknownbutalso tounknowability,exposing instabilitiesof bothphys-icalandepistemologicalinfrastructures.Thefactualtelevisionprogramsthatexplorethenatureof thesinkholepurporttoexplainthephenomenonbutresistdeflatingitsmysteryandhorror.Sinkholesstrikewithoutwarningorreason,theseprogramstellus.Their rootcauses remainunclear.Theprogramsseeminvested in the idea thatsinkholesultimatelyfrustrateanyassignationof blameorculpability(evenif fracking,industrialagriculture,andquick-buildprojectsofferotherwiselogicalexplanationsfortheirincreasingprevalence).Thevoice-overcommentarythataccompaniesthefootageof sinkholesaimstomaintainthisunknowabilitytosuchanextentthatthiscommen-taryshouldbeclassifiedasphantasmagoric.Theepisodeof theBBC2documentaryseries Horizon(1964–present)titled“SwallowedbyaSinkhole”continuallyreferstothesinkholeasapassagetotheindefiniteandinfiniteandasaneventthatcapturesour“fearof droppingintotheunderworld.”Theseprogramscarrythequalityof second-arytexts,admittingtheyaresimplybuildingoffimageswealreadyknowwell.Theyreplaythesameamateurandsurveillancefootageinapatternthatparallelstheendlessloopingof theGIF. AnnaMcCarthyhascalledthe“endlessness”of theGIFa“fugitivetemporality,”suggestingthatitistherepositoryforameditativewastingof time,anexerciseof self-soothing,oramode forexploringvisualpleasure.4 If the GIF streams data neither tonor from theuser,but ratherprovides smallnuggetsof animation inan infinite
4 Anna McCarthy, “Visual Pleasure and GIFs,” in Compact Cinematics: The Moving Image in the Age of Bit-Sized Media, ed. Pepita Hesselberth and Maria Poulaki (London: Bloomsbury, 2017), 114.
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looping,couldwesay,then,thataGIFisasinkhole?AfteralltheGIFisasynchole,ahoardorcacheof artificialsynchronies.Atthesametime,itisalsoasynchole,asin apitthatabsorbsthemeaningfulpassageof timeorspace,existingoutsideof useful laborandbanishingtheenginesof conventionalnarrative:happenstance,coincidence,andchancemeeting.TheGIF’sloopingiswherethetelosof momentoustimegoestodie.TheGIFcouldbethoughtof as“aswallowhole,”wherelinearity,causation,andother features of narrative space are gobbled down and then regurgitated in a manner thatfrustratestelos. Inwhat follows, I lookat variousvisualizationsof sinkholes aspotential imagesof ecocatastrophe thatdon’tcontribute toan“endof worlddiscourse.”Themanycontemporaryfilmsdepictingsinkholesarelessinterestingtomydiscussion,becausecontemporary cinemahas become able to depict geological distresswithout incur-ringmuchvisualdisruption.Evenwhenannouncednarrativelyassinkholes,thecavi-tiesof twenty-first-centurymoviesdon’t swallowup thenarrative’s coordinationof spatiotemporalrelationsassuchholesdoinearlierfilms.Recentcinematicsinkholesprovokenoneof the“deepshuddersof temporality”thatMortonassociateswiththe“world”-banishingqualities of thehyperobject.5Vis-à-vis theagile representationalcapacitiesof digitaleffects,thesinkholelosesitsdisruptivenatureandwelcomesan“endof theworlddiscourse.”ThankstoCGI,afilmlike2012 (RolandEmmerich,2009)cancreatealongtakeof acrackopeningup,asJacksonCurtis( JohnCusack)driveshisfamilydownaroad,narrowlyescapingaseriesof earthquakesandsinkholes.Crosscuttingbetweenthepanicinsidethecarandshotsof thecardodgingthehazardsof aworldcomingapart,thefilmneverlosesdirection.Atraditionalnarrativelook(anditsanthropocentrictendencies)remainsstabilized,orientedtowardlinearityand directionality(theprogressof mankind).Inotherwords,thesinkholesof thiscentury’scinemaproceeddifferentlyfromthesinkholesof mid-twentieth-centuryfilms,orforthatmatter,fromtheregurgitationsof theGIF. Lookingforsinkholesinfilmsfromearlierperiodswouldencompassawideinven-tory, includingfilmswithexplicitlyreferencedsinkholesandalsoravenouslyhungrytremors,groundcracks,andearthquakes.6Tectonicdisturbancesoftendisorganizetheconventionalnarrationof thegaze inthedisasterof midcenturyfilms,proposingahiatus in linear timeand space.Fromapreliminary investigation into theaestheticturbulencecausedbythemovingimageof theground“givingway”emergesanascentorderof destabilizedtime-spacerelations,onethatlaterfindsperfectformalaffinityinthemediumof theGIF.Putsimply,whendepictinggeologicaldisastermanyolderfea-turefilmsexpressthesamestructuralambivalencestowardthecertaintyof progressivetimeandspaceasGIFs,disorganizingvisioninatleastthreeways:repetition,doubleframing,andfracturedlinearity.
