Anyway, as a souvenir of that day, I attach "The Rocky Horror Guide to
Contemporary Film Theory," which some of you may find amusing and/or
interesting.  It comes across better printed out than on the screen, but
the basic idea is to bring together lyrics from the Time Warp and quotations
from recent film theory - well, beyond that, I'll let it speak for itself.


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                      Professor Black presents . . .


            The Rocky Horror Guide to Contemporary Film Theory


THE TIME WARP (excerpt)

                                          The narrative film does not incite
It's so dreamy -                          one to action....  It encourages
                                          narcissistic withdrawal and the
                                          indulgence of fantasy which, when
Oh fantasy, free me!                      pushed further, enter into the
                                          definition of dreaming and sleep.
                                          (Christian Metz, "The Imaginary
                                          Signifier")
                                          
                                          ...the mass of mainstream film ...
So you can't see me,                      portray[s] a hermetically sealed
                                          world which unwinds magically,
No, not at all,                           indifferent to the presence of the
                                          audience, producing for them a sense
                                          of separation and playing on their
In another dimension,                     voyeuristic fantasy.  Moreover, the
                                          extreme contrast between the
                                          darkness in the auditorium (which
With voyeuristic intention,               also isolates the spectators from
                                          one another) and the brilliance of
                                          the shifting patterns of light and
Well secluded,                            shade on the screen helps to promote
                                          the illusion of voyeuristic
I see all.                                separation.  (Laura Mulvey, "Visual
                                          Pleasure and Narrative Cinema")
                                          
With a bit of a mind flip,                The impetus for creating a story
                                          time does not derive in any simple
You're into the time slip,                way from the running time of the
                                          film - screen time - but rather from
And nothing                               top-down [mental] processes seeking
Can ever be the same.                     a new order.  (Edward Branigan,
                                          "Narrative Comprehension and Film")
                                          
                                          ...the subject who has fallen prey
You're spaced out on sensation            to the filmic state (most of all
                                          when the grip of the fiction on his
Like you're under sedation -              fantasy is sufficiently strong)
                                          feels he is in a kind of daze....
                                          (Metz, "The Imaginary Signifier")
Let's do the Time Warp
Again.

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David Black
dblack@pilot.njin.net
Department of Communication
Seton Hall University

[EDITOR: pulled from alt.cult-movies.rocky-horor 16 Jun 1994]