Distant Replay

[This is in reply to this post by redredshoes.]

I used to have a friend who refused to watch movies more than once. She was a Television/Film major at the time, and I remember thinking, "God, you're never going to make anything worth watching." The argument was always the same one that gets made with books - there are so many good books and films out there, it's a waste of time to watch the same one again instead of a new one. If you're smart, you can remember the whole book/film anyway and just play it back in your head.

My reaction has always been that, yes, you can do that, but then you have to keep all of it in your head at once; when you're watching it, you can focus on just one aspect without worrying about keeping track of the rest. When I find a film that really interests me, I start watching it in alternate ways - paying attention to just the sound or just the visuals, or turning off the color so I can study the composition. Listening to the commentary and reading through the script. Deconstructing it. This is how I taught myself to make movies, and this is how I taught myself to write. (Not to mention edit.)

So I guess the thing for me about rereading isn't that I enjoy the familiarity of the book, but that I like what is different about it. I like to focus on a different character or a different theme. With some very good literature, I try to let several years pass between readings and instead of re-analyzing the book, I use it as a tool to observe the differences in myself: what characters do I like, what decisions do I agree with, what historical paralells am I picking up? Especially since I read so rapidly, I can't imagine giving up a book unless I absolutely hate it. I still pine for every single book I have had to return to the library.