Rashomon and "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction"

When I saw that we were reading Walter Benjamin's essay on "The Work of art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction," I was relieved because I had to read this essay last semester for one of my film courses and we spent an extensive amount of time on it. There is a definite correlation between Benjamin's essay and the film Rashomon. In Benjamin's essay he talked about the aura, which is an artwork's unique presence in space and time, but when you change something from its original form, that artwork is no longer unique. He talks about how the reproduction of takes away from contemplation aspect of the piece and instead inserts distraction into its place. This was evident to me while watching Rashomon, because I was trying to watch and take in the film but at the same time I have to be looking at the subtitles, therefore I don't think I took away as much as I could of from the film. On the other hand, Benjamin also discusses the idea of exhibition value and how it replaces what was lost when an artwork is separated from its original. Although we may have to read subtitles for Rashomon, we still see the rest of the movie the way it was intended. It is still in black and white and because the movie was reproduced it is given a greater social and market value, so more people are able to view it.