Field trip 2: Central Escalator

Cropped view: Glasses frame

The visible phenomenon with respect to the glasses frame is a rewind of human activities outside the crop. The mirroring effect of the glasses lens creates a scene inside a scene.

 

De-Escalator: Eye-level

The eccentric moment of up-and-down in the escalator journey: the central escalator, supposedly a sloped public infrastructure, comprises a sudden downward moment in the journey. This particular junction is a double-lane while the rest of the escalator is single-lane.

 

Framed view: Rear Window

The nostalgia that the policeman 633 derives from watching his flight attendant girlfriend leaving through the rear window of his apartment is essentially an anticlimax: from an incrementally exciting and luscious moment of love to an abrupt and disappointing end to his relationship. Meanwhile, A Fai also voyeuristically glimpses outside the same window with curiosity at a different timeframe, capturing her love for 633 and hinting the beginning of 633’s new relationship.

In this experimentation on cropped view, the rear window was brought into focus from the other side of the escalator in contradiction to that of Wong’s Chungking Express. Three dining women are subjected to the camera’s scrutiny: the camera perspective is now the curious and voyeuristic one, stimulated by the captured movements of three subjects and incessantly watching them. The public infrastructure here serves as a rear window to the other side. There are few climactic scenes in this experimentation where passersby of the central escalator and the subjects by the window have possibly recognized the camera’s presence, but as such moments of anxiety resolve into nay, the film progresses into celebrating voyeurism of urban flaneurs.

 

Differentiation of speeds: Isolation

This is an experiment to isolate subject (Hae Jin) from background pedestrian flux through differentiating subject’s velocity from the rest. Before I manipulated the speed of the raw clip, the actor had to move twice as slow as the moving pedestrians.

 

Static camera and zooming: Sunday pigeon

The central escalator is populated by three groups on Sunday: pedestrians, domestic helpers, and pigeons. The camera preserves an undisrupted and profound aesthetic of the pigeon lifestyle on the roof adjacent to the central escalator.

 

By: Dong Yuqi Kiki

UID: 3035447879

1 thought on “Field trip 2: Central Escalator

  1. Nikolas ETTEL says:

    I like the idea using your personal glasses as a frame, continued through your eye level and observation shots, but this might need more configuration, as both, outside and inside landscapes are slightly blurred.

    Reply

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