Sergio Martínez Esqueda completed this video essay under the supervision of Leigh Singer at the National Film and Television School. First published in Notes on Videographic Criticism on February 19, 2021.
You made nearly all of this video on an iPad, and you show us the iPad interface throughout. Why did you choose an iPad over, say, your desktop, for example? What did the iPad allow you to do with the video that you otherwise could not?
You made nearly all of this video on an iPad, and you show us the iPad interface throughout. Why did you choose an iPad over, say, your desktop, for example? What did the iPad allow you to do with the video that you otherwise could not?
I've always been a big iPad fan. Since the last year, I started to use it as my main computer and my relationship with how I approach my information consumption and work production changed drastically. In contrast to a desktop computer or a laptop, the iPad is much more flexible in terms of easy access to different tools - this is often called productive multi-tasking - and I wanted to do a video essay that reflected that flexibility. It was easy to go for Playtime, as it is one of my favourite films of all time and also because I think it's hilarious how Tati critiqued the use of ridiculous modern gadgets; I felt that doing a video essay about one of the greatest comedies about technology on an iPad was very funny.
It's such a great moment when you liken the apartment scene in Playtime to Instagram. The use of the iPad and various apps so clearly invites us to reflect on the film's relationship to today's technology, and in particular the ways in which we "look" at one another online. When did you make this connection between Instagram and Playtime? Did creating the video essay challenge or change your own relationship with technology, and social media in particular?
The connection between Instagram and the window scene in Playtime came almost naturally. I guess looking at many "squares" - the windows - on my iPad, while editing the video essay, felt almost like scrolling down on social media. A similar scene happens in Edward Yang's Yi Yi, where the camera is placed outside apartments buildings and we can through the windows. The feeling Yang and Tati created by doing this, challenges us a viewers, specially now, when the social media removed the curtains of our privacy; and that was a constant question I was asking myself while writing and editing the video essay.
You talk about (and show us scenes from) creating the video essay in the final video essay. How did the video evolve throughout its creation? What is something you learned about Playtime through the process of creating the video?
At the beginning of the writing process, I was very sure it was going to be much more academic, concerning a concept André Bazin developed called "the democracy of the viewer". Basically, Bazin said that the viewer needed freedom to place his attention to whatever detailed he preferred, without the guiding hand of the director. However, it didn't really worked for me, so I changed my main "reference" from Bazin to "Where's Waldo?". Deciding since the beginning that I was only going to work on my iPad, gave a natural playful approach to the video essay that I wasn't exploring more having an academic approach. So I decided to just have fun and experiment with the different options that the iPad provided.
Playtime is such a rich film. One could watch it hundreds of times and still take away something new each time. I feel the same way about your video essay. For me, one of the most exciting things about videographic criticism is that our own work often teaches us something about our object(s) of study, even weeks, months, and years after we've completed the video essay. Have you found this to be true? What have you learned by watching your own video essay?
I think that is absolutely true. The process, from the research to the editing, is a big learning curve; not just about the film or the themes you are exploring, but also from a personal point of view. I had the great opportunity of watching my and all my classmates' video essays at the cinema at the National Film and Television School. I was so used to watch my video essay from my iPad so when I watched on a big screen, I felt as it was something new. I discovered Tati disguised at the restaurant scene. How could I had totally missed that? When I watched the film many times and did zoom in and out to everyone. I felt very moved because in a way, that was exactly what my video essay was about: exploring films from different screens, and finding something new on a new screen was just a confirmation of that.