Monday, February 23, 2009
Chelsea girls response.
I'll start by saying that to me, Chelsea girls has been the most engaging film that we have watched thus far. Without meaning to be it is a perfect representation of the emotional and behavioral changes that occur while on drugs. We watch the Pope of Greenwich Village get some spike then go on a violent tirade against a harmless young lady. The scene becomes incredible emotional and one cant help but feel they are in the room marinating in the awkward tension. It even has a vivid climax as he pulls her hair and smacks her in the face five or six times. Then we watch as he rationalizes with himself over what he did, then the drugs come back into play and he mellows out. On top of all this we have Nico on the other frame crying softly with no audio. It's an almost perfect juxtaposition as one can switch sides if they become too bored or shocked with the other. It was a brilliant idea to just place a person in that state in front of a camera and see what comes out. Even the lack-luster audio quality seemed to make it more raw and unscripted (even though it was definitely not scripted in the first place.)
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
1. It is suggested that Smith's obsession of Maria Montez comes from her ability to grab the viewers attention even though she was a meteocre actress at best. It was said that she is the original diva; that when she was in a room she was all anyone could pay attention too. It seemed also in the film that she wore very flamboyant outfits that would tend to attract the gay crowd. To her defense though, she was a very pretty lady, especially in technicolor.
2. New York in the 60s was one of epicenters of deviation from the status quo's need to conform. It was here that the film makers could live cheaply in large apartments and root through garbage bins behind department stores.
3. After the obscenity chargers were brought Mekas began traveling around and showing the film; daring the police to bust them up. Smith felt that Mekas was a lobster or a crab; someone who scavenges around and takes credit for other peoples work while not paying dues to those who created it. Smith referred to him as "uncle fishhook."
4. John Zorn states about Normal Love that instead of being a film its self, Smith should have just had an audience there while he was filming. This coincides with the art movements in the 60s which stated art as an activity to do in fellowship. Smith strived to create a reality in his films that is unachievable in the real world.
7. Allen Ginsberg, Bob Dylan, and Jonas Mekas.
8. Rubins film consists of two reels: Reel A has all the sexual action on it and reel B has images of penises and vaginas among other things. It is then projected simultaneously with the audio being live radio from any station. The film cannot be reproduced or digitized as it is more of an event than a film. One would have to record a live showing to get the idea how how it works.
2. New York in the 60s was one of epicenters of deviation from the status quo's need to conform. It was here that the film makers could live cheaply in large apartments and root through garbage bins behind department stores.
3. After the obscenity chargers were brought Mekas began traveling around and showing the film; daring the police to bust them up. Smith felt that Mekas was a lobster or a crab; someone who scavenges around and takes credit for other peoples work while not paying dues to those who created it. Smith referred to him as "uncle fishhook."
4. John Zorn states about Normal Love that instead of being a film its self, Smith should have just had an audience there while he was filming. This coincides with the art movements in the 60s which stated art as an activity to do in fellowship. Smith strived to create a reality in his films that is unachievable in the real world.
7. Allen Ginsberg, Bob Dylan, and Jonas Mekas.
8. Rubins film consists of two reels: Reel A has all the sexual action on it and reel B has images of penises and vaginas among other things. It is then projected simultaneously with the audio being live radio from any station. The film cannot be reproduced or digitized as it is more of an event than a film. One would have to record a live showing to get the idea how how it works.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Reading Response Four
I have to admit that I was surprised by George Maciunas 10 Feet. Usually in avant-garde there tends to be a movement away from math and set patterns; especially ones that the viewer can figure out. I figured that 10ft was supposed to be a metaphor for something else but it turns out it was exactly what it said it was: 10 ft (of film). The best part was that it skipped 8 but in my head I knew exactly when 9 was coming. One on the other hand is a interesting film because of my obsession with slow motion. One is much more engaging than 10 Feet because not only does it show an image; it's an image we wouldn't be able to enjoy because of it's brevity.
1. Guns of the Trees, Rabbitshit Haikus, and Diaries Notes and Sketches are all films from the time period that Mekus states was the birth of "Baudelairean Cinema." Charles Baudleraire was a poet poet in the later 1800s that also lambasted religion in is work. Aside from both being polemicists, each of these men are recognized as brining back romanticism to their movement in art. Both men also actively participate in the critiquing of the art that they themselves participate in.
2. Mekus's views on avant garde cinema changed in the late 1950s and early 1960s due to the impression of nouvelle vague in France. Nouvelle Vague is an all-inclusive term for French filmmakers in the '50s and '60s that were linked by their self-scious rejection of classical cinematic form and youthful iconoclasm. Mekus also saw a rise in new filmmakers coming from various countries that hadnt had time to become established directors. He also saw a change over from strictly "experimental" films to more active and socially conscious works. Seeing that the early films had led up to this new movement, he began to go back and watch those also.
3. Mekus's passion for acting shaped his views on film in the 1960s to the point where he picked 4 films for awards because of their use of performance and who was performing. He also stated that he was less interested in classical acting than spontaneous performance that comes about in Engels and Leacocks films.
