The rules that the Bush and Kerry campaigns attempted to impose on news networks covering their debates may have made for a good laugh at the politicians’ expense, but David Thomson says that the participants’ aversion to reaction shots can be lumped in with the movie and television industry’s move away from “two-shots” and other camera angles designed to emphasize the space around individuals. These days, it seems like close-ups are the only thing anyone cares about. “There was once a set of theories on film direction, or mise en scène, that attested to the aesthetics and the ethics of using spatial relationships in movies.”