This opinion was not so bluntly stated by Benjamin, but I believe it to be essentially true. Cult art such as the theatre is completely aura oriented, while film art partially destroys the aura. Here are a few of the fundamental differences between the two. (In my opinion, not Benjamin's).
1. The actor is no longer the master of the presentation, rather the director and editor are.
2. The actor can no longer adapt his acting to his audience. The audience is now in charge.
3. The actor is now an instrument in the presentation, no longer the center of it.
4. In theatre, illusion of reality is created as soon as the stage is defined, whereas in cinema, they must use a lot of technical tricks to produce an illusion of reality.
I believe that cinema is less a form of art than it is an entertainment medium. If something is made purely for the moneymaking potential of it, I have a very hard time calling it art, since often no introspection or meaning is inherent in the finished product of the film. To qualify this statement, there are some films that are purely artistic in their conception, so to make a blanket statement about film cannot be completely accurate. I speak mainly of mainstream Hollywood moviemaking. Benjamin stopped short of saying that film is not art, he believes that it is. But this does not come from the belief in and love of film on the part of Benjamin. He believes that basically everything is some sort of art form, thus film, no matter the quality, is a form of art. He does believe that the more technologically advanced the production of art becomes, the more the art itself is degraded. .
Mr. Benjamin's? opinions to me seem to contain a little bit of a double standard, since in some parts of his essay he seems to like technological advancement in art because of its liberating and democratizing effect. Benjamin stated thatfor the first time in world history, mechanical reproduction emancipates the work of art from its parasitical dependence on ritual .
