On Storytelling

During the lecture, and the reading on the creation of Third Cinema, I found myself less interested in the political agenda of the films being created, as i was with the way the narrative is constructed in different parts of the world.
This is not to say I do not understand and appreciate the importance that the political undercurrents of these films carries, however out of context, to someone unfamiliar with the conflicts that the films address, their attempts to present a new telling of the past fall on deaf ears, I personally do not know enough about the history of colonialism (not that I know nothing, but my knowledge isnt extensive), so the content of the films didnt affect me in any deep way. I think that for them to be truly effective, there has to be a bias in the viewers mind already, which can either be challenged or reinforced by the film, not created.
What I found more interesting was the differences between Western cinema and Third Cinema. Of course the technology and infrastructure is less impressive, but in terms of the way stories are told. The readings reminded me of something that had struck me years earlier. The way peoples language is formed changes the way that they live and percieve life, it is beyond just a tool. There are several small African and Native American tribes that have no past tense, in which events are retold orally as stories, occuring in the present or future even. While the reading didnt mention anything on this, it hinted at it with the notion of a different type of storytelling. However, because of their very nature as indigenous tribes, they do not have the ability or perhaps desire to film, which strikes me as unfortunate, because such a direction in the film narrative would be very compelling, even without a political agenda.