I wonder what the difference between fantasy nonsense and surrealism is.
To clarify, there are lots of films and books now which are about make-believe. They’re set in some strange land, or they have elements which are supernatural. But some of these elements feel very different from eachother.
Particularly, I am curious about two very different incarnations of “fantasy”: the sort of high-fantasy nonsense (lord of the rings, conan, anime) and the weird fantasy of surrealism (primarily david lynch)
So what is so different about these two incarnations? They both are “make believe”, right?
What does the Lady In The Radiator have to do with the elven citadel of Rivendell? Why does the Red Room in Twin Peaks feel so strange and eerie, while I feel right at home in the grunge-y dives of Tattoine? Why are they so different?
Does it have to do with how seriously the film takes it? Perhaps it’s all about how seriously the viewer takes it? A lot of it tends to be about how familiar a place is. You can put a weird coat of paint on it, but most fantasy worlds are just like our own, right down to the books, the economies, the power struggles. In contrast, surrealism tends to focus on the places at the fringes where the rules we know start to break down. My favorite surrealist stuff feels like nothing I have ever seen before, or at least like something I can barely recall from a long-forgotten dream or a nightmare.
As a couple of interesting case studies, Haibane Renmei and Kino’s Journey present a narrative with both fantasy nonsense and surrealism. The surrealism is immediately distinct in both. You can tell right away when the switch flips from one mode to the other. I’m personally much more compelled by the surreal moments, and can barely stay awake through the fantasy.
I started to think about this since I watched Suzume, which is obviously hugely influenced by Kafka on the Shore. Suzume is like a fantasy nonsense version of that book. It suffers for it, in my view, although is probably much more palatable to many people for it.