5 Morton, Hyperobjects, 16.
6 In this essay, I bracket two adjacent phenomena—quicksand and the black hole—since both have independent valences. As a trope, quicksand has a historical particularity, in its formal capacity to reverse teleology of 1930s colonialism within the mise-en-scène. In this sense, it is more about revenge than it is about the infinite. The black hole has a specificity in 1970s and early 1980s sci-fi films, functioning as an escapist wormhole from the period’s bankrupt geopolitics and poisoned ecology.
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First, a consonance can be found in how both use spectacle to disorganize thelook.Crack in the World (AndrewMarton,1965) followsamadscientistwhosendsanuclearwarheadundertheearth’ssurfacetominethemagmaforarenewablesourceof energy to replaceconventional fuels.Despite theendorsementof world leaders,thisminingprojectleadstomayhemandnearapocalypse.Thesequencesshowingtheactualcrackdisordersthenarrationof ourgaze.Wedon’tknowexactlywheretolook,excepteverywhereatonce.Themontage-likequalitiesof coveringtheeventabstractspatialcoordination,frustratinganymentalmappingof thediegeticspace.Theviewercannotanticipatethesequencingof movementacrossshots,placingourlookmomen-tarilyoutsideof causaltimeandspace.Thus,thesinkholeoperatesasLauraMulveydefinestheaestheticparametersof spectacle,asthatwhichisoutsidenarrative.7 As in Mulvey’sdefinition,spectaclehereslowsdownnarrativetimeandthenaturalisticpac-ingof theimageinrelationtotheevent,andtheimagelosesthenarrativespatialityof consequentialdirectionandmeaningfuldepth.HelenWheatleyarguesthattheslow-ing of time and movement in front of the spectacular landscape should be understood asaformalized“hesitation.”ThishesitationbecomessostaccatoedinCrack in the World thatitfeelslikeamodeof serialityorrepetition,muchlikethatof theGIF’sapprehen-sionof thesinkhole.8
Towardthestartof theJapaneseGodzillaspin-offChikyû Bôeigun (The Mysterians;IshirôHonda,1957),landslipsintoanever-increasingcrackinthemiddleof acoun-tryside scene.A seriesof edits fromdifferentanglesanda repetitive soundtrackof crashingnoisesdepict the frenzyof catastrophebutalsounleashan indeterminacyabouthowandwherewearetraversingtimeandspace.Thisturmoilintimatesaloop-ing structure rather than a linear account of eventful time in which the instantaneous is inimitableandconsequential.Instrivingtocoverthesinkholeasanevent,Chikyû Bôeigunperformsastutteringof time-spacerelations.Eachnewshotnotonlyoffersanewperspectiveonwhatishappeningbutalsointroducesanewarcof theevent,asif thissequencewereacollectionof separateevents.Disasterbeginsafresh ineachshot.Thisrepetitionof theevent’stimerunscountertoconventionalnarrative’slin-eartemporality.Thepacingof eachshotdoesn’taccordwiththoseshotsthatcomebeforeorafterit.Thismishmashof perspectivesonspaceandtimecanalsobefoundin the landslide sequence of It Came from Outer Space( JackArnold,1953),whichcom-bines slow motion and various points of view in its depiction of the ground splitting apart.Whenmenacingcracks(latersinkholes)openthegroundonLondonstreetsinQuatermass and the Pit(RoyWardBaker,1967),asimilarlycompulsive,multiple-viewedcoverageof asingleeventoccurs.Chikyû Bôeigun and Crack in the World enfold two modes of reiterationintheirdisastersequences.First,andsimply,thesinkholetriggersincon-ventionalfilmformarepetitionthatanticipatestheGIF’sloopingstructure.Second,theloopingof anevent’sforwardmovementintimefeelsnotunliketheGIF’s“fugitivetemporality”whichMcCarthyattributestoits“endlesssmallactsof reproduction.”9
