Certified Copies and Mechanical Reproductions
My girlfriend’s Letterboxd review of Certified Copy (2010) states: “I think Walter Benjamin would have a field day with this movie.” I agree.
Certified Copy is a movie by the legendary Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami. The film engages directly with a lot of the same topics as Walter Benjamin’s The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction. Mainly, the Aura of copies (reproductions) of art. Benjamin asserts that “even the most perfect reproduction of a work of art is lacking in one element: its presence in time and space, its unique existence at the place where it happens to be[...] That which withers in the age of mechanical reproduction is the aura of the work of art.” In other words, the Aura is a work of art’s presence in time and space. Its inaccessibility, its history, its uniqueness. For example, the Mona Lisa’s place in the Louvre, the story behind the painting, its transactional history (including the times it was stolen), and its value as probably the best-known, most talked-about painting ever made.
Walter Benjamin states that mechanical reproducibility (photography and film) abolishes a work of art’s relation to its aura. One would assume that this is a bad thing, detrimental to art. Theodore Adorno and Max Horkheimer lament the loss of aura in the Dialectic of Enlightenment: “Whatever the camera reproduces is beautiful. The disappointment of the prospect that one might be the typist who wins the world trip is matched by the disappointing appearance of the accurately photographed areas which the voyage might include. Not Italy is offered, but evidence that it exists.” Walter Benjamin, on the other hand, celebrates it: “For the first time in world history, mechanical reproduction emancipates the work of art from its parasitical dependence on ritual.” The uses of the words “emancipates,” “parasitical,” and “ritual” here tell us all we need to know. The aura is ritualistic and totalitarian. It confines not only the art, but the admirer. Without mechanical reproducibility, a work of art exists only once, in one space. Before photography, the only way to appreciate the Mona Lisa was to travel to the Louvre in Paris, Starry Night at the MoMA in New York, and Guernica at the Museo Reina Sofia in Madrid. Ever since the invention of photography, though, we can know what these paintings look like from anywhere in the world. The reason an image materializes in one’s head when one reads “Mona Lisa, Starry Night, and Guernica” is because of mechanical reproducibility. Once, these works of art were confined to their time and space. If one were to see a reproduction, it would be a man-made replica or imitation. Now, we can all see perfect (or near-perfect) reproductions in textbooks or through the internet (digital reproducibility has only reinforced Benjamin’s thesis, in my opinion). As such, photography and film are the art form of the masses, since they are meant to be reproduced, and lack any kind of ritualism or authenticity. They are reasonably accessible to anyone, at any time and place.
Certified Copy begins with a speech by James Miller, one of the film’s two protagonists. He has written a book about copies of works of art, and says that the original title of the book was “Forget the Original, Just Get a Good Copy.” He goes on to say, “It’s my intention really just to try and show that the copy itself has worth in that it leads us to the original and in this way certifies its value.” Miller, however, does not just think copies have a value lesser than the original. He thinks there’s no difference in value between an original and its copy.
Miller also believes that copies and aura extend beyond art, they apply also to nature. “I believe this approach is not only valid in art. I was particularly pleased when a reader recently told me that he found in my work an invitation to self-inquiry, to a better understanding of the self[...] I would take the idea to its extreme and draw parallels between reproduction in art and reproduction in the human race. After all, it might be said we are only the DNA replicas of our ancestors.” Replicas seem to be everywhere to Miller. The fact that we only apply the positive aspects of originality to art is hypocritical. While driving by some trees, Miller says: “Look at these cypresses. They’re beautiful, they’re individual — you never see two cypresses look the same, they’re old. Originality, beauty, age, functionality — the definition of a work of art, really. Except they’re not in a gallery, they’re out in a field so nobody takes enough notice of them.” This statement does not praise replicas, but rather, it shows us that our worship of ritualistic and authentic art is misplaced. We do not think about these aspects when we look at nature, even though no two trees are the same. We ignore originality in nature, but we idolize it endlessly in art. Walter Benjamin also applies his theory to nature. He believes the aura to reside in nature as well. He states “If, while resting on a summer afternoon, you follow with your eyes a mountain range on the horizon or a branch which casts its shadow over you, you experience the aura of those mountains, of that branch.” The aura is inherently elitist, in the same way a journey to the peak of Mount Everest or a submarine ride to the Titanic is an excursion solely reserved for the bourgeoisie. In art, it’s the confinement of a painting or a sculpture to a single place, its manufactured inaccessibility, that makes it a product for the upper class.
Later on in the movie, the two protagonists visit a coffee shop. They are assumed to be man and wife by the owner, and they play along. Unexpectedly, however, they don’t stop pretending for the entire rest of the movie. They invent flaws in their marriage, backstories, anniversary dates, they act like Miller is the father of the woman’s son, and more. They are, in a sense, putting Miller’s theory into practice. They are reproducing the ideas they have of what a relationship might look like. It echoes what Miller said about his theory extending beyond the world of art, inviting self-inquiry and reflection. But these characters seem to truly believe that they are married, even though they only met today. They hold grudges against one another and feel the pain and stress that one feels when they have an ugly spout with their partner. They cry and yell and seem frustrated that they cannot rekindle what their relationship used to be. Except they were never together. Their relationship simply did not exist. This does not stop them from feeling the emotions that they feel. They are not fake emotions, they are really feeling them. They stumble for the right words to say with every fiber of their being. Does this not validate their feelings despite their relationship existing as a copy, or as an idea? I think Miller would argue that it does.
Walter Benjamin’s essay, despite never being directly mentioned, is an essential companion to Abbas Kiarostami’s Certified Copy, a film that proves its director was a true philosopher in the field of cinema.
References
Adorno, Theodor. 2016. Dialectic of Enlightenment. London, England: Verso Books.
Benjamin, Walter. 2008. The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction. Translated by Harry Zohn. Schocken/Random House. Penguin Books. https://www.marxists.org/reference/subject/philosophy/works/ge/benjamin.htm
Cover Photo by IFC Films. Edited by Madison Case.