This easement has been in process for at least forty years, since cameras were first installed in a home to make a documentary of conventional family life. And this comfort with a camera seems to take a person into new realms of behavior. In Soderbergh's sex, lies and videotape a man induces women to confide in him about their sexuality merely by filming them with a camcorder as they talk of intimacies. Admittedly, sexual candor is not necessarily a step toward the murders in The Contenders , but the nearly thaumaturgic power of the camera tilts values scarily. The producers and the sponsors of The Contenders might have been snugly ensconced elsewhere, but these cameramen were right on hand and had the chance to warn victims.
Realism is the camera's realm and boundary.
It is what the camera glories in and is limited to. No matter how fanciful its subject, the camera photographs it realistically. This indissoluble marriage of film and realism, ordained by the camera, long ago produced a singular offspring. With television, the hunger for factualism exploded. The distinction between what was on the screen and what surrounded it was lessened.