Listen to as well as Look

After reading Liebman’s theories on the meaning or lack of meaning in the film Un Chien Andalou, you come to realize that although the film appears to be a mismatch of random dream like images I like Lieban feel that Dali and Bunuel put a lot of thought and planning into the film. He states they “do not attempt to recount a dream” and that they more likely were using gestures and visual images in place of verbal expressions. The only words or verbal’s in the film were 5 short sentences that are thrown into the film to distract us from making any sense of the story.
Liebman goes on to explain how the scenes in the film correspond with words and many of these words have various meanings. In a way the jokes on us. As the saying goes “We’ve been had in the eye” or “ants in the pants” He connects these saying, some not as familiar in our time, to the scenes in the film, the cutting of the eye and the ants crawling out of the hand. If you think about it these avant garde films were not made for the general public but more likely the elite in society or those who think they have a broader outlook on life, writers, artists, those who think they have an edge on what’s hip. Dali and Bunuel were playing games with them, challenging their minds to find the puns on words and images, a lot of the wording in the reading explaining the theory was in French but I was still able to get the point he was making, it’s interesting once you break down a seemingly random movie the way he did how you can see all these things, as Liebman said you have to listen as well as look.

Abstract Art & Randon Form

I enjoyed the history about Germany and the UFA it's always interesting to learn something new. The film Rhythmus 21 and its art deco "look" really showed how film was advancing with the light and shadows, the depht and movement, the intricate designs and how they flowed, it amazing the drawings took 3 years to create, patience is one thing Richter sure had!
Fischinger's work is amazing. The first film reminded me of an ocean and a school of fish swimming together, how he scycronized it all to music is amazing and much more enjoyable to me than the abstract squares and such of the earlier films we saw, not to take away from them, its unbelieveable what people were able to do with film in such a short time, you have to start somewhere. I think the addition of not only music but color also added to Fischinger's impressive work, I'm not a film major so I find it incredible as to how he did what he did.
I really liked Smith's work, the little bit we got to see in color really did make a difference. It reminded me a bit of soft watercolor paintings, a fuzzy layered texture. I guess it was accomplished by his unconvential manipulation of the film, vaseline? I also liked the music, I visited the Grand Canyon in Dec. and watched some Native American dance and song and the film took me back. I can understand Smith's attraction to their music and chanting, it very soothing and spiritual. They are very private though and I wonder how they feel about him using thier sounds for his film, they are very much into nature and I can't imagine they would want their "sound" associated with such an "unusual" film. I could be wrong, just a thought.

Surrealist & DaDa Weekly Reading

The one quote from the reading that struck me was "two people watching the film at the same time would not perceive it in the same way" and this is so true. The article discusses how Anemic Cinema was erotic but in an androgynous way. I did not see that at all, maybe for its time but not today. I saw it more as a trick to the eyes with the swirls not male and female organs.
The article also discusses Ballet Macaniqu which the class gave various opinions as to what it was about when we saw it on Wednesday. The article seems to favor the idea of rythemic movement and no real plot which is what I think was our conclusion as a class. I personally felt a connection to the thought that as machinery was becomming more common place it was taking over the jobs of humans, how the film would show the woman carrying the sack, repeating her movements just like the machinery repeated its movements.

Enjoyed the History Lesson

I really enjoyed the history lesson we got in class. It really helps to understand what the artisits were thinking and what motivated them to do the things they did with art. I learned about this group of artists including Gertrude Stein in my Women of the 1800's Literature. She was a member of this group of artisting pushing the limits for their time. She was a writer and I have to say I did not enjoy the poems she did during the Cubism Dada stage but it was interesting to see and hear about the connections to the films we saw by her buddies.
I normally do not like Surrealism art or films but I really enjoyed Entr' Acte by Clair, I think he took us on a little fun journey, the baloon heads were interesting and I thought the people following the casket was funny as they started to run faster and faster. Maybe I'm just silly but I found it entertaining and interesting, wacky and very dreamlike, it was probably the most enjoyable film so far this course.

The First American Avante-Garde (Horak)

This was an interesting read, the Avante-Garde movement was quite bigger than I would have imagined considering film was only around for 20 years or so. A few things that surprised me were that in 1928 Universities were offering film classes and independent theatres were popping up all over the North East. The Little Theatre in Rochester is still functioning til this day and is the oldest theatre in the US. That would be a fun class trip!
Professionalism = Commercialism and Amateurism = Artistic Beauty, a quote from this era which I still believe is accurate in today's film world.
A few of the films talked about in the reading sound really interesting and I hope we see some of them in class. Knee Deep in Love 1926, with narration and they never showed the actors faces sounds interesting. I'm a big nature lover and I was surprised that some of the films were trying to make people more aware of cities and their effects on nature even at that time. Flaherty's Manhattan 1921 sounded interesting with the story line showing man over nature and Weinberg showing mans lost connection with the wilderness. It's amazing that the points they were trying to make approx. 80 years ago are still valid today.

Happy Germs, Gertie and Trip to the Moon

Let me start off by saying I have no interest in SciFi and prefer a documentary any day. With that said Trip to the Moon didn't do much for me. I understand some new techniques were used to make things disappear and such but it really just looked like a play with an elaborate set and a few tricks and way too many people on stage at once. The face with like whip cream on it representing the moon was bad!
Happy Germs on the other hand was creative Chol being a puppeteer you could see how he had the characters joints move like puppets and how the faces morphed into other faces was really cool, it remined me of Michael Jackson's video for Black or White (I think thats the name).
Most of all I liked Gertie, the plot was clever cutting back and forth from live people to Gertie, the emotions of Gertie and the sound track really brought her to life as did the conversation going on with her. The little touches McCay put in like the pumpkin to show her size was creative. Fun Stuff!

Philadelphia Fringe/Live Arts Festival

Some of you may be interested in this festival, it runs now thru Sept 19th. It was promoted on the cover of the To Do section of the Bucks County Courier Times. The festival is described as daring, innovative, cutting-edge, it features various art forms. You can find out more at www.phillyburbs.com