every grain of film

Window Water Baby Moving - Stan Brakhage (1959)

2009-01-16T21:11:00.000-08:00

Part I:

Part II:

New Left Notes - Saul Levine

2009-01-16T17:22:00.000-08:00

Part I:

Part II:

Part III:

Bill T. Jones

2009-01-15T21:43:00.000-08:00

Jonas Mekas on Paris Hilton

2009-01-14T23:09:00.001-08:00

Electonic Moon # 2 - Nam Jun Paik and Jud Yalkut (1969)

2009-01-13T11:18:00.000-08:00

Andy Warhol's Silver Flotations - Willard Maas (1966)

2009-01-13T11:14:00.000-08:00

Johnny Guitar - Excerpt

2008-10-23T20:16:00.001-07:00

Some Fugazi Vids

2008-10-20T20:53:00.000-07:00

Repeater:

Song #1:

Charles Bukowski - The Secret of My Endurance

2008-10-18T19:58:00.001-07:00

Jem Cohen - Lost Book Found (excerpt)

2008-10-12T00:31:00.000-07:00

Phill Niblock - The Movement of People

2008-10-02T01:47:00.000-07:00

Bill Viola - Ocean Without a Shore

2008-09-28T12:07:00.000-07:00

Aloha, Paul

2008-09-27T13:50:00.000-07:00

How Wings Are Attached to the Backs of Angels - Craig Welch 1996

2008-08-23T14:22:00.000-07:00

Cocksucker Blues - Rolling Stones/Robert Frank

2008-04-26T14:59:00.000-07:00

David Allen Coe - Time Off for Bad Behavior1

2007-09-15T01:46:00.000-07:00

Loudon Wainwright III

2007-09-15T00:59:00.000-07:00

The Motel Song:

Ingmar Bergman - The Silence

2007-08-19T19:26:00.001-07:00

A Couch in New York (trailer) - Chantal Ackerman (1996)

2007-08-17T13:02:00.000-07:00

John Coltrane Quintet with Eric Dolphy - Impressions

2007-08-12T16:22:00.001-07:00

Harry Smith - Early Abstractions Part 3

2007-08-03T13:46:00.000-07:00

Charles Bukowski - Born Into This (excerpt)

2007-08-02T21:02:00.000-07:00

Thanksgiving Day Nov. 28, 1986 - William S. Burroughs

2007-08-01T14:44:00.001-07:00

Film by Gus Van Sant

Solomon Burke - You're the Kind of Trouble

2007-07-31T16:39:00.000-07:00

The Band - It Makes No Difference

2007-07-30T15:45:00.000-07:00

From The Last Waltz, which is on TV, like, twelve times a week.

Peter Max Commercials

2007-07-29T18:58:00.000-07:00

Intermission Refreshments:

Stop Smoking:

7-up:

7-up:

Sally Cruikshank - Make Me Psychic (1978)

2007-07-28T22:11:00.000-07:00

If you really want this cartoon to fuck you up, try watching it as a 33-year-old with chickenpox.

Walter Ruttman - Lichtspiel Opus I (1921)

2007-07-24T23:11:00.000-07:00

John & Faith Hubley - Cockaboody (1973)

2007-07-23T14:17:00.000-07:00

Viking Eggeling - Symphonie Diagonale (1924)

2007-07-20T14:05:00.001-07:00

Alexandre Alexeieff & Claire Parker - Night on Bald Mountain (1933)

2007-07-19T11:42:00.000-07:00

Norman McLaren - Pas De Deux (1968)

2007-07-17T12:08:00.000-07:00

Part One:

Part Two:

Len Lye - The Peanut Vendor (1933)

2007-07-16T11:40:00.000-07:00

Mary Ellen Bute - Dada (1936)

2007-07-15T19:28:00.000-07:00

Ray Charles - Ring of Fire

2007-07-14T19:39:00.000-07:00

From the old Johnny Cash show. If you don't like, there's something wrong with you.