7 Laura Mulvey, “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema,” Screen 16, no. 3 (October 1975): 11–12.
8 Helen Wheatley, “Beautiful Images in Spectacular Clarity: Spectacular Television, Landscape Programming and the Question of (Tele)visual Pleasure,” Screen 52, no. 2 (July 2011): 243–244.
9 McCarthy, “Visual Pleasure and GIFs,” 114, 113.
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Anothermodeof doublingbringsendlessnesstothefore:theframewithinaframeto signalbottomlessness.TheJulesVerneadaptationJourney to the Center of the Earth (HenryLevin,1959)usesframewithinaframetoportrayvoidsintheearth.Beforereachingthesevoids,thefilmdescribesthedeclaredaimof thevoyage’sparticipantsas“totalpenetration,”toreach“theworldbelow,whateveritmaybe.”Inthefirstglanceatthespectaclepromisedbythefilm’stitle,andelsewherelateron,thefilmintroducesadeepholewithanemblematicshot.Thevoidsof theseholesappearframedwithina frame.A tension formsbetween the ragged, random,dropped-off, quasi-circularcontoursof theabyssof nothingnessandthesharpgeometryof therectangularframeof theimage.(Thissamecompositionproliferatesincontemporarysinkholefootage.) Suchdoubleframingaccompaniesthesensethatthisholeisaninfiniteandunmap-pable void. Its limitlessness confounds perception, its blackness swallowingup every-thing,whileexhaustinghumanresourcefulness.“There’snotenoughropeintheworldtogetdownthere,”declaresonecharacterpeeringoverthehole’sperimeter.Theblack,emptied-outcenterof thesetwoframessuggestsarefusalof therepresentationalimpera-tivesof theimage,asuspensionof itsotherwisefigurativepriorities.Thevoidalsodis-penseswithdepthcuesandseemstoswallownarrativetime,if weacceptthatnarrativetimerequiresmarkedspatialprogressionincinema.Thingsaredroppeddownthehole,but theydisappearquickly, rarely to reappear.They leave functionality (diegetic andotherwise),nevertoreturn.GIFsseemtoinheritthisdoubleframingasameansof usingthevoidtoexploitboththespectacularandtheantispectacular.Ourattentiontoframingbringsustoonemorefeatureof thesinkhole:itscapacitytoswallow.Thisappearstoplaywiththeframe-within-a-framestructure,ravenouslypullingtheimageinsideout.10
The failure of cinema to provide the temporal or spatial plenitude associated with “the event”isnotuniquelyexposedbysinkholes,butcinemahasalwaystriedtocom-pensate for or cover over its inadequacies in relationship to time and space (continu-ityeditingbeingonlyonesuchsystem).Sinkholesrevealandflauntthesefailuresasconstraintstobetaunted.Ineachof theseinstancesof disorganizedvision—includingrepetition,doubleframing,andfracturedlinearity—thesinkholeexposestheshamof spatiotemporalcoherence. TheGIFandthenon–digitallyproducedsinkholeshareatrickyhistoricity.Thishistoricity comes into viewwhenwe encounter sinkholes in twentieth-first-centurycinema,suchasthosein2012,Geo-Disaster(ThunderLevin,2017),andSisters ( Jason Moore,2015),whichlacktheformaldisruptionselaboratedinthedisastersequencesof eco-apocalypticsci-fiof themidcenturyandthatcontinuetoresideintheGIF.Mypointhasnotbeensimplytoexplainthisoddhistoricitysharedamongsomemediaandnotothersoverthepastsixtyyears.Instead,ithasbeentoattendtowhattheseimages make clear when we stop seeing them as representational failures—to listen for whatMortoncallsa“being-quake”of whichtheymaybesymptoms.11
10 Here I briefly note a visual affinity between one of the most popular GIFs of sinkholes, the sudden devouring of a stand of trees in Louisiana’s Bayou Corne (https://giphy.com/gifs/xKhCnEOPmErCw), and the bizarre ending of the inexplicably odd noir film, The Red House (Delmer Daves, 1947).