5. Jack Smith uses a number of visual techniques in Flaming Creatures. He used outdated color stock to produce pastel hues and murky, high contrast shots to create different depths and ranges of space. The film itself is 10 scenes that are more or less held together by rhythm and separately loosely into 3 episodes. The photography changes for each scene like a musical piece.
Callie Angell
6. Angell characterizes Warhols first period of filmmaking as minimalist and generally "unwatchable." Films like Sleep and Empire which both are more than 5 hours long and both feature little or no action during a static shot on one subject
7. Not only did screen tests help Warhol learn specific ways of posing, framing, and lighting his subjects but they also served as a guest book for all the famous writers, actors, and filmmakers that came through his factory at the time. The screen tests paralleled other works of his such as "Photobooth pictures," an exercise in serial photography.
1. Guns of the Trees, Rabbitshit Haikus, and Diaries Notes and Sketches are all films from the time period that Mekus states was the birth of "Baudelairean Cinema." Charles Baudleraire was a poet poet in the later 1800s that also lambasted religion in is work. Aside from both being polemicists, each of these men are recognized as brining back romanticism to their movement in art. Both men also actively participate in the critiquing of the art that they themselves participate in.
2. Mekus's views on avant garde cinema changed in the late 1950s and early 1960s due to the impression of nouvelle vague in France. Nouvelle Vague is an all-inclusive term for French filmmakers in the '50s and '60s that were linked by their self-scious rejection of classical cinematic form and youthful iconoclasm. Mekus also saw a rise in new filmmakers coming from various countries that hadnt had time to become established directors. He also saw a change over from strictly "experimental" films to more active and socially conscious works. Seeing that the early films had led up to this new movement, he began to go back and watch those also.
3. Mekus's passion for acting shaped his views on film in the 1960s to the point where he picked 4 films for awards because of their use of performance and who was performing. He also stated that he was less interested in classical acting than spontaneous performance that comes about in Engels and Leacocks films.
5. Jack Smith uses a number of visual techniques in Flaming Creatures. He used outdated color stock to produce pastel hues and murky, high contrast shots to create different depths and ranges of space. The film itself is 10 scenes that are more or less held together by rhythm and separately loosely into 3 episodes. The photography changes for each scene like a musical piece.
Callie Angell
6. Angell characterizes Warhols first period of filmmaking as minimalist and generally "unwatchable." Films like Sleep and Empire which both are more than 5 hours long and both feature little or no action during a static shot on one subject
7. Not only did screen tests help Warhol learn specific ways of posing, framing, and lighting his subjects but they also served as a guest book for all the famous writers, actors, and filmmakers that came through his factory at the time. The screen tests paralleled other works of his such as "Photobooth pictures," an exercise in serial photography.
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Questions 02/03
The film Allegreto by Fischinger is completely different from Cormans House of Usher. Not only is Fischingers film animated but it is also in color and deals solely in the beauty of the image and it's connection to the sound. Cormans film shows the growing need to tell a story that comes into Hollywood. Some aspects of expressionism do come out in House of Usher , specifically with the large german-expressionist sets and the canted angles.
Sitney on Brakhage
1. When it comes to film and vision, Brakhage demands that the filmmaker show what he sees rather then what he/she has been taught to see or thinks they should see. He also believes that have been taught to be unconscious of what we really see. He believes that vision includes eye movements and changes in focus of what the mind sees as well as shapes formed when ones eyes are closed and what one sees during dreams or "brain movies." This coincides with Wallace Stevens who states that reality is the product of our imagination as it shapes the world and that the eye is just a thing, a "vulgate of experience." Both he and Brakhage are trying to capture moments specifically in time in the exact way each of them perceived them. To Brakhage it's by turning the camera into a third eye with all of the movements and randomization of a real eye while Stevens uses words to achieve the impossibility of direct knowledge of reality.
2. Going back to page 168 in Lyrical film, Sitney also argues that because of Brakhages ideas of vision and their application to his films he stumbled upon a representation of space that corresponds to that of Abstract Expressionism that did not occur to him. My example for Sitneys arguement is action painting (sometimes used as a synonym for Abstract Expressionism). In action painting the artist drips, slings, or throws paint into a canvas depending on their movement or action. Basically the painting would come out as a record physical expression of the artist. Brakhage does the same thing when he paints/ scratches on film; granted on a much smaller canvas. This even shows in the editing of Window Water Baby Moving as it shows is excited and disoriented state during such an event.
Sitney "Apocolypses and Picaresques"
3. Sitney says the use of Synecdoche, meaning "simultaneous understanding," plays a major role in MacLaine's films. Specifically in the section in The End where Charles is running from the police and then "with his last dime he removed himself from the red tape..." we are shown a turnstile and then the golden gate bridge. Even though it isn't state outright, through the sound and the image it is understood he jumped from the bridge. To quote Sitney "the combination of picture and sound at the conclusion of the next episode exemplifies the latter." This happens again in the next section with the suicide of John being compared to the dancers legs and sleeping bum. After seeing the The End Brakhage also tried to go beyond the trance film as MacLaine did by making a three part film with a unifying theme Reflections on Black. He also used the ideas of direct and indirect address in Blue Roses and helped MacLaine distribute his films.
