underground

1. What were some of the venues associated with the early underground film movement in New York City? What were some of the unique characteristics of the Charles Theater and its programming?

Cinema 16, Fashion Industries Auditorium, Living Theater, the Charles Theater, Thalia, New Yorker, the Bleeker Street Cinema
The Charles Theater had a diverse venue, from musicals to jazz shows to Italian neorealist dramas, cheap B movies and even Orson Welles's. Local art adorned the theater and it catered itself to the local art scene. Discussions would about film would erupt during the intermissions.


2. Which filmmakers did Jonas Mekas associate with the “Baudelairean Cinema”? Why did Mekas use that term, and what were the distinguishing characteristics of the films?

Artist such as Jack Smith, Ron Rice and Ken Jacobs were associated with the bauderlairean cinema, coined from the writer Baudelaire these films contained images of violence and sex and anything else considered taboo.


3. Why did underground films run into legal trouble in New York City in 1964? What film encountered legal problems in Los Angeles almost on the same day as Mekas’s second arrest in New York City?

That damned Worlds Fair -didn’t China just do something similar? Scorpio’s Rising
4. What were some of the defining characteristics of Andy Warhol’s collaboration with Ronald Tavel? What were some of the unique characteristics of Vinyl? How does Edie Sedgewick end up "stealing" the scene in Vinyl?
Tavel rewrote Clockwork Orange, stripped it down to its basic elements, and helped document Warhols factory -Vinyl was shot with one stationary camera. Sedgewick just sat on a truck and flicked her cigarette, but her eyes were so intense that they stole scene

5. In what ways did the underground film begin to "crossover" into the mainstream in 1965-1966? What films and venues were associated with the crossover? How were the films received by the mainstream New York press?
After Warhol's series, "The Chelsea Girls" was released, it gained popularity, partly due to an impressive review in "Newsweek," gave legitamacy to the film . It was the first underground film to screen at a major theater. Then the film spread throughout other major theaters around the country.


6. Why was John Getz an important figure in the crossover of the underground?

Midnight screenings of underground films at a theater owned by his uncle. called the " The Underground Cinema 12". This gave underground film more exposure then ever before.


7. How do Hoberman and Rosenbaum characterize Warhol’s post-1967 films?

He never again created anything that caused much of a buzz, but he did remain as a great influence over the sexual content in experimental films of the following era.

Fluxus

Yoko Ono - One

Although not quite as much of an assault to my optics as some of others, this film and all of the Fluxus films, in my humble opinion, take minimalism a little far. Which to answer the next question, is why the are not listed in the index of visionary film and do not fit the model of American avant garde according to Sitney. The films do not attempt to portray the mind but only explore the medium of film itself.

Responses- Smith and Warhol

Mary Jordan, Jack Smith and the Destruction of Atlantis

3. Chapter 4. What are some of the reasons suggested for Smith’s obsession with Maria Montez? What are some of your responses to the clips from the Montez films (especially Cobra Woman)?

Maria Montez, for Smith, was the epitome of a diva, she was the star of Technicolor and brought back pleasant memories of watching films as a child. She was exotic and melodramatic.

4. Chapter 5. What were some attributes of the New York art community in the 1960s, and what was the relationship between the economics of the time and the materials that Smith incorporated in to his work and films? [How could Smith survive and make art if he was so poor in the city so big they named it twice?]

In the 60’s the NY artist were a close group, so close in fact they were considered akin to an ethnic group all their own. Smith dumpster dove, so to speak, to make his props and costumes, left over fabric, mannequins and whatever else he could find. Although Smith was poor, NY was not so expensive back in the day.

5. Chapter 6. What problems emerged after the obscenity charges against Flaming Creatures in the relationship between Jack Smith and Jonas Mekas? What metaphor emerged from the conflict between Smith and Mekas?

Smith felt the Mekas used his work for profit, thus ruining the purity of art. By taking his film to various shows and profiting, Mekas was considered a Lobster, a metaphor for a scavenger, bottom feeder.