11 “The discovery of hyperobjects and OOO (object oriented ontology) are symptoms of a fundamental shaking of being, a being-quake. The ground of being is shaken.” Morton, Hyperobjects, 19.
TheGIFisitself athrowbacktoanearliergenerationof digitalimagery,namelyWeb 1.0 animation. And in this context, wemight call it a “loophole” or even a“wormhole” to the capacities of an earlier, apparently lesser mode of depiction.Through thisperspective,wecanresee thepredigital-era imageof catastrophenotforitsincapacities(itsinabilitytocapturealongtakeof ecodisaster)butasacomplexrepresentationalmodeof negotiatingwiththeecologicalthatwemayhavelost.Whatif these sinkholes unearthed something disordering about the Anthropocene that the newblockbusterscantooeasilyforgetand/orcoverover? ✽
Reorientations; or, An Indigenous Feminist Reflection on the Anthropoceneby KaLi simmons
D estructionof homelands.Lossof kinship species.Exposure todeadlycontaminants.Massextinction.Transformedlifeways.Inthefaceof theseradicalchanges,aquestionlingers:Howlongwilllifebepossible?Recentlytheacademyhasalsofelttheur-
gencyof theseenvironmentalproblemsandproposedtoaddressthemwithin the frameworkof the term“theAnthropocene.” IndigenousstudieshasofferedvariousresponsestotheAnthropocene,someargu-ingthatithasutilityinframingtheviolenceof colonialismandotherscritiquingthelimitationsandassumptionsbehindthe“anthropos”inAnthropocene.1 Since contact, indigenous peoples of the Americashavedealtwithanescalationof theforcesof environmentalchange.Consequently, their ability to live has been challenged. Indigenousscholarship has shown that the Anthropocene can bring attention to theviolence indigenouspeoplehave sufferedandcontinue to resist,
1 For works addressing the utility of the term, see Heather Davis and Zoe Todd, “On the Importance of a Date, or Decolonizing the Anthropocene,” ACME: An International Journal for Critical Geographies 16, no. 4 (2017): 761–780; Simon Lewis and Mark Maslin, “Defining the Anthropocene,” Nature 519 (2015): 171–180; and Audra Mitchell, “Decolonising the Anthropocene,” Worldly (blog), https://worldlyir.wordpress.com/2015/03/17/decolonising-the -anthropocene/. For works critical of the term, see Jessica L. Horton, “Indigenous Artists against the Anthropocene,” Art Journal 76, no. 2 (2017): 48–69, and Zoe Todd, “Indigenizing the Anthropocene,” in Art in the Anthropocene, ed. Heather Davis and Étienne Turpin (London: Open Humanities Press, 2013), 241–254.
