While watching the film on Duane Michals, “The Man Who Invented Himself,” I found that I was captivated by many of Michals’ quotes. For example, during the movie, there is a scene where Michals says “It is no accident that you are reading this… Remember me.” This quote in particular stuck with me because I couldn’t help but think it was extremely beautiful and poetic as soon as the words came from his mouth. I felt similarly when he talked about his piece “Many Moons.” In this piece, he talked about how, as a kid, he originally thought that there was more than one moon, and that the moon at his house, and the moon at his grandmothers’ houses were different. As he grew up, he learned that they were all the same moon, and he couldn’t help but feel that the sky seemed so empty. With both of these lines, I was mesmerized by Michals word choice and thought that, had he not become a renowned photographer, he could’ve became a renowned poet.
Another memorable line from the movie was when Michals gave the advice, do not try to be an artist. To summarize, Michals said that one should never try to be an artist, rather, you should instead be yourself. I really liked this advice because often, people will try to imitate old masters to be successful, and in the process, they lose any creativity and originality they had to begin with. In Michals’ case, I believe one of the reasons he was so successful was because, rather than trying to copy other photographers or follow any unsaid rules, Michals decided to be himself. This is seen in many of the strange scenes in the movie, such as him wearing a wig and trying to call a taxi in the wrong direction, or him having a conversation with an inanimate duck, but was especially seen in his works where he combined text with his photographs, something no one had seen before.
Lastly, one sequence from the film that stuck with me from the film was the Pandora’s Box clip. In this segment, we watch a woman reading a book look up after hearing a knock on the door. Once opening the door, she discovers a box, which, upon opening leaves her distraught. She then responds by setting the box on fire and running away from the room. Upon first viewing this, I had no idea what was happening and was very confused until the caption finally appeared, telling me what the story was about. Once I saw that the clue was describing the story of Pandora, I was inspired with ideas about how to take narrative photography. Therefore, I really enjoyed this film and feel that people can learn a lot from it, just as I have.
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