Brief Summary Of The “Art Of Killing” AND “The Arbor." Essay

Introduction

The norm is to simulate the real events that occurred in the past. For instance, the American civil wars reenactment is used to mimic the hobbyist wars (Kalshoven 65). In a like manner, the veterans in America recreated to commemorate their lost comrades who lost lives in during the war.
There exist a range of the approaches to a reenactment. As thus, it is incumbent upon the actor to choose the one that best suits their piece, though the actor’s personal preference dominates. For instance, the approach that best befits the historical battles may not necessarily be efficacious to one that evince childhood trauma. However, it is not uncommon to find play writer exhibit several of the approaches in a single piece.
This paper consist a discourse on the range of approaches to reenactment in the art of killing (2012) and The Arbor (2011).

The artist Clio Barnard retells the life of the late Andrea Dunbar, an author and at the same time a dramatist (Sneider 54). The hero in the film died of hemorrhage having being weakened by alcohol at an early age of 29. The film is thus an autobiographical play of some form told in a thrilling and hilarious manner that leaves the audience glued to the film. It combines both uses of factual and fictional presentations. For instance, the biopic Dunbar survives though the real Dunbar did not (Sneider 21)
On the other side, the Act of Killing is a documentary film dating back to 1965 Indonesians’ massive killings. It is relatively long and emotionally draining. It is a documentary by an American filmmaker. In cursory, the play, films details of the atrocities that were meted on the communists in Indonesia during the anti-communism wave (Kalshoven 43). During the time, huge numbers of pro-communists lost their lives. The film sets the pace for countries like Congo to reenact their wars.

Re-enactment Approaches Employed In the Films

The growth of technology has seen the rise of modern verbatim theaters where proceeding of trial process are reconstituted and performed on stage (Kalshoven 80).
In essence, it introduces an entirely new concept of ‘verbatim cinemas.’ This art has helped to revitalize the art of reenactment, besides constituting one of the most crucial approaches. The Arbor, for instance, is a film presenting the chronology of the life of the Dunbar through images and sound. Similarly, The Act of Killing makes use of visual images to replicate the massive killings of the pro- communist’s Indonesians. This approach requires one to use images and the sound and in a way that will maintain the authenticity to an acceptable level to dig clear divide between documentary and the fictional films.
Both films present a happening of the realities of the past. The choice of the actors of the film has been carefully selected to fit their roles perfectly. For instance, the filmmaker uses men who don’t seem to understand the wrongfulness of their acts (Sneider 77). This perhaps is what allows them to act with loathe and nihilism that closely depicts the action of the real original incident to making the film more hilarious manner. All this is made a necessary recipe elicit the empathy and joy as the case may be from the viewer.
More so, as the modern art of reenactment, play writer has made it their obligation to add some unacknowledged sureness and some extra-textual qualities in order to extend a moral lesson (Kalshoven 45).
Furthermore, testimonial reenactment is another of the approach employed by these two films. This tactic requires one’s use of some interviews and some investigations to gather the right information. Specifically, the play writer heavily makes use of it by relying on the relatives’ testimonies. Nevertheless, it is not always the case that the testimonies contain truthfulness in them (Kalshoven 26).

Works cited

Schneider, Rebecca. Reenactment. Hoboken: Taylor & Francis, 2011. Print.
Kalshoven, Petra Tjitske. Crafting "the Indian": Knowledge, Desire and Play in Indianist Reenactment. New York: Berghahn, 2012. Print.