Describe the kind of preception suggested in 'A Child's view of Essay

Describe the kind of preception suggested in 'A Child's view of colour' and 'Metaphors on Vision' and relate that to your percep - Essay Example In the essay, â€Å"From Metaphors on Vision,† Stan Brakhage confirms the power and beauty of perception that is unfettered by logic. Like Benjamin, Brakhage asserts that infants, who have not yet acquired human logic, possess the purest perceptions because they have not learned the meaning of fear. These notions of â€Å"perception† are applied on Lynne Ramsay’s 1999 film, Ratcatcher. Ratcatcher demonstrates the different visions of a good life from the viewpoints of the director, children, and the audience because of their varied, potentially conflicting, perceptions of images that are caused by differences in how these three groups perceive, understand, and express the film’s colours, sounds, composition, and sequences. Before going through the claims of the essay, an overview of the film is essential to understanding its elements. The setting of the film is Glasgow in 1973. During this time, Glasgow suffers from poor housing conditions that are worsene d when the garbage collectors go on strike. Because of the strike, garbage accumulates and pollutes the surroundings. The government balances numerous priorities, as it pursues a development program that includes a housing project and seeks to resolve the problem of the garbage workers going on strike. James Gillespie (William Eadie) is the main protagonist of the film, where he and his family are waiting to be re-housed in one of the newly built apartments of the government (Ratcatcher). James’ friend is Ryan Quinn (Thomas McTaggart), who is supposed to visit his father in jail. Instead of going to his father, Ryan plays with James (Ratcatcher). Their rough play has resulted to Ryan’s drowning in the canal. James feels guilty because he has not alarmed the neighbours of what happened, and instead, he runs away. James has other friends, Margaret Anne (Leanne Mullen) and Kenny (John Miller), who all have their personal issues. The rough boys in the neighbourhood make fu n of Kenny and Margaret Anne, while also sexually abusing the latter. The military arrives to clean the rubbish in the area, but somehow, James feels that only the outside aspect of their social dilemma is cleansed. He jumps into the canal and commits suicide, while the film ends with the vision of his family relocating to their new house. To begin the analysis of â€Å"perception,† Ratcatcher illustrates the perception of the director of a good life that can be described as limited and delimiting. The difference between limited and delimiting is that limited pertains to the film as it is, a limited view of life, while delimiting pertains to the intentions and biases of the director that affect what can be included and not included in the elements of the film. The director controls the camera, which, as a tool of perception, can only include a semblance of reality. In the bus scene, where James runs away and rides a bus, he sees mounds of trash from the bus windows (Ratcatche r). The bus windows are similar to the camera. It can only catch what is in front of it without fully covering everything and without completely conveying what the presence and absence of images mean. The scene exposes the limitations of the camera as an eye for the director, and in connection, to the viewers. Brakhage states that the camera can only capture so much, as it superimposes images on one another and attempts to cover varied motions and emotions (122). He argues that the camera eye is a limited peek into the world.