Avant-Garde, Experimental & Non-narrative Films

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Gregory
Joined: Tue Nov 02, 2004 4:07 pm

#76 Post by Gregory » Wed Nov 01, 2006 1:31 pm

Some interested parties may not be aware of this, but a DVD of Harry Partch-related films titled Enclosure 7 quietly came out a couple of months ago as part of the Enclosures series of Partch CDs, Videos, a book, and finally this DVD. I picked it up recently from Overstock.com for about $13, and it's also available from at least a few other online retailers, as well. The Amazon listing says it's no longer available (and it also says it's R2, when it's actually NTSC R0).

A short description of Patrch for those unfamiliar: he was a great composer, inventor, and visionary who was seriously involved in music and writing from a young age and developed some iconoclastic views toward traditional music. Many of his pieces involved written texts, some of them based on his experiences traveling around by rail as a hobo during the Depression. More than anything else, though, he is known for his invented instruments: mostly tuned percussion and string instruments of unimaginably striking appearance and sound. With names like "Gourd Tree," "Spoils of War," "Cry-Chord" and "Mazda Marimba" made them out of glass bottles, different sized light bulbs, artillery shell casings, hub caps, and so on. But this was no arbitrary assortment of junk: they were all meticulously designed to produce exactly the sounds Partch wanted, and tuned to his 43-tone scale. There is really no other music that sounds like this, and Partch himself was a true original, to risk pointing out the obvious.

A couple of the films of this disc (The Dreamer That Remains and the Bonus Album Slideshow) consist of Partch enthusiastically explaining what the instruments are and why he made them the way he did. Delusion of the Fury, one of his full theatrical productions, is also included here. One of the bonus extras is Harry, in one of his more eccentric and unintelligible modes, showing us how to make rose petal jam in just one minute.

A word of warning, however: the transfers of these films are very soft, to the extent that in the dimly lit Delusion of the Fury I found it hard to clearly make out the instruments behind the dancers in the foreground (it may look better on a tube). Audio quality seems perfectly fine. It's very doubtful these will ever get a better release anywhere, so my advice is to just enjoy them as they are.
Last edited by Gregory on Thu Nov 02, 2006 4:53 am, edited 1 time in total.

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vogler
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#77 Post by vogler » Wed Nov 01, 2006 2:10 pm

Gregory wrote:Some interested parties may not be aware of this, but a DVD of Harry Partch-related films titled Enclosure 7 quietly came out a couple of months ago as part of the Enclosures series of Partch CDs, Videos, a book, and finally this DVD.
I received my copy of this dvd today. I've not had a chance to watch it properly yet but I had a quick look to see what the quality was like. The transfers are actually not a lot better than the VHS versions although the sound is a lot better, particularly on Delusion of the Fury. This makes a huge difference. Do you think the dvd was made from the same master as the VHS? I'm very happy with the disc anyway. The Dreamer that Remains is a great documentary and the performance of the composition The Dreamer that Remains is a sight to behold and probably the most bizarre musical performance ever.
The extra features are great as well, particularly the Revelation footage. I only wish there was more of it.

I am now wondering if they will release an Enclosure 8 DVD featuring the four short films Partch made with Madeline Tourtelot and there's also a few more documentaries that could be included. Have you seen the 4 Tourtelot films yet Gregory?

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Gregory
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#78 Post by Gregory » Wed Nov 01, 2006 2:39 pm

Not yet but I will soon. By the way, I read that Enclosure 7 is to be the last in the series. Still, Innova and Philip Blackburn could always issue DVDs of Enclosure 1 ("Four historic art films by Madeline Tourtelot") and even Enclosure 4 ("Delusion of the Fury" and "The Music of Harry Partch") without really considering them new additions to the series.

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Kirkinson
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#79 Post by Kirkinson » Wed Nov 01, 2006 6:54 pm

Thanks for the heads-up, I hadn't heard about the Partch DVD. I'll definitely be picking that up as soon as I can.

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#80 Post by David Ehrenstein » Wed Nov 01, 2006 8:27 pm

Le Lit de la Vierge is marvelous. Saw it once back in 1970 at the Museum of Modern Art.

