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In the Dark

Episode 1 of 10

Author and film critic David Thomson explores how cinema has changed him - and us: do we need a map for the dark? From 2011.

David Thomson, author of the Biographical Dictionary of Film, takes a highly personal journey through how cinema has changed both him and us.

Film has changed us. It is all too easy to forget what a shock the coming of the moving image was to our world. First we could see ourselves and then we could imagine ourselves and then we could hear ourselves. How we kissed, fought, dreamed and died have all been projected around the world.

David Thomson writes:

"Do you want a map for the dark? By now you either know the history of the movies or you have it wrong and all mixed up. It doesn't matter, the mixture is in your unconscious and your nervous system, and one of the consequences of the movies is that we trust nothing and imagine everything. That's why the dark is so important."

Producer: Mark Burman.

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in January 2011.

15 minutes

Last on

Tue 15 Oct 201902:15
BBC Radio 4 Extra

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