Histoire(s) du Cinema -- Chapter 4(a) part II Method of Alfred Hitchcock

continued from:
http://jdcopp.blogspot.com/2006/12/jean-luc-godard-control-of-universe.html

.
.
.

.Introduction
to
a
veritable
history
of
cinema
the only
the true
.
.
chapter 4 (a)
The Control of the Universe
Part II
An Introduction to the Method of Alfred Hitchcock
.
.

we have forgotten
why Joan Fontaine
leans over
the edge of the cliff
and what it was
that Joel Mc Crea
went to do
in Holland
we have forgotten
for what reason
Montgomery Clift kept
an eternal silence
and Janet Leigh
stopped at the Bates Motel
and why Theresa Wright
is still devoted
to Uncle Charlie
we have forgotten
what Henry Fonda
is not
completely guilty
and why exactly
did the American government
employ Ingrid Bergman
but
we remember
a handbag
but
we remember a bus
in the desert
but, we remember
a glass of milk
a windmill's blades
a hairbrush
but
we remember
a row of bottles
a pair of glasses
a musical score
a bunch of keys
because with them
and through them
Alfred Hitchcock succeeded
right there where had failed
Alexander, Julius Caesar
Napoleon
to take control
of the universe
maybe
ten thousand persons
have not forgotten
Cezanne's apples
but there are millionsand millions
of spectators
who will remember
the lighter
in Strangers on a Train
and if Alfred Hitchcock
was the only
accursed poet
to meet success
it is because he was
the greatest
creator of form
in the 20th century
and that these forms
tells us
in the end
what is there at the bottom
of things
now, what is art
if not where
form becomes style
and what is style
if not man
so it is a braless
blonde
tailed by a detective
who fears the void
who furnishes us
proof
that all of this
is only cinema
in other words
the infancy of art
at the outset
it felt
only a few things
and it thought
that it knew everything
later on
taken wholy
by doubt, distress
fear
faced with the mystery
of life
it begins to flutter about
and now
that it feels everything
it thinks
it knows nothing
but nevertheless
from nonchalance
to anxiety
from the loving recording
at the beginning
to the hesitant but basic
form
at the end
it is the same central force
which has steered
cinema
we follow it from inside
from form to form
with shadow
and ray
which lurk about
illuminating this
obscuring that
elevating a shoulder
a face
a raised finger
an open window
a forehead
a baby
in a crib
what plunges
into the light
is the echo
of what engulfs the night
what engulfs
the night
plunges into the invisible
which plunges
into the light
thought, look
word
action
connect this brow
this eye, this mouth
this hand
to the volumes
scarcely glimpsed
in the shadows
of the heads and the bodies
bent around
a birth
a living death
or a death
even
and maybe most of all
when he had
for an implement
of work
only black and white
even then
he handles the world
as a ceaseless drama
that the day
and the darkness
model
delve into, convulse
hush up
and make born
and die
as bidden by his passion
his sadness
by the hopeless desire for eternity
and by the absoluteness
which overwhelms
his core
an automobile headlight
a face asleep
a darkness which comes alive
beings leaning
over a cradle
where all the light is falling
a man executed
against a dirty wall
a muddy road
hugging the sea
a bend in the road
a dark sky
a ray of sun on a meadow
the empire of the wind
discovered in a cloud
there are only black lines
crossing
a beige canvas
and the tragedy of space
and the tragedy of life
contort the screen
in their fire
cinema alone
has seen
that if each one
is at their task
the masses are organized
alone
following an impeccable
harmony
where light falls
where it need
and disregards
where it need not
because it is necessary
to light one point
in the scene
and to let shadow
would reign elsewhere
it is alone
in having been
always present
in all
that it looked at
the only one which could have
permitted itself to mix
mud
with the glowing of eyes
to introduce fire
to cinders
to make a rose
shine
on the shroud
or a pale sky
as fresh
as a rose
its humanity
is really incredible
it is fateful
like a lament
wrenching
like love
dramatic
like the exchange
indifferent and unending
between all that is being born
and all that
is dying
in following
our walk towards death
on the trail of blood
which marks it
cinema does not cry
over us
it does not comfort us
since it is
with us
since it is
we, ourselves
it is there
when the cradle lights itself
it is there
when the young girl
appears to us
leaning out the window
with her eyes
which know not
and a pearl
between her breasts
it is there
when we have undressed her
when her taut torso
quivers
at the throbbing
of our lust
it is there afterwards
when she is old
her face
is sunk in
and her hands shriveled
tell us
that she does not hold it against
life
for having done her
harm
it is there
when the women
opens her knees for us
with
the same motherly feeling
that she has
in opening her arms
for the child
it is there
when the fruit
falls from her
one, two, three
how many times
in her life
it is still there
when we are old
when we look ahead fixedly
towards the side of the night
which is coming
and it is there
when we dead
and when our cadaver
passes the shroud
into the arms of our children
there it is
I am yours
which I am
which I am
who wants
to be remembered
must entrust himself
to oblivion
and this chance that it is
complete oblivion
and to
this beautiful chance
which then becomes
memory
.
.
.
Continued at:
http://jdcopp.blogspot.com/2006/12/godard-langlois-celan.html