Faraway, So Close!

It's hard to imagine, but many of us have become too lazy to think. Wim Wenders made a film years ago, Faraway, So Close!, a sequel to his Wings of Desire. One of the critical themes of the movie was that we have become absorbers of the image rather than participants in it. What does that mean? Well, for Wenders, it is clear that he was trying to challenge us to do more than simply absorb what comes to us via the television and film in general. To become active participants in the images we see on the screen means to reflect on what the language of the moving images speaks. Rather than just being entertained, we might digest the videos and contemplate our societies and our participation within them from the perspective of the film. In other words, rather than inhaling your dinner, chew the flavor out of it and savor each morsel.

It may be challenging to think on a philosophical level, but what happens to a society that can not think philosophically? That is something well worth contemplating in this age.