Trans-forming aristotle
by skylar caldwell
Even though film wasn’t even thought of in Aristotle’s days, I believe Aristotle would find the Transformers movies as dramatic art. Aristotle describes many different aspects of dramatic arts. Even though he talks of tragedies and poetry, I believe he would find film comparable to these. Aristotle says that ‘tragedy is essentially an imitation not of persons but of action and life, of happiness and misery.’ The Transformers movies do this. It doesn’t focus on just the person, but the events. Even though the person (Sam Witwicky) is a crucial part in the development of the movie, he’s not what makes the movie what it is. He isn’t the only one with a crucial role in the movie. ‘The unity of a plot does not consist in it having one man as its subject.’
This brings up another point brought up by Aristotle: that it’s not just the one part; it’s the whole. He says that the whole has a beginning, middle, and end. Aristotle also says that a well-constructed plot has a beginning, middle, and end: that it doesn’t just start and stop at any point. Transformers has a well-defined beginning, middle, and end. The parts are distinguishable if you know what to look for, just as with anything.
Aristotle also goes on to explain the ‘six parts of a tragedy as a whole, which determine its quality’: (1) a fable or plot (combination of incidents in the story), (2) characters (reveals the moral purpose of the agents), (3) thought (is shown in what the agents say in proving or disproving some particular point), (4) diction (the expression of the agents thoughts in words), (5) melody (the greatest of pleasurable accessories of tragedy [song] ), and (6) spectacle (stage appearance of the actors). He ranks these based on their importance. Again, Transformers has these aspects. They can easily be spotted all throughout the movies, if you pay close enough attention to the background and story development.
Aristotle explains that tragedy is meant to contain incidents that arouse fear and pity. The Transformers movies have several such incidents that create different emotions. There are several incidents that cause fear, anxiety, happiness, sadness, nervousness, anger, and frustration. Several different points can create different emotions, depending on how you choose to look at them.
The main point I found in Aristotle’s reasoning that I felt highly pertained to Transformers was that he said ‘…the poet’s function is to describe, not the thing that has happened, but a kind of thing that might happen… The distinction between historian and poet is not the one writing prose and the other verse…; it consists really in this, that the one describes the thing that has been, and the other a kind of thing that might be.’ The Transformers movies are a depiction of what could be. They let us think of what else there might be out there in the universe.
This brings up another point brought up by Aristotle: that it’s not just the one part; it’s the whole. He says that the whole has a beginning, middle, and end. Aristotle also says that a well-constructed plot has a beginning, middle, and end: that it doesn’t just start and stop at any point. Transformers has a well-defined beginning, middle, and end. The parts are distinguishable if you know what to look for, just as with anything.
Aristotle also goes on to explain the ‘six parts of a tragedy as a whole, which determine its quality’: (1) a fable or plot (combination of incidents in the story), (2) characters (reveals the moral purpose of the agents), (3) thought (is shown in what the agents say in proving or disproving some particular point), (4) diction (the expression of the agents thoughts in words), (5) melody (the greatest of pleasurable accessories of tragedy [song] ), and (6) spectacle (stage appearance of the actors). He ranks these based on their importance. Again, Transformers has these aspects. They can easily be spotted all throughout the movies, if you pay close enough attention to the background and story development.
Aristotle explains that tragedy is meant to contain incidents that arouse fear and pity. The Transformers movies have several such incidents that create different emotions. There are several incidents that cause fear, anxiety, happiness, sadness, nervousness, anger, and frustration. Several different points can create different emotions, depending on how you choose to look at them.
The main point I found in Aristotle’s reasoning that I felt highly pertained to Transformers was that he said ‘…the poet’s function is to describe, not the thing that has happened, but a kind of thing that might happen… The distinction between historian and poet is not the one writing prose and the other verse…; it consists really in this, that the one describes the thing that has been, and the other a kind of thing that might be.’ The Transformers movies are a depiction of what could be. They let us think of what else there might be out there in the universe.