Open forum question from popularculture – Totally PC:

I always wondered about films such as Frances Ford Coppola produced film Koyaanisqasti; with the 1988 produced Powaqqatsi with George Lucas. With the final Steven Soderbergh, 2002 produced Naqoyqatsi.

The cinematic films neither carry dialogue nor a vocal narrative: their tone being set by the contrast of filmic image to music score.

Technically ‘documentaries’ they are feature length productions and would be curious to know what you think of these in regard to planning a ‘story structure’ or perhaps you may think these are more prone to treatment films?

First off, I confess I’ve only seen the first film of the Qasti Trilogy – Koyaanisqasti. As I recall, having seen the movie over 25 years ago, I was pretty well mesmerized by the film. Of course, the original music by Philip Glass was a major part of the experience.

Some background for those who aren’t familiar with the films or director Godfrey Reggio. From the movies’ website, this info:

Godfrey Reggio is an inventor of a film style which creates poetic images of extraordinary emotional impact for audiences worldwide. Reggio is prominent in the film world for his QATSI trilogy, essays of visual images and sound which chronicle the destructive impact of the modern world on the environment.

You can see the entirety of Koyaanisqatsi online here.

Here is its trailer:

Here is the opening from Powaqqatsi:

Here is the opening segment from Naqoyqatsi:

Here is Reggio’s own take on his movies:

KOYAANISQATSI is not so much about something, nor does it have a specific meaning or value. KOYAANISQATSI is, after all, an animated object, an object in moving time, the meaning of which is up to the viewer. Art has no intrinsic meaning. This is its power, its mystery, and hence, its attraction. Art is free. It stimulates the viewer to insert their own meaning, their own value. So while I might have this or that intention in creating this film, I realize fully that any meaning or value KOYAANISQATSI might have comes exclusively from the beholder. The film’s role is to provoke, to raise questions that only the audience can answer. This is the highest value of any work of art, not predetermined meaning, but meaning gleaned from the experience of the encounter. The encounter is my interest, not the meaning. If meaning is the point, than propaganda and advertising is the form. So in the sense of art, the meaning of KOYAANISQATSI is whatever you wish to make of it. This is its power.

I suppose it’s not surprising that Reggio made the trilogy without the benefit of dialogue as he spent 14 years in silence and prayer in training to become a monk. But as I recall from seeing Koyaanisqasti, the very absence of words amplified the power of visuals and music.

As to the specific question about whether such ‘tone poems’ can have a story structure — when I watched Koyaanisqasti, I certainly felt like I was in the midst of a narrative. And in fact, Reggio is credited in that film as being a “writer,” along with three others. And there are “writers” in the other two films as well.

And yet, as Reggio indicates, these movies are different than, say, a silent film. Even without dialogue, in a silent film we have ‘traditional’ characters and ‘traditional’ storylines. With the Qatsi trilogy — and I’m assuming the second and third films are directed in the same spirit as the first — whatever Reggio intended in the way of narrative is, shall we say, open-ended. It is a narrative approach that embraces gaps, chooses not to use dialogue to plug holes, enabling the viewer to fill in the blanks themselves, make their own story connections themselves.

As I say, I found the first film a remarkable experience. I’d be most curious to see what the reactions were from GITS readers who have seen any or all three of the films.