{"id":144,"date":"2006-11-15T11:23:04","date_gmt":"2006-11-15T15:23:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/archives\/144"},"modified":"2014-09-09T11:29:04","modified_gmt":"2014-09-09T16:29:04","slug":"by-brakhage-disc-2-1959-2001-stan-brakhage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/archives\/144","title":{"rendered":"By Brakhage disc 2 (1959-2001, Stan Brakhage)"},"content":{"rendered":"

A thorough viewing of the second disc of my favorite DVD set in the world this weekend. Some thoughts:<\/p>\n

I do not know how to talk about Brakhage. Mostly on this site I talk about story, quality of performance… how do I talk about a non-narrative motion painting? Don’t have the background or vocabulary for that.<\/p>\n

Cat’s Cradle<\/em> and Window Water Baby Moving<\/em> are early ones with actual camera shots of actual things. The editing of Window Water<\/em> is entrancing.<\/p>\n

Mothlight<\/em> will be great forever. I’ve watched it twenty times now.<\/p>\n

Then, chronologically, came Dog Star Man<\/a><\/em> and Act Of Seeing<\/a><\/em>, which I haven’t watched yet because I am afraid of them. The scariest nightmare I’ve had in a decade resulted from falling asleep during my only attempted viewing of Dog Star Man<\/em>, and if Window Water<\/em> is so attractive and disturbing, I can just not imagine how my stomach will feel after viewing The Act Of Seeing<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Eye Myth<\/em> (a nine-second film) took a year to complete because Brakhage had to convince himself that it could be done, had never done a hand-painted film before. Mothlight<\/em> was almost a decade earlier, but I guess Eye Myth<\/em> was a big step. I’ve watched it a ton of times just because I can.<\/p>\n

I’m not so wild about the visuals of The Wold Shadow<\/em> (painting on glass over a view of the forest) or The Stars Are Beautiful<\/em> (creation myths with shots of home and chickens with sync sound) or Kindering<\/em> (kids at play), but then The Dante Quartet<\/em> and Rage Net<\/em> hit hard… some of my favorites of the painted films.<\/p>\n

Black Ice<\/em> and Delicacies<\/em> and Study In Color<\/em> are creepy. The screen shots below reveal nothing about those two. The Dark Tower<\/em> is always a favorite. And I don’t remember ever seeing Commingled Containers<\/em> before so I watched it three times. Can’t understand what it is, what those things are, what is happening. Something in a stream? What are “containers”? Beautiful, of course. That applies to all of the above… beautiful, beautiful, blah.<\/p>\n

Need to read Brakhage’s book(s), to read Fred Camper’s writings, to read the DVD liner notes again and listen to the interviews with Brakhage on the discs. But I don’t expect to learn much that will gain me a deeper appreciation of the films… they need no explanation.<\/p>\n

Matt Stone and Trey Parker were Brakhage’s students. He acted in Cannibal the Musical<\/em> and loved the South Park<\/em> movie<\/a>. Incredible.<\/p>\n

Katy did not watch it. I’m afraid to show her any Brakhage. What if she doesn’t love it? How will I explain or convince?<\/p>\n

A barrage of screen shots.<\/p>\n

Cat’s Cradle
\n\"image<\/p>\n

Window Water Baby Moving
\n\"image<\/p>\n

Mothlight
\n\"image<\/p>\n

Eye Myth
\n\"image<\/p>\n

The Wold Shadow
\n\"image<\/p>\n

The Garden of Earthly Delights
\n\"image<\/p>\n

The Stars Are Beautiful
\n\"image<\/p>\n

Kindering
\n\"image<\/p>\n

I… Dreaming
\n\"image<\/p>\n

The Dante Quartet
\n\"image<\/p>\n

Nightmusic
\n\"image<\/p>\n

Rage Net
\n\"image<\/p>\n

Glaze of Cathexis
\n\"image<\/p>\n

Delicacies of Molten Horror Synapse
\n\"image<\/p>\n

For Marilyn
\n\"image<\/p>\n

Black Ice
\n\"image<\/p>\n

Study in Color and Black and White
\n\"image<\/p>\n

Stellar
\n\"image<\/p>\n

Crack Glass Eulogy
\n\"image<\/p>\n

The Dark Tower
\n\"image<\/p>\n

Commingled Containers
\n\"image<\/p>\n

Love Song
\n\"image<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A thorough viewing of the second disc of my favorite DVD set in the world this weekend. Some thoughts: I do not know how to talk about Brakhage. Mostly on this site I talk about story, quality of performance… how do I talk about a non-narrative motion painting? Don’t have the background or vocabulary for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[74,13,21,148],"class_list":["post-144","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movie","tag-avant-garde","tag-criterion","tag-shorts","tag-stan-brakhage"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=144"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9331,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144\/revisions\/9331"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=144"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=144"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=144"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}