Pierre Clementi and Zouzou as Christ and the Virgin Mary (sort of) with Tina Aumont and songs by Nico.

fred
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#81 Post by fred » Thu Nov 02, 2006 4:42 am

It is. Jackie Raynal has had a print of this in New York for the past several years and it has occassionally screened at Anthology. It's exquisite.

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vogler
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#82 Post by vogler » Fri Nov 03, 2006 8:04 am

davidhare wrote:Funny - I only recently got a copy of Flaming Creatures (which I had NEVER seen) and for which I have unbounding and total adoration.
I also saw Flaming Creatures for the first time very recently and thought it was fantastic and much better than I expected. Have you seen Smith's Normal Love? Also a great film. There's an excellent quality TV rip of the long version available on the share networks and a not so good shorter version available at ubu.com.
EDIT: I just watched the shorter version again and it is nowhere near as good. The time difference is about 50 minutes which is a huge amount. It also seems to be missing almost all of the footage which I found the most amazing. The more abstract imagery with incredibly beautiful and vibrant colours where you're not quite sure what you are seeing a lot of the time.

I hope that someone will eventually release a dvd set of Smith's work and the Jack Smith & The Destruction of Atlantis documentary could be included. Did anyone get a chance to see this documentary at the recent London Film Festival screenings or anywhere else for that matter?
Last edited by vogler on Fri Nov 03, 2006 7:08 pm, edited 3 times in total.

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#83 Post by Anonymous » Fri Nov 03, 2006 10:16 am

"Flaming Creatures" is one of my great pleasures. It has a unique aura of magic that no other avant-garde film of its time equals. I have seen it many times and never tire of it's exotic beauty. I highly recommend J. Hoberman's wonderful book about it, filled with great illustrations and on-set photos.

Guest

#84 Post by Guest » Sat Nov 04, 2006 6:26 am

davidhare wrote:It is also obviously adored by Rosenbaum in "Essential Cinema". His piece on this and "Scotch Tape" is very nice.

EDIT: I downloaded "Normal Love" (which took FOREVER) and if this is considered weak video I cant wait to see a better (and more complete) print!! Can you PM?
More complete will be difficult because Smith never finished another film after "Flaming Creatures". "Normal Love", "No President" and others were integrated by him into his performances and he always showed variations of these films.

Rosenbaum's writing on the film is very nice, but the film's lifelong champions remain Jonas Mekas and J. Hoberman, who both have written brilliantly about this masterwork. A Village Voice Film Guide containing decades of reviews will be released in December and I'm pretty confident it will include Mekas' review from the 60s.

Ken Jacobs has told me a lot of great anecdotes about Smith. As Ken said, Jack was someone about whom no one ever said "Oh Jack wouldn't do that".

Guest

#85 Post by Guest » Sat Nov 04, 2006 8:55 am

davidhare wrote:Of course Mekas seems to have (inadvertently?) alienated Smith with his pronunciations of high seriousness. Not that Smith's work isn't, but I assume Jack Smith was both too sensitive and too sensible (also the French meaning) to wear this label lightly.
We must remember that Jack was an extremely flamboyant artist, a man capable of doing everything, regardless of what others think of him. Mekas as well as Susan Sontag regarded "Flaming Creatures" as a serious, profound and beautiful work of art (they were of course right) and Jack felt they were pretentious. While no one can know what Jack really felt about his film, he was always very resistent to high-brow academics. His work came from his heart, so he didn't really contemplate about it as Mekas and Sontag did. From that point on Jack refered to Jonas as "Uncle Fishhook".

Ken said that Jack was definitely an intellectual, but never made it overtly explicit in his behaviour. He might seem crazy at first, but gradually revealed his sharp mind. I recommend reading the book "Wait for me at the bottom of the pool", edited by Hoberman, which collects some fine writing by Smith. Jack also wrote a little essay on von Sternberg which is included in Criterion's "The Scarlet Empress" DVD.

By the way, "production costs" for "Flaming Creatures" were $300. Tony Conrad told me they spend it on the lab costs and that was it. Jack was able to shoot the film on the roof of a building because he knew the tenant. Here is a radio report about Jack.

Fantoma is FINALLY releasing their first volume of Kenneth Anger films on DVD!

Contains the films:
Fireworks (1947)
Puce Moment (1949)
Rabbit's Moon (1950, the rarely seen original 16 minute version)
Eaux d'Artifice (1953)
Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome (1954)

The extras sound wonderful!

