People have asked me what DAZE, the short film, is about. https://vimeo.com/225925560
I wrote this to make it easier to explain and have a consistent explanation.
Meaninglessness in Media.
Pick your favorite show. Then pick your second favorite. Now, wait. Pick your third favorite. What do all these have in common? They are all meaningless.
I’m not passing judgment.
And I’m sure you could make a compelling argument about why Friends was super important. Or why I Love Lucy is necessary
Media entertainment is an artificial intelligence that is reproducing at an alarming rate. Media feeds on our brains.
Nihilism and Burn Out.
DAZE uses a familiar pattern to show meaninglessness in the pattern. It does this by using the burnout of the main characters.
I love a good detective story. Chinatown is fantastic. I read and watched Girl with a Dragon Tattoo and Silence of the Lambs. I read Missing Person by Patrick Modiano because I was he won the Nobel Prize for Literature. I wanted to know what a Nobel Prize winner would write about. It was great, conceptual and unconventional. I watch the Twin Peaks series and found it to be fascinating. I also read and watch a lot of more conventional detective stories.
Many detective stories fall into a pattern…which is fine. Patterns provide a creative constraint and allow beautiful stories. Patterns can also be a crutch.
The pattern in DAZE is (1) discovery of crime, (2) investigation of crime, and (3) solving of the crime. This is a common pattern in many detective stories and mirrors the pattern found in “real” life.
When the pattern occurs in infinite frequency, it flattens out into a straight line. Viewed from hundreds of miles into space, all detail and texture are lost. All entertainment smooths like the earth at a great distance. It is unrecognizable as the pale blue dot.
The main characters in DAZE are at the tail end of the infinite pattern. They are in the second half of that infinite blip.
Discovery and Selfishness
The film opens and we glide through open doors, through a house, and into the backyard like sliding into a dream.
Two detectives stand around a dead body floating in a pool. One of the detectives is staring off into the distance, not looking at the pool. The other detective tries to make some small talk but triggers something in his partner. He starts ranting about pools and nature. How he hates it all.
It is not a dialogue. It is two monologues.
The characters don’t even look at each other. They do not acknowledge the body. They only acknowledge their own selves. The realization that someone has to get into the pool breaks their trance. Water is a metaphor for the subconscious.
Investigation and Memory
The detectives continue their formal investigation in the second sequence of DAZE. They drive, lost and aimless, looking for their key suspect.
The monotonous drive invokes memory. One detective tells the story of his lost love. It is particularly poignant since he is talking about high school love and he is well into the last half of his life. The detective finally tells his partner that he found his lost love on facebook and she is married now.
The sequence ends when they knock on the door of the suspect. The door opens and shuts it in their faces. They have reached the end of their search and the end of the memory of lost love.
Resolution and Fear
The interrogation scene is the anticlimax. The detectives have the suspect, handcuffed, and under their control. A few tough questions should elicit a confession and seal the deal.
Our hero detective is preoccupied. He has a medical condition. Something unusual that has been bothering him. He even called a specialist. Our hero detective reveals that he has a mole.
To anyone who has ever had a medical condition that has caused you grief while you searched the Internet for answers: this interrogation is for you.
How many people, professionals, workers, do their job while worrying about something personal? These people, like the detective, express themselves in a monologue to coworkers. They can’t focus on anything but their own problems. DAZE is a working fantasy.
And finally, a climax to release us from nothing. The suspect acknowledges the death. It was an accident. But she smiles. There is more. Do we care?
Our detectives are not listening.
Conclusion
DAZE was an experiment to call attention to the detective story form. It is a classic detective story structure uprooted by the detectives’ personal obsessions. The detectives do not acknowledge the murder or the body. The detectives do not discuss the crime. DAZE is a window into the abyss of meaninglessness.