6. Chapter 7. What is John Zorn’s argument about Normal Love? How does his argument relate to some of the changes in the New York art world in the 1960s that we discussed in class? What are some arguments made about the influence of Jack Smith on other filmmakers (including Warhol)?

Zorn argues that the real art was the making of the film not the film itself. During this time in NY, there was a reaction to commercialism. Artist exploited commercial media in protest of conformity and materialism. Smith is said to have influenced many other artist that saw his films. Fellini used his imagery, Warhol copied style and he used many of the same actors that Smith did. The Factory was even reminiscent of Smiths earlier apartment film shooting.

7. Chapter 9 and 10: In what ways did Jack Smith become “uncommercial film personified”? What is meant by the slogan, “no more masterpieces” and how did Smith resist commodification (or the production of art products)?
Smith kept it real, did not sell out, his vision of the world was that art should be free and accessible. After Flaming Creatures, Smith never made another “masterpiece” in other words did not make another complete film. Later showings of his work would be edited during projection so that you would have to be there to experience it. In this way his work could never be bought and sold as a commodity.


Callie Angell, “Andy Warhol, Filmmaker”

[I have emailed part one of this article to the class, it is not on reserve.]

8. How does Angell characterize the first major period of Warhol’s filmmaking career? What are some of the films from this period, and what formal qualities did they share? What are some significant differences between Sleep and Empire?

The films were long, minimal and silent. Sleep, Kiss, Haircut, Blow Job, Eat, Empire, and Henry Geldzahler. Sleep was shot from multiple angles, different shot sizes and edits. Empire was a continuous shot without movement.

9. What role did the Screen Tests play in the routines at the Factory and in Warhol’s filmmaking?
Screen tests shot at the Factory, documented life there. Capturing and framing the people and visitors of the factory, like a series of still photographs, these tests informed Warhol’s production technique.

10. How does Angell characterize the first period of sound films in Warhol’s filmmaking career? Who was Warhol’s key collaborator for the early sound films? What are some of the films from this period and what formal properties did they share?

Ronald Travel was his main collaborator. His films had the quality of stage productions of life as it occurs. Vinyl, Poor Little Rich Girl, Restaurant, and Afternoon are some of the films.

Answers 3

Sitney, “Apocalypses and Picaresques”

2. Why does Sitney argue that synechdoche plays a major role in Christopher Maclaine’s The End, and how does the film anticipate later achievements by Brakhage and the mythopoeic form?
In the film The End, Maclaine uses the film’s apocalyptic message as a metaphor, alluding to the larger “end” of the cinematic movement. The use of mixed film stock, metaphor and doom/redemption as well as direct and indirect address leads to later forms expressed by Brakhage and the mythopoetic film.

3. What are some similarities and differences between the apocalyptic visions of Christopher Maclaine and Bruce Conner?
Both show montages of images of destruction, mushroom clouds…. but Conner juxtaposition take a more comedic tone contrasting images that are terrible and ridiculous.

4. Why are the films of Ron Rice (The Flower Thief) and Robert Nelson (The Great Blondino) examples of Beat sensibility and what Sitney calls the picaresque form?
Both of these films use irony of the image to convey the larger irony of life itself.


Bruce Jenkins, “Fluxfilms in Three False Starts.”

5. How and why were the “anti-art” Fluxfilms reactions against the avant-garde films of Stan Brakhage and Kenneth Anger. [Hint: Think about Fluxus in relation to earlier anti-art such as Dada, and Marcel Duchamp's "Fountain."]
These films sought to attack the pretentiousness of the avant garde by using the techniques of direct film manipulation, image montage or lack of image such as Zen to react and in a way reject the previous film paradigm

6. What does Jenkins mean by the democratization of production in the Fluxfilms?
He means the artist worked on each other’s films making them less personal but conveying.

7. The "zen" film is nothing but clear leader, showing nothing but a few scratches and particles the viewer has nothing to see, causing the mind to create its own story, it also reminds me of John Cage and 4:33

Dog Star Man: prelude

The images reminded me of some sort of primordial beginning. The solar shots, painted film stock and earth images combined and collided giving you the sense of the early stages of life. The hadean period moving towards the paleolithic and cambrian, the elements, earth, water, wind, fire all represented with color and images. Like synthesia, the colors have a sound of their own.