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butitcanalsobeusedtoerasethishistoryof violence.Narrativescanconcealothernarratives.Itistheworkof scholarstobeattentivetothis.TheAnthropocene,asaterm,hasthepotentialtobolsterindigenouscriticalprojectsbecauseitcanbereadasanindexicalmarkontheplanetthatmakestheviolenceof imperialprojectsvisible.Theenvironmental,economic,spiritual,andsocialchallengesthatindigenouspeoplefacearearearticulationof theviolenceof livinginacapitalistsettlerstate. ToapproachtheAnthropocenefromapositionthatdoesnotrememberthehistoryof empireisacontinuationof thesystemof settlercolonialismthaterasesindigenouspeoplessothesettlernationcanbeimaginedasemptyandoccupiable.Indigenousfemi-nismswarnagainstresponsestotheAnthropocenethatreinscribethisviolenterasure,takingastheirstartingpointtheintersectionsof empire,industrialcapitalism,andhet-eropatriarchy.2Inthisshortessay,Iexplainhowstartingattheseintersectionsrequiresaradicalreorientationtothreekeyconcepts:time,contamination,andkinship.Itheorizethesereorientationsalongsidetheworkof NavajoartistWillWilson,whoseAuto-Immune Responseseries(2005–present)addressesindigenoussurvivalandresilienceintheAn-thropocene.Wilson’swork is a call to critically decenter thehuman indiscourses of apocalypticclimatechange,challengingtheframeworkof the“anthropos.”Indigenoustheoreticalwork,embodiedinartworkslikeWilson’svideos,asksustorefusethesettlerstateasabasis for relationalityand justice,promptingus to imagine solutions to theAnthropocene“outsideof themodelsof governanceandcommunitythatsettlernation-statesarefoundedon.”3 Media studies scholarship must also consider these intersections asastartingpointforitsengagementswiththeAnthropocene.
Time.Indigenouscultureshavedifferentorientationstowardtime,andtheorizationsof thisalternative time—althoughtheyarevariedandmany—requirescholars torethinkthescaleof climatechangewithinalongerhistoricaltrajectory.ScholarssuchasKimTallBear,GraceDillon,andKylePowysWhitehavearguedthatindigenouspeoplesarealreadypostapocalyptic.4Thatis,indigenouspeopleshavealreadyfacedcatastrophicviolence,thelossof relationships,andthefundamentalalterationof theirwaysof lifetosurviveinspacesthatarephysically,emotionally,andspirituallytoxic. The“Orbisspikehypothesis”isastratigraphicmarker,introducedbySimonLewisandMarkMaslin, thatcanbe interpreted to show that theapocalypsehasalreadyhappenedtoindigenouspeoples.5Thetermreferstothedropinatmosphericcarbon,apparentingeologicaldata,thatstemsfromthepopulationdeclineof theAmericas
2 See Maile Arvin, Eve Tuck, and Angie Morrill, “Decolonizing Feminism: Challenging Connections between Settler Colonialism and Heteropatriarchy,” Feminist Formations 25, no. 1 (2013): 16. I am deeply indebted to this work not only for its interventions into feminist and indigenous studies but also for inspiring and guiding this response.
3 Arvin, Tuck, and Morrill, 16.
4 See Kim TallBear, “Future Imaginary Lecture: Kim TallBear. ‘Disrupting Settlement, Sex, and Nature,’” YouTube video, posted by Obxlabs, 1:25:13, January 25, 2017. Also see Grace Dillon, “Imagining Indigenous Futurisms,” in Walking in the Clouds: An Anthology of Indigenous Science Fiction, ed. Grace Dillon (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2012), 1–12; and Kyle Powys Whyte, “Our Ancestors’ Dystopia Now: Indigenous Conservation and the Anthropocene,” in The Routledge Companion to the Environmental Humanities, ed. Ursula K. Heise, Jon Christensen, and Michelle Niemann (New York: Routledge, 2017), 271–273.
