Sightlines · how to watch
How to watch Tabu: A Story of the South Seas
1931 · F. W. Murnau · Tabu: A Story of the South Seas on Sightlines
5 things to watch and listen for on a first viewing, without spoilers, and 3 more once you have seen it. Each names something you can see or hear, the pattern it belongs to, and what noticing it gives you. How these keys work.
On a first viewing
Watch the long unbroken shots of swimmers and divers. (camera)
Floyd Crosby's camera holds on bodies in motion, divers, dancers, swimmers, letting real physical movement play out in real space rather than cutting it into pieces.
Payoff: The film trusts the beauty of a body moving to carry the scene on its own.
Notice the light growing darker as the film goes on. (light)
The first half is shot bright and open, and the second half closes into shadow and confinement, even though the setting is still the same islands.
Payoff: The change in light tells you the mood of the story has changed. In the reading: line of slope / degradation. The reading calls this a line of slope: a gradual change carried by the image, not one sudden shift.
Watch shadow arrive whenever the warrior Hitu appears. (staging)
Every time Hitu enters a bright scene, his presence is marked by darkening shadow moving into the frame with him.
Payoff: Light and shadow start carrying a moral charge on their own, not just lighting a face. In the reading: expressionism / non-organic life. The reading calls this non-organic life: light and shadow carrying a moral charge on their own, not just illuminating a face.
Notice that nothing about Reri looks different after the declaration. (structure)
She looks exactly the same, but the whole world around her reorganizes itself into permitted and forbidden ground the moment she is named sacred.
Payoff: A single decree reshapes every space in the story at once. In the reading: the encompasser. The reading calls this an encompasser: a single decree that reshapes every space in the story at once.
Watch the performers move with unrehearsed physical ease. (performance)
The largely nonprofessional cast carries scenes through bodily grace and presence rather than through trained theatrical technique.
Payoff: The film gets its feeling from how people actually move, not from performed emotion.
The 3 rewatch keys open on this page when you choose "Seen it?".
Carry this in: Watch the light more than the plot. Notice how its mood changes between the two halves.