Questions 2

1. While Brakhage’s Reflections on Black is a trance film, why does Sitney argue that it anticipates the lyrical film?

In reflections on black, Brakhage begins to explore the idea of the camera being the eyes of the filmmaker. Not so much as in a dream like in trance film but how the filmmaker perceives the world. In Reflections on Black, the film imagines how a blind man “sees” the world. Brakhage uses the film itself to convey the blind mans “vision”, by altering exposure, intercutting and scratching on the film itself.

2. What are the key characteristics of the lyrical film (the first example of which was Anticipation of the Night).

The filmmaker is the protagonist of the film. Movement instead of a hero fills the screen, emulates a person looking. Superimposition, multiple perspectives and acknowledging the screen and the film media itself is characteristic of the lyrical film.

3. Which filmmaker was highly influential on Brakhage’s move to lyrical film in terms of film style, and why?

Joseph Cornell, wanted Brakhage to film the Third Ave. El before it was destroyed. Here he had to use rhythmic editing and camera movement to convey the experience of vision with no actor or dramatic structure.

4. What does Sitney mean by "hard" and "soft" montage? What examples of each does he give from Anticipation of the Night? {Tricky question; read the entire passage very carefully.]

Brakhage uses “hard” montage like the opening of Anticipation of the Night, colliding night and day shots, inversion and repetition to counterpoint the “soft” montage of images fusing shadows and blending scenes like the shadow of the rose in the bowl merging with the shadow of the protaganist.

5. What are the characteristics of vision according to Brakhage’s revival of the Romantic dialectics of sight and imagination? [I’m not asking here about film style, I’m asking about Brakhage’s views about vision.]
Vision according to Brakhage, is limited by our perception and language of what we have been taught to see. Most of what we see is ignored because our brain filters out what we perceive as unimportant information. By altering the lens, speed and film stock Brakhage attempt to show what the eye really sees remove from what we have been taught to see.

Sitney, “Major Mythopoeia”

6. Why does Sitney argue, “It was Brakhage, of all the major American avant-garde filmmakers, who first embraced the formal directives and verbal aesthetics of Abstract Expressionism.”

By scratching and painting on the film itself along with flying cameras and fast cutting Brakhage brought attention to the media itself staying away from structure and myth and focusing on the film itself as a form of expression like the artist that explored the media of paint and canvas instead of representations.

7. What archetypes are significant motifs in Dog Star Man, and which writers in what movement are associated with these four states of existence?

Birth of consciousness, innocence – Ezra Pound, Noh drama

Experience, cycle of seasons, sexual disillusionment – William Blake, Northrope Frye

Ulro, hell of rationalization, self-absorption, domination of nature- Robert Kelly

Eden, redemption – Mallarme and Stevens


Sitney, "The Potted Psalm"
[This is an addition to the syllabus. After reading the introductory paragraphs, focus on the discussions of The Cage and Entr'acte (p. 47-54 and The Lead Shoes (p. 68-70).]

8. According to Sitney, what stylistic techniques are used to mark perspective and subjectivity in The Cage, and why is this an important development in the American avant-garde film?

He used all camera times, slow, fast, normal, reverse, superimposition and stop motion, distorted lens. These radical techniques used as metaphors for the liberated eye, this paves the way for future refinements in cinematic perspective

9. For Sitney, what are the key similarities and differences between Entr'acte and The Cage?

Similarities include use of camera tricks and the chase sequence. The films differ since Entr'acte was more focused on comedy. The Cage had a more aesthetic focus

10. How does Peterson synthesize the seemingly incongruent suggestions of his Workshop 20 students into The Lead Shoes?

The intertwining of ballads, synthesis of ideas

11. Compare your response to The Lead Shoes with the descriptions by Sitney and Parker Tyler.

Unlike Parker and Sitney I did not about the combining of the ballads, but I had a sense of a story, mainly because of the soundtrack.