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From: elag <elag@cloud9.net>
Newsgroups: alt.surrealism
Subject: Re: H0llyw00d Flatlands
Date: Sat, 05 Jul 2003 02:17:27 -0400
Organization: de mortuis nil nisi bonum
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Parry wrote:
>
> elag <elag@cloud9.net> wrote in message news:<3F019F19.3FEF308A@cloud9.net>...
> > Parry wrote:
> > > [snip McLaren stuff]
> > > > > I don't know how much he's appreciated, though. Seems
> > > > > all anybody wants to see nowadays is Michael Snow.
> > > >
> > > > Heh, I've actually seen several. I like them, but he does go on doesn't he?
> > >
> > > I've never actually seen one. But I've read about them, and wonder if
> > > that isn't just as good.
> >
> > Maybe almost as good as they are high concept pieces. Once you get the
> > concept you're more than halfway to experimental film nirvana.
> >
> > > For instance, as I recall one film was made
> > > by strapping the camera to a self-operated contraption and letting it
> > > spin around.
> >
> > I believe that would be "<->" aka "Back and Forth".
> >
> > > As an idea it's intriguing, as a viewing experience maybe not.
> >
> > It's not exactly entertainment in the Hollywood sense, but I do find
> > experiments entertaining.
> >
> > These experiments can get tedious after a bit even for a masochistic
> > experimental type such as myself but I think the experience is
> > worthwhile. If you get a little bored you can always take a refreshing catnap.
> >
> > You might even like a film like "Wavelength" if you can stay awake, but
> > "<->" may give you a spell of vertigo. Imagine-a film which causes vertigo...
>
> "Wavelength" is something of a murder story, isn't it?
Yes, that is part of it.
> I'd be curious to see how the narrative emerges in this film.
It does stretch the narrative form in a new way.
> To go off on a bit of a tangent, I'm recalling a short story by J.G. Ballard which was
> designed to look like the index of a book. As you read the index, the
> bits of information begin to connect and gain significance, and in
> this way its narrative emerges. That's the sort of experience one may
> have in a dream, where a innocuous activity like reading a book's
> index evolves into something larger and revealing.
ooo... that sound great... any chance you can turn up the title?
> I think any film with narrative
Or even w/o narrative...
> has the potential to connect to dreams and hope that
> watching "Wavelength" would be a similar experience.
I think that it could be experienced in this way.
>
> > > Anyway my impression is that Snow is avant-garde, whereas McLaren
> > > had an explicit affinity with surrealism, though discussion of his
> > > works often revolves around his technical innovations.
> >
> > Labels, labels... One of my professors once said that "all films are
> > experimental" to a degree and that's roughly how I look at it. What is
> > the avant garde in advance of?... Theiving Hollywood hacks?... Okay,
> > sometimes that's the case, but I bet they won't be copying Snow.
> >
> > Both of them expanded the Cinema by working their imaginations in
> > different ways, and I have learned from both of them. It is true that
> > the improvisitory animations of McClaren do have an affinity w/
> > Surrealist improvisation. Some of his other work would probably have
> > pleased them as well. His sense of humor did drift into "umour"
> > ocassionally, I suppose.
>
> I would label "avant garde" a work in which the formal properties of
> the medium become the foremost concern.
I guess I'd just say formalist, but I don't get overly concerned w/ such
terminology. There's an advance guard of form and there's an advance
guard of content. There's even an advance guard of commercialism.
> Some of McLaren's later films
> are like this -- the ones where straight lines divide and bop around,
> or where images of dancers' movements are multiplied with an optical
> printer. In these films, technique is everything, and it's the sort of
> stuff which allows critics to say his work is "about the unadulterated
> joy of movement, colour and shape. They are purely aesthetic."
I'd just say non-representational. They definitely tie in to early
films by Richter & Eggeling. There were a few filmmakers in the '20's
like Walter Ruttman & Oskar Fischinger who tried to find a visual
equivalent to music.
> I had seen these films and was indifferent to McLaren's animations until I
> saw some of his earlier work, for instance one in which the animation
> is created by gradually altering a single picture frame-by-frame
> (rather than drawing a new image for each frame), which was visually
> powerful. So now I'm a fan.
Me too. Unfortunately, I haven't seen that material for a long time and
my memory is very hazy. I hope I can find a few.
Later, I heard an interview in which
> McLaren equated his work with surrealism, presumably because his
> abstract imagery was drawn from the unconscious.
I can see that, at least in some of what I've seen.
>
> > I'll have to look for some McClaren films at the Library...
>
> Good idea. This discussion has prompted me to sign out an NFB
> documentary on McLaren -- probably the same one with the interview I
> just mentioned,
Does it include any complete films, or just excerpts?
> but I'll watch it again this wekend. It's either that
or "The Hulk."
Oh no... see the movie/ play the video game!
If it must be the Hulk just dig up some 60's reprints.
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