It was out of technical necessity that they planted the camera in one place and let the world happen in front of it. Whatever the motive, the results suggest how much of the real movie magic is a passive phenomenon, a matter of standing back and letting things take place. I cannot otherwise account for the power of Boat Leaving the Harbor, in which some women stand on a jetty watching some men set off into a fairly rough sea in a small boat. The audience had an infinite curiosity, and there was an apparently infinite supply of objects for that curiosity to batten on. It was as if they had seen nothing.
Every subject becomes exotic by virtue of being filmed.
The world was to be made over for their benefit, brick by brick and dog by dog. We, on the other hand, begin to feel that we have seen everything. Life imitates movies, and movies themselves imitate other movies. We would like to go back, and the irony is that through the machinery of movies we can enjoy the illusion of doing so. It isn't lost, it's merely lost to us, who are condemned to inhabit the other side of the screen.