* High-definition transfers from newly restored elements
* Screen specific audio commentary by Kenneth Anger
* Rare outtakes and behind-the-scenes images
* 36 page hard-cover book, featuring rare photos, written appreciations by renowened filmmakers, never before seen sketches and plans for unproduced films, and more!

Jonas Mekas has updated his website with some amazing content! There are a lot of great videos up there and he announced to put up some rare Menken and Anger films on December 9th. I hope the Menken will be GO! GO! GO! Jonas Mekas really must rank among art history's major visionaries. What he does right now with his 365 diary-films reinvents cinema once again, and almost no one notices it. I am passionately following these films and am downloading them regularly. As today's film (Jan. 5th) proves once again, Mekas may be one of the last true beat poets that made Downtown Manhattan so famous in the 60s. For me, this man really represents life, living it in a way that we all should aspire to.

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vogler
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#86 Post by vogler » Sat Nov 04, 2006 9:16 am

JLG's neighbor wrote:Tony Conrad told me they spend it on the lab costs and that was it. Jack was able to shoot the film on the roof of a building because he knew the tenant.
As well as doing the soundtrack for Flaming Creatures wasn't it Tony Conrad who played the mummy in Normal Love? I have a lot of respect for Tony Conrad both as a film-maker and as a musician. It seems to me that he deserves far more credit in the field of music known as minimalism (probably more than La Monte Young).

Guest

#87 Post by Guest » Sat Nov 04, 2006 10:44 am

I'm not sure whether Conrad played the mummy in "Normal Love" or not. I'd have to ask him about it. Andy Warhol makes an appearance in that film by the way.

He did the soundtrack for "Flaming Creatures" with Jack in his back. Jack chose the records, said where he wanted them, Conrad did it.

The one thing I wonder about is what happened to the performers from "Flaming Creatures". Neither Conrad nor Jacobs know where Joel Markman, Sheila Bick, Francis Francine and Arnold Rockwood are today. Mario Montez is interviewed in the Mary Jordan documentary "Jack Smith and the Destruction of Atlantis" which I didn't have a chance to see yet.

Jonas Mekas has updated his website with some amazing content! There are a lot of great videos up there and he announced to put up some rare Menken and Anger films on December 9th. I hope the Menken will be GO! GO! GO!

acquarello
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#88 Post by acquarello » Tue Nov 14, 2006 10:52 am

Robert Todd is releasing a pair of short film anthologies on the 15th (tomorrow) at his site. From the handful that I've seen of his work, his films seem to be part structuralist, part essay film. The composition of his shots, especially of landscape, remind me a little of Rose Lowder (although without the painstaking single frame process).

One DVD is all recent films: Qualities of Stone, Bliss, Interplay, Evergreen, There: An Inverted Gloaming

The other is from his 1990-97 films: Radio Therapy, Shut up, Lost Satellite, Forgotten Time, Family History, Meditations

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vogler
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#89 Post by vogler » Mon Nov 27, 2006 10:06 am

acquarello wrote:Index has released the third Kurt Kren DVD compilation, including Which Way to CA, although their expected release of Martin Arnold's Cineseizure is still up in the air.
The Martin Arnold Cineseizure DVDis now available from Index. Also just released are 'Leo Schatzl - Farrago' and 'Jan Peters - ..but I still haven't figured out the meaning of life'.

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Gregory
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#90 Post by Gregory » Sun Dec 03, 2006 5:06 am

On Dec. 5 Mode will release John Cage's only full-length film, One11, with 103, an orchestral work. More info here. There will also be a screening of this in 35mm at Anthology Film Archives in NYC Jan 20-21.

As long as I'm posting in this thread I'll mention this article from DVDBeaver that summarizes avant-garde films available on DVD. Many of these have already been discussed in this thread (or on previous incarnations of this forum) but it's a good overview for the novice.
One very recent title mentioned in the piece that I also recommend is Tributation 99.