4. MacLaines view on doom seems to be more of a serious outlook. Each apocalypse (for each character) is presented in a somber fashion with deep narration. Conner on the other hand seems to have a more comical, matter-of-fact outlook. The scene in which the guy meets the girl, they ride the horse, and then are blown up by the atomic bomb could be seen as funny, I don't think that was it's original intention. MacLaine seems to be aware of death and the apocolypse and wishes there was something to do about it while Conner seems to just point it out and accept it; "engendering the viewer into a state of ambivalence."
5. Both The Flower Thief and The Great Blondino are expressions of Beat sensibility because they go against mainstream culture and give critical representations of it. Both films are picaresque examples because each involves a "roguish main character who lives by their wits in a corrupt society."
Bruce Jenkins "Fluxfilms in Three False Starts" (this article was hard to read)
7. What jenkins means by the democratization of production is that he created a way for anyone to make films that are so-called "art." Since fluxfilms are there solely to refute the highly established, highly creativity based films that were at the time considered art they needed a way to produce films in an easy way. Thus making fluxfilms available by the yard and going against all the time and effort taken by Brakhage and his peers.
8. Na June Paiks Zen for Film fixed material and aesthetic terms for production by taking it all the way down to just film. This way the film is in its more pure form and the viewer is left to cultivate an experience out of it. Since the film would become more and more worn out as it played over and over, the film would look different each time one would see it. It breaks down the film into what it actually is, just a strip of something running through a machine.
Sitney on Brakhage
1. When it comes to film and vision, Brakhage demands that the filmmaker show what he sees rather then what he/she has been taught to see or thinks they should see. He also believes that have been taught to be unconscious of what we really see. He believes that vision includes eye movements and changes in focus of what the mind sees as well as shapes formed when ones eyes are closed and what one sees during dreams or "brain movies." This coincides with Wallace Stevens who states that reality is the product of our imagination as it shapes the world and that the eye is just a thing, a "vulgate of experience." Both he and Brakhage are trying to capture moments specifically in time in the exact way each of them perceived them. To Brakhage it's by turning the camera into a third eye with all of the movements and randomization of a real eye while Stevens uses words to achieve the impossibility of direct knowledge of reality.
2. Going back to page 168 in Lyrical film, Sitney also argues that because of Brakhages ideas of vision and their application to his films he stumbled upon a representation of space that corresponds to that of Abstract Expressionism that did not occur to him. My example for Sitneys arguement is action painting (sometimes used as a synonym for Abstract Expressionism). In action painting the artist drips, slings, or throws paint into a canvas depending on their movement or action. Basically the painting would come out as a record physical expression of the artist. Brakhage does the same thing when he paints/ scratches on film; granted on a much smaller canvas. This even shows in the editing of Window Water Baby Moving as it shows is excited and disoriented state during such an event.
Sitney "Apocolypses and Picaresques"
3. Sitney says the use of Synecdoche, meaning "simultaneous understanding," plays a major role in MacLaine's films. Specifically in the section in The End where Charles is running from the police and then "with his last dime he removed himself from the red tape..." we are shown a turnstile and then the golden gate bridge. Even though it isn't state outright, through the sound and the image it is understood he jumped from the bridge. To quote Sitney "the combination of picture and sound at the conclusion of the next episode exemplifies the latter." This happens again in the next section with the suicide of John being compared to the dancers legs and sleeping bum. After seeing the The End Brakhage also tried to go beyond the trance film as MacLaine did by making a three part film with a unifying theme Reflections on Black. He also used the ideas of direct and indirect address in Blue Roses and helped MacLaine distribute his films.
4. MacLaines view on doom seems to be more of a serious outlook. Each apocalypse (for each character) is presented in a somber fashion with deep narration. Conner on the other hand seems to have a more comical, matter-of-fact outlook. The scene in which the guy meets the girl, they ride the horse, and then are blown up by the atomic bomb could be seen as funny, I don't think that was it's original intention. MacLaine seems to be aware of death and the apocolypse and wishes there was something to do about it while Conner seems to just point it out and accept it; "engendering the viewer into a state of ambivalence."
5. Both The Flower Thief and The Great Blondino are expressions of Beat sensibility because they go against mainstream culture and give critical representations of it. Both films are picaresque examples because each involves a "roguish main character who lives by their wits in a corrupt society."
Bruce Jenkins "Fluxfilms in Three False Starts" (this article was hard to read)
7. What jenkins means by the democratization of production is that he created a way for anyone to make films that are so-called "art." Since fluxfilms are there solely to refute the highly established, highly creativity based films that were at the time considered art they needed a way to produce films in an easy way. Thus making fluxfilms available by the yard and going against all the time and effort taken by Brakhage and his peers.
8. Na June Paiks Zen for Film fixed material and aesthetic terms for production by taking it all the way down to just film. This way the film is in its more pure form and the viewer is left to cultivate an experience out of it. Since the film would become more and more worn out as it played over and over, the film would look different each time one would see it. It breaks down the film into what it actually is, just a strip of something running through a machine.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