5 Simon Lewis and Mark Maslin, “Defining the Anthropocene,” Nature 519 (2015): 171–180.
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fromaroundsixtymilliontosixmillionpeopleduetocolonialwar,famine,disease,andenslavement—alossof lifethatcanhardlybedescribedintermsotherthanapoc-alyptic.TheOrbisspikeisanindexicalmarkof colonialviolenceuponEarthitself,showingthatacolossallossof humanlifecanresultinsignificantshiftsintheenviron-ment,theresultsof whicharenowvisibleinthegeologicalstrata. A reorientation to time requires an expansion of the scale of time combined with anunderstandingabouthowviolenceisenactedoverandthroughtime.Thisdistinctunderstandingof temporalityiswhatenablesindigenousscholarstoreadtheOrbisspikeashavingadeepconnectiontotheviolenceof empire.DoingsopointstothewaythatEuropeananthropocentricprojectsimaginetheirhistoricalpastandfuturethrough the erasure of indigenous histories and communities as a means to construct andguaranteesettlerfuturity. Inaseriesof shortvideosconnectedtohis largermultimediaprojectAuto-Immune Response (AIR),WillWilsonaddressestheapocalypticconditionsof theindigenouspres-ent. Inthisproject,aDinéman(playedbyWilson)recordshimself ashehikesthefourmountainsmarkingtheterritoryof theDinépeople.6 The short videos mix documen-taryandspeculativefiction.Theyprovide,accordingtoWilson’swebsite,“anallegoricalinvestigationof theextraordinarilyrapidtransformationof Indigenouslifeways,thedis-easeithascaused,andstrategiesof responsethatenableculturalsurvival.”7 The setting isanuncertainpostapocalypticfuture,atimewhentheenvironmenthasbecomeunliv-ableforhumans.Yethisvideosandphotographshaveareal-worldreference:uraniumminingonaNavajoreservationhasirradiatedwater,animals,plants,andthepeoplelivingthere,creatinganinhospitableenvironment.Wilsondescribestheprojectas“thequixotic relationship between a post-apocalypticDiné (Navajo)man and the devas-tatinglybeautiful,but toxicenvironmenthe inhabits.”8 The AIRproject’salternativeapproachtotemporalityrevealsthefaultsinaWestern,teleologicalunderstandingof historicaltime.Wilson’sAIRprojectexpresseshow,asKylePowysWhyteargues,indig-enouspeoplecanconceptualizetheAnthropoceneaslivingintheirancestors’dystopia.9
Contamination. Blood quantum is one technology that has enabled indigenousdystopiaandapocalypse.Bloodquantum isa technologyof the settler state that isdesignedtoeliminateindigenouspeoplesthroughalogicof purity. This assimilation-istprincipleconfinesindigenouspeoplestothepastwiththeir“pure-blooded”rela-tions,whilelawsrequiringspecificlevelsof quantumdivideindigenouspeoplesalongtriballinesastheyattempttosecurenecessaryaccesstoresources.However,fromapostapocalypticindigenousperspective,puritycanneverbeanendgoal.Thedrivetoenshrineandrestorenaturalspacesshouldnotbeguidedbyautopicnostalgiaforanaturedestroyedbyimperialism,asRenatoRosaldohasarguedinhisessay“Imperial-istNostalgia.”10Conservationisteffortsthatenshrinepurityreinstateviolenceagainst