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vogler
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#91 Post by vogler » Sun Dec 03, 2006 9:45 am

Gregory wrote:On Dec. 5 Mode will release John Cage's only full-length film, One11, with 103, an orchestral work. More info here. There will also be a screening of this in 35mm at Anthology Film Archives in NYC Jan 20-21.
Wow - this is incredibly exciting for me since Cage is one of a few artists who have had the biggest impact on me both artistically and philosophically. I have the previous John Cage dvd from Mode 'From Zero' which is absloutely amazing. Gregory, you seem to have a talent for tracking down these awesome music releases - the Harry Partch dvd is fantastic.
Gregory wrote:As long as I'm posting in this thread I'll mention this article from DVDBeaver that summarizes avant-garde films available on DVD. Many of these have already been discussed in this thread (or on previous incarnations of this forum) but it's a good overview for the novice.
I saw this article a short while ago and it is a useful guide. I have most of the dvds listed but there was one I am not familiar with and that is the new Mystic Fire DVD, The Films of Hilary Harris: Four Visionary Short Films. Do you (or anyone else) know anything about Hilary Harris's films? I have not been able to find much information about him but I am always interested in seeing experimental films that I was previously unaware of.

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Gregory
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#92 Post by Gregory » Sun Dec 03, 2006 5:21 pm

I haven't seen the four Harris films but from what I've read about his work I'm intrigued. Nine Variations on a Dance started with a basic set of dance movements (50 seconds in duration) by a female dancer, which were filmed and edited in nine different ways. Harris's main fascination was motion, and in this film the handheld camera moves gracefully with the dancer forcing the viewer to be engaged with her movements rather than a detached spectator.
Hilary Harris wrote:The rhythmic, pulsing, changing progressino of images on the screen of a darkened room can be endowed with all the power and magic or delicacy that one can imagine. Out of our eyes all things move and express themselves in their movement The action of shapes in reality or the abstract can have a wonderful range of depth of communication, from the flick of a cat's tail to the majesty of the earth's rotation. When you begin to think about it every mood, character, animal or place has its kind of movement and, conversely, every movement expresses something.
I'm interested in seeing how the films convey not only the kinesthetic sense but also the experience of movement as a central to human (and indeed all) experience.

David Ehrenstein
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#93 Post by David Ehrenstein » Sun Dec 03, 2006 6:44 pm

If you can score a copy I write about Jack Smith at length in my book Film: The Front Line -- 1984 (Arden Press)

Jack was, as they say, a piece of work.

There are short excerpts from Flaming Creatues in The Cockettes -- as Irving Rosenthal was one of that film's stars.

Andy Warhol appears in drag in Normal Love. He can be glimpsed on a giant cake in a forest glade with chorus girls on top evoking the "No More Love in His Heart For Me" number from Roman Scandals.

Haven't seen the new Jac Smith documentary yet, but I gave the filmmakers a soundbite for it (Andy talking about why he admired Jack so much.)

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vogler
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#94 Post by vogler » Mon Dec 04, 2006 10:53 am

Gregory wrote:I haven't seen the four Harris films but from what I've read about his work I'm intrigued.
Thanks for the information Gregory. This does sound very interesting. The films of Norman McLaren and Maya Deren have led me to an interested in experimental films involving dance so I think I'll buy a copy of this dvd soon.

Amos Vogel speaks very highly of Hilary Harris:-
“Hilary is unquestionably one of the most original and talented filmmakers of the American independent cinema … he is in a class by himself, a master of his craft.â€

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vertovfan
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#95 Post by vertovfan » Wed Dec 13, 2006 9:13 am

Anyone noticed this new label? They've got a Hermann Nitsch DVD for sale now and one on Günter Brus coming up. Both are fairly pricey. I'm curious, though - the Vienna Actionists sound about as radical as you can get, content-wise.

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vogler
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#96 Post by vogler » Wed Dec 13, 2006 9:51 am

vertovfan wrote:Anyone noticed this new label? They've got a Hermann Nitsch DVD for sale now and one on Günter Brus coming up. Both are fairly pricey. I'm curious, though - the Vienna Actionists sound about as radical as you can get, content-wise.
I'd not seen that label before - looks very interesting. That Nitsch box is just way too expensive for me. The Vienna Actionists are VERY EXTREME. The only other thing I can think of that was similar was COUM Transmissions which was a performance group that preceded industrial pioneers Throbbing Gristle. I think the Actionists must have been an influence on them. To most people the Vienna Actionist performances will be absolutely disgusting - a mixture of shit, piss, vomit, maggots, harcore porn, animal slaughter and worse. Many of these things are often combined in the most unimaginably disgusting manner. The Kren films of Actionist performances are very interesting for their technical and artisitic qualities. Have you seen the Kren dvd from Index? The other actionist films are a lot more rough although there are some, such as Sodoma, which have a certain sense of revolting poetry about them. You can download or stream a very large number of Actionist films hereat ubu.com. It's extreme stuff though and likely to offend and repulse almost everyone. The philosophy of the Actionists is actually rather interesting and worth reading about.

