The ReWatchables
When you sit down to watch a movie for the first time, there is always an anticipation of the unknown. Be it in the theater, in your home, or while traveling, you are wondering, what’s going to happen? Many factors — excitement, escape, curiosity, boredom — influence the type of anticipation.
When you sit down to watch something again, those factors become reflections on expectation. Based largely on you feeling of your first viewing.
The context of now will heavily impact how you will experience a movie. Then you will carry that experience with you as your opinion of it. That is, until you rewatch it. You can love it now, but feel that it doesn’t hold up upon viewings years later. Or maybe something you disliked before, because you felt it was predictable and troupe filled, you realize later, was actually self-aware with many layers to it, that only multiple viewings could expose.
This ability to watch a story, over and over again, exactly as it was originally presented, gaining a new experience and understanding from them each time, is one of the most unique aspects of films.
But this unique viewing experience leads to questions of interpretation. How does your current state influence how you experience a film? How much stock should we put into a first viewing of a movie? Are movies meant to be watched only once? Do they deserve and/or demand multiple viewings? Should a film be only be deemed a success if it is able to convey its message on the first viewing? What does the film owe the audience member and vice versa?
I find this idea very interesting because our opinions of movies are, for the large part, etched in stone based on our initial feelings and judgements from our first viewing.
But the more I watch and rewatch movies, the more I’ve come to appreciate them on a different level. Second and third and subsequent views give me a greater context of what I’m watching and why it was made the way it was made. Having that understanding helps frame how I’m suppose to watch this story.
The marketing of a film, many times does not properly frame the intent of the filmmakers and what perspective I should have going into it.
But this framing isn’t just about the film itself. It’s about you.
A major aspect of repeat viewings is the time between them. It’s one thing when you rewatch some soon after first watching it or within a few months. But what about when you rewatch something years or even decades apart? What was relevant and topical in moment becomes dated and less impactful. What stage of life you were in, affects your point of view of the world and everything you experience in it. What was once shallow and contrite, now has depth and truth to it that you couldn’t understand in your old self and time.
This is not to say that appreciation for a film always grows with subsequent viewings. While there have been times when my initial dislike of a film has been confirmed or in even rarer cases, I’ve turned on a film after previously having a deep connection with.
But the more I rewatch movies, the more I’m surprised and delighted when I find a new (but old) movie that I love. Or discovering something new in a film I’ve seen a dozen times. Discovery doesn’t just have to be for the brand new. This is something that theater has done for centuries.
Theater has repurposed plays over and over again, that while the sets and actors may change, go by the letter of the written word, as it captures an essences of it’s enjoyment and connection. But film takes that a step further, creating a time capsule of all the creative and technical contributions that helped bring it to life.
And one of greatest components of rewatching movies is the ability to discover something new each time. This is both layered aspects of the story and characters, and little details that don’t show themselves unless you know the content intimately. Be it an off-handed comment that gives insight into motivation for a character action or signage that shows a cleaver hidden detail related to the story, these discoveries bring a whole new joy to viewing a movie.
When watching a story, the audience are detectives. From the instant the first image appears on screen, they are gathering clues as to what is going on in the world, figuring out the rules of the world, and searching for the purpose of the story as it builds. Being able to constantly to find new discoveries with each viewing is what makes a movie a classic (whether personally or culturally) and able to stand the test of time.
While not every film aims to have a lasting impact, writer/directors should consider leaving a few breadcrumbs (and layers) for audiences to continue to relive and discover again and again.
Audiences should continue to rewatch everything they have seen before, to revisit that feeling they’ve had in the past, give something a second chance, or find hidden clues that only a repeat view can expose.
Film in a medium that is not ephemeral. It is lasting. It is unique. The next time your endlessly scrolling for something new on Netflix, consider rewatching that movie you’ve seen before, whether one or a hundred times. Chances are it still has few surprises to share.