6 Will Wilson, “Video,” https://willwilson.photoshelter.com/video.
7 Will Wilson, “About,” https://willwilson.photoshelter.com/about.
indigenouspeoplesandthelandwithwhichtheyarekin.Indigenouspeoplesknowthisstorywell:thelogicof assimilationthatconsignsindigenouspeopletoavanishingpastimpliesthatthereareno“realIndians”left.Instead,“realIndians”existedonlyin1492,1776,1879,or1934,dependingonthehistoricalnarrativeof settlercolonial-ismoneinvestsin.“Indians”werecreatedinawaysuchthattheywouldeventuallybecome socontaminated that theywoulddisappear,which showshowacontinuedinvestmentindiscoursesof purityenablestheerasureof indigenouspeople.11
InWilson’swork,contaminationundertheAnthropoceneisnotonlyphysicalbutalso spiritual and ontological.Wilsonmakes contamination visible not bymarkingtheenvironmentbutbyshieldinghisownbodywithprotectivegear.Thegasmaskhewearsinhisvideosistheonlysignthatmarkstheenvironmentasdeadlyandunlivable.This choice suggests that making life livable in contaminated spaces requires adapta-tion in recognition of changed material conditions rather than a nostalgic wish for the pureandpristine—thatis,theunmarked.Byconstructinganalternativeresponsetoenvironmentalcatastrophe,Wilsonquestionshowandwhyhumanlifeisprivilegedindebatesaboutclimatechange. Thedeadlychemicalsalreadypresentinthewater,soil,andairforestallanyrecon-structionof natureinanidealized“pure”state.TheAIRprojectrefusesconservation-isteffortstopurifynature,becauseasmentionedpreviously,thelogicof purityplaces“authentic”indigenouspeoples inanirretrievablepastandtherebyrisksreplicatingwhat indigeneityhasworked todeconstruct.AsRobertWarriorargues, indigenousmethodologies are no purer than any other, and to demand such from indigenousknowledges andpractices overlooks their relevance: “Tounderstandwhat the ‘realmeaning’of traditionalrevitalizationis,then,AmericanIndiansmustrealizethatthepowerof those traditions isnot in their formal superioritybut in theiradaptabilitytonewchallenges.”12Inthepostapocalypse,akeyreorientationinvolvesaturnawayfrompurity,modeledafterthedeepentanglementof indigenousminds,bodies,rela-tions,andcultureswiththematerialconditionsof thistoxicworld.
Kinship.Theterm“Anthropocene”impliesakindof kinshipthatIwanttoproblema-tize.WhiletheAnthropoceneentailsthevulnerabilitytoextinctionof humanityasawhole,thedistinctvulnerabilitiesmanybeingshavefaceduptothispointcannotbeeffaced.Itisthecasethatthesubjectpositionof thehumanhasbeenmadeavailableonlytocertainkindsof bodiesatcertaintimes.Indigenouspeopleshavebeenoffered access to the position of the humanonly by disavowing their kinship connections.Often,thislossof kinshipconnectionentailedafundamentalshiftinhowindigenouspeoplesconceptualizedandwereabletoenactrelationsof kin,particularlywithnon-humanotherssuchasthelandtheyinhabited.IntheUnitedStates,indigenouspeopleswere forcibly entered into the system of private land ownership through the 1887DawesAct.Whiletheywerethenrecognizedashumans—thoughinmanycasesstill
11 For more on the logic of contamination, absorption, and blood quantum, see Kim TallBear, Native American DNA: Tribal Belonging and the False Promise of Genetic Science (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2013).
12 Robert Warrior, Tribal Secrets: Recovering American Indian Intellectual Traditions (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1994), 94.
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notentirely—thislegalframeworkreorganizedtheirprevioustiestothelandaroundthesanctionedandexploitativeprinciplesof capitalistownership.Onemightsaythatgainingonekinmeans losinganother.InCanada,after theenactmentof the1876IndianAct, indigenouspeoplescouldgainaccess tohumanrightsonlybyrejectingtheirstatusasIndians.Indigenouswomenwhomarriedsettlermenautomaticallylosttheirstatus,andinsomecases,theirabilitytoliveonreservelandwiththeirfamily.Asbefore,gainingonekinmeans losinganother.Indigenoushistorydemonstrates thatthecategoryof thehumanhas repeatedly functionedasa toolof settler colonialassimilation,oftendisguisingitself asakinship-makingproject. WillWilson’sAIRprojectdecentersthehumaninhisrepresentationof