spencerw
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#97 Post by spencerw » Wed Dec 13, 2006 10:35 am

vertovfan wrote:Anyone noticed this new label? They've got a Hermann Nitsch DVD for sale now and one on Günter Brus coming up. Both are fairly pricey. I'm curious, though - the Vienna Actionists sound about as radical as you can get, content-wise.
The Ubu website allows you to download specimens of the work of Nitsch and some other Vienna Actionists

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vertovfan
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#98 Post by vertovfan » Wed Dec 13, 2006 4:51 pm

I have the Kurt Kren Index DVD, and for the most part I found it quite interesting and really not as disgusting as I'd expected (with the exception of 20 September). The quick editing gives the films a kind of abstract quality, and the destruction of narrative continuity could be read as paralleling the various bodily deformations or transformations. Apparently Otto Muehl didn't much care for this at the time, preferring a more straightforward documentation of his actions. I've also checked out the Ubu links, but I've only skimmed through the writings and I've been meaning to give them a more thorough read. They do seem like they would shed some light on the motivations and underpinnings behind the work.

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toiletduck!
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#99 Post by toiletduck! » Wed Dec 13, 2006 6:14 pm

vertovfan wrote:Anyone noticed this new label? They've got a Hermann Nitsch DVD for sale now and one on Günter Brus coming up. Both are fairly pricey. I'm curious, though - the Vienna Actionists sound about as radical as you can get, content-wise.
Merdre! I've been interested in the Vienna Actionists after seeing Vogel's coverage of Muehl in Film as a Subversive Art. These would be a great pickup, but they are far too rich for my blood (like most releases mentioned in this thread).

Sad face.

-Toilet Dcuk

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vogler
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#100 Post by vogler » Thu Dec 21, 2006 10:30 am

vertovfan wrote:I have the Kurt Kren Index DVD, and for the most part I found it quite interesting and really not as disgusting as I'd expected (with the exception of 20 September). The quick editing gives the films a kind of abstract quality, and the destruction of narrative continuity could be read as paralleling the various bodily deformations or transformations. Apparently Otto Muehl didn't much care for this at the time, preferring a more straightforward documentation of his actions.
The Kren films are mostly quite tame compared to some of the others. It gets much more extreme. I actually prefer Kren's non actionist films but they are all very interesting. Muehl was horrified when he saw the films Kren had made and he felt that they completely destroyed the effect of the actions with regards to the continuity and structure of the performance. I think he was right but what Kren created was a new work of art independent of the actions themselves. As you said, what Muehl really wanted was straight documentaries of his art. I think in a way you have to separate the films themselves from what was actually being filmed. By that I mean they are original artworks in themselves with the main element being the editing and structure. The actions only really provided the visual material for Kren to use in his films based on these formal elements.

The original Muehl interview can be found here with images included.

In my opinion one of the most exciting avant-garde dvd releases since 'By Brakhage' (scroll down a bit).

Shoot Shoot Shoot: The London Film-Makers Co-op & British Avant-Garde Film of the 1960s & 1970s

LUX and Re:Voir are proud to announce the release of the DVD 'Shoot Shoot Shoot', the first time that works from this defining period in British artists' filmmaking have been made available on DVD or video. The 1960s and 1970s were groundbreaking decades in which independent filmmakers challenged cinematic convention. In England, much of the innovation took place at the London Film-Makers' Co-operative, an artist-led organisation that incorporated a distribution agency, cinema space and film workshop. Within this unique laboratory, filmmakers were able to control every aspect of the creative process, and the physical production of a film – the printing and processing – became vital to its form and content. Many of the films made at the LFMC explored the physical nature of the film material, using production processes that shaped the form and content of the final works.

The “Shoot Shoot Shoot" is 2 hours long and contains 13 complete films accompanied by bilingual English / French booklet written by project curator Mark Webber, with a foreword by A. L. Rees (author of “A History of Experimental Film and Videoâ€

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