Nina Simone - Ain't got no . . . I got life

2007-07-14T00:09:00.000-07:00

Live in Harlem, 1969:

P.O.V. - Arctic Son

2007-07-12T11:19:00.000-07:00

"In "Arctic Son," airing on PBS's "P.O.V." series on August 21, 2007, the clash of tradition and modernity puts a Native father and son at odds in the remote village of Old Crow, 80 miles above the Arctic Circle. Stanley Jr., raised in Seattle, is drifting deeper into drinking and partying. Stanley Sr., a distant, philosophical figure to his son, keeps the ways of his Gwitchin ancestors alive by hunting, fishing and living by his wits in the harsh arctic environment. After a lifetime apart, the two are reunited in the raw, quiet beauty of the Canadian Yukon in a story that captures the dialogue between a father and son from vastly different worlds. Find out more about this film and other P.O.V. films at www.pbs.org/pov"

Brian Eno

2007-07-11T11:30:00.000-07:00

Brian Eno & David Byrne - Mea Culpa

Brian Eno - 77 Million Paintings Interview

www.77millionpaintings.com

Baraka - Ron Fricke (1992)

2007-07-10T16:42:00.000-07:00

The Chances of the World Changing

2007-07-10T16:37:00.000-07:00

A decade ago, after an epiphany at a New York restaurant, Richard Ogust began dedicating his time and resources to rescuing endangered turtles — confiscating hundreds bound for Southeast Asian food markets. When the filmmakers catch up with the 50-year-old writer, he is sharing his Manhattan loft with 1,200 turtles, including five species extinct in the wild. But his growing "ark" and preservation efforts are threatening to exhaust him, both mentally and financially.

With luminous images and a haunting musical score, "The Chances of the World Changing," airing on PBS's P.O.V. series on July 17, 2007, documents two years in the life of a man who finds himself struggling to save hundreds of lives, including his own. Find out more about this film and other P.O.V. films at www.pbs.org/pov (more)

Kathy Rose

2007-07-08T18:04:00.000-07:00

Syncopations (1987 - excerpt):

Oriental Interplay (1991 - excerpt):

Queen of the Fluids (2004 - excerpt):

Robert Flaherty - Nanook of the North (1921)

2007-07-07T20:43:00.000-07:00

My sister-in-law forwarded me this article from the New Yorker, and I couldn't help but think of Nanook of the North, which was one of the first "nature" documentaries ever made:

My Nature Documentary
by Jack Handey July 2, 2007

Show monkey in a tree. Narrator says, “The monkey, proud and smart, in his native habitat. But one thing he does not have . . .” Show a giraffe. “. . . is a long neck, like the giraffe. Which is why nature has allowed them to combine forces.” Show monkey on giraffe’s neck. (Note: Monkey may have to be tied on.)

Then the narrator says, “The monkey can now see very far, and has protection from predators. And the giraffe has a little friendly guy to ride around on him.”

The monkey is shot by a poacher and falls from giraffe. Put ketchup on monkey to make him look bloody, but put something bad-tasting in the ketchup or monkey will lick it all off. Shoot BB gun at giraffe to make him run off.

Narrator: “The monkey and the giraffe have been separated.”

Show monkey wandering around, injured, lost and alone. Make him trip, using fishing line attached to his leg. (Try to get this on first take, because after that monkey will probably try to bite off fishing line.)

Show giraffe being chased by a lion. If not too expensive, use full-sized, realistic robotic lion, able to run at full speed. Otherwise get a man in a lion suit.

The oppressive sun beats down on monkey (heat lamp). Monkey looks up with an expression that says, “Why, oh sun, do you torment me so?” (Get good director.)

We see lion eating a giraffe. At first, we think it is our giraffe, but then we are relieved to see it is a baby giraffe.

Rock slide covers monkey (fake monkey). Show monkey crawling out (real monkey with a few heavy rocks laid on top of him).

Narrator: “Can the monkey and the giraffe survive? Will they ever be reunited?”

Show monkey trying to join group of monkeys (real monkeys or children in monkey suits, whichever is cheaper). Our monkey is driven away by the leader of the monkey pack, a vicious, snarling brute (papier-mâché marionette). Subtitle translates snarls as “You thought you were so great when you were riding on that giraffe’s neck, but you aren’t so high and mighty now.”

Show giraffe, alone in the darkness, shivering from fear (ice packs on legs). Finally, he falls asleep (sleeping pills?). We see his dream. In it, the giraffe fearfully approaches a gravestone. At first, he can’t make out the name on it, but when he finally does he is shocked. The name on the gravestone reads, “The Monkey.” The giraffe wakes up in a cold sweat (heat lamp).