kinshipinthepostapocalypse.Wilson’sprotagonistmustreshapehisownbody,bydonningapro-tectivemask,tosurviveinthistoxicspace,ratherthanreshapingthespacesandnon-humanotherssurroundinghim.AIR South and AIR North depict green plants and trees inthebackground,signifyingthattheworldismorehabitablefornonhumanspeciesthanitisforhumans.Ratherthanconformingthespacetotheneedsof humanityby“terraforming”atoxicearthtorenderithabitableagain,theprotagonistinsteadadjustsinawaythatisnotdestructivetotheothersurvivingbeings.Thismovetocriticallydecenterthehumanreflectsindigenousepistemologiesof mutualaccount-ability,awayof living in theworld that refusesahierarchyof being. InWilson’swork,livingintheAnthropoceneisaquestionof survival,butonenotnecessarilysecuredforhumanity. To reorient oneself in kinship relations means that this violence that underwrites muchof humanhistorycannotbeeasilyforsakenorforgiven.Forindigenouspeoples,kinshipisnotsimplyshorthandforfamilyorpeers;itisanentiresystemthatstructureshowonemovesthroughtheworld.Thismeansthatotherformsof lifesubsistoutsidethenarrowpurviewof thehumanandthatthesekinandkinshipsystemscannotbeforsaken.Recently,KylePowysWhytehasarguedthat“onecan’tclaimtobeanallyif one’sagendaistopreventhisorherownfuturedystopiasthroughactionsthatalsopreservetoday’sIndigenousdystopias.”13“Allyship”isaspecifickindof kinshipthatrequiresmutualaccountability.Failingtoproblematizetheframeworkof thehumaninthediscourseof theAnthropocene,particularlythekindof singularhumanhistorytheAnthropocenecanbeusedtoconstruct,istoconcealthewaystheprojectof thehumanhasbeenusedtoproduceindigenousdystopias.WhyteandWilsonrefusetoproduceadystopiafornonhumankin,andsimilarlyscholarshipthatreckonswiththeAnthropoceneshouldrefusereproducingindigenousdystopias.
Conclusion. I posit these reorientations as a response to the question: How much longer will life be possible? Otherquestionsfollow:Howislifeimagined?Whatkindof lifewaspossibletobeginwith?If scholarsof theAnthropocenehopetoanswertheseques-tionsthoroughly,theymustengagewithindigenousknowledgesandontologies.Thereorientations I offer require attentiveness towhose future is envisioned and guar-anteed.Indigenousmediamakers,likeWilson,arealreadyimaginingresponsestotheAnthropocenebytheorizingthroughindigenousmethodologiesandontologies.The
13 Kyle Powys White, “White Allies, Let’s Be Honest about Decolonization,” Yes Magazine, April 3, 2018.
James Leo Cahill is associate professor of cinema andFrench at theUniversityof Toronto.Heisauthorof Zoological Surrealism: The Nonhuman Cinema of Jean Painlevé (Universityof MinnesotaPress,2019)andaneditorof Discourse.
Jennifer Fay isassociateprofessorof filmandEnglishatVanderbiltUniversity,whereshedirectstheprograminCinema&MediaArts.Sheistheauthor,mostrecently,of Inhospitable World: Cinema in the Time of the Anthropocene(OxfordUniversityPress,2018).
Jennifer Peterson is associate professor and chair of the Department of Commu-nicationatWoodburyUniversityinLosAngeles.Sheistheauthorof Education in the School of Dreams: Travelogues and Early Nonfiction Film(DukeUniversityPress,2013),andarticles innumerous journalsandeditedanthologies.Sheiscurrentlyworkingonabookaboutthevisualizationof natureinAmericanfilmhistorybeforethe1960s.
Karl Schoonover isassociateprofessor(reader)of filmandtelevisionstudiesattheUniversityof Warwick.Heistheauthorof Brutal Vision: The Neorealist Body in Postwar Italian Cinema (Universityof MinnesotaPress,2012),coeditorof Global Art Cinema (OxfordUniversityPress, 2010), and coauthor of Queer Cinema in the World (Duke UniversityPress,2016),whichreceivedSCMS’sKatherineSingerKovácsAward.Heiscurrentlywritingabookoncinemaasamediumof wastemanagement.
Kali Simmons (OglalaLakota)isaPhDcandidateintheEnglishDepartmentattheUniversityof California,Riverside.HerresearchfocusesonAmericanvisualculture,exploring how indigenous peoples have responded to the material structures and culturalimaginaryof empire.
Graig Uhlinisassistantprofessorof screenstudiesatOklahomaStateUniversity.Hisscholarship has appeared in Cinema Journal,Quarterly Review of Film & Video,Games & Culture,andotherjournalsandeditedcollections.Hisresearchfocusesonmodernistfilmandenvironmentalaesthetics.