Show two female explorers swimming in a crystal-clear lagoon, so you can see they’re nude. Narrator: “Meanwhile, nearby are two explorers, Laci and Brandy.” Show the explorers swimming for quite a while. Then show them getting dressed and leaving. We notice they have left behind a pair of binoculars.

The monkey is starving now. We know this because when he looks at a parrot on a branch it turns into a roasted, steaming parrot on a branch.

Narrator: “The monkey is now at the end of his rope. So he puts his faith in the Almighty.” Monkey prays. (Glue monkey’s hands together.) Show monkey walking along later. (Be sure to unglue hands first.) He sees a glowing treasure chest and opens it—it’s filled with bananas. (Have choir singing in background, so you know it’s from God.)

Refreshed and healed by that good banana nutrition, the monkey heads off. For comic relief, show monkey approaching a skunk and getting sprayed. If monkey will not approach skunk, feed monkey whiskey so he will relax and go up to skunk. However, do not let him drink too much or he may kill skunk.

Show monkey finding binoculars. Monkey learns how to use binoculars. (Have plenty of film, because this may take a long time.) Monkey climbs up tree and scans horizon. We see his point of view, which finally focusses on, yes, the giraffe! He screams (BB pellet) with joy.

Just then, the giraffe is shot by a tranquillizer dart. We show the shooters, two trappers from a zoo. We know they are evil because we saw a part earlier where they were shooting each other with tranquillizer darts, to get high.

Cut to a truck travelling across the savanna. In a cage in the back is the giraffe, looking sad (half a sleeping pill). But then we reveal that it’s not the two trappers driving the truck but the monkey! (Note: Use cheap truck, because monkey will probably wreck it.)

Show the two trappers sitting on the ground, tied up. No need to show how the monkey captured them; just have one of the trappers say, “That damn monkey!”

Show monkey releasing giraffe from cage and monkey leaping onto neck of giraffe. (Note: Monkey may not do this, so put monkey on giraffe’s neck and jerk back with harness; then show film in reverse.)

Narrator: “The monkey and the giraffe are reunited at last, as nature intended.” Show giraffe trying in vain to reach a piece of fruit high on a tree branch. The monkey clambers up on top of giraffe’s head and picks the fruit, but then eats it himself. The giraffe shakes his head and laughs. (Give giraffe something to induce choking, then dub in laughing sounds.)

Show the two female explorers returning to the lagoon, looking for the binoculars. They can’t find them, so they just decide to go swimming again.

Monkey and giraffe gallop off into sunset. Question: Would it be too much to show monkey wearing a little cowboy hat? Cute, but maybe hurts reality of the documentary.

Milcho Manchevski - Before the Rain (1994) (excerpt)

2007-07-04T19:19:00.000-07:00

Errol Morris - The Fog of War (excerpt)

2007-07-03T11:33:00.001-07:00

Errol Morris - The Fog of War (excerpt)

2007-07-03T11:33:00.000-07:00

Randy Newman - A Few Words in Defense of Our Country

2007-07-02T16:24:00.000-07:00

Jacques Derrida on Forgiveness

2007-07-02T16:14:00.001-07:00

Mahalia Jackson - I Know It Was the Blood

2007-06-28T18:35:00.001-07:00

Didn't It Rain

2007-06-28T18:29:00.000-07:00

Sister Rosetta Tharpe:

Mahalia Jackson:

Vestal Goodman:

John Prine and Iris Dement - In Spite of Ourselves

2007-06-27T19:25:00.000-07:00

Henry Miller on New York

2007-06-26T15:46:00.001-07:00

I Am Trying to Break Your Heart (excerpts)

2007-06-25T13:22:00.000-07:00

A film about Wilco.

The Pornographers - Shohei Imamura (1969)

2007-06-22T00:41:00.001-07:00

Pipeline Bodysurfing Classic 2006

2007-06-19T15:48:00.000-07:00

Jonas Mekas - Scenes from the Life of Andy Warhol (1966) (excerpt)

2007-06-15T10:45:00.000-07:00

Jonas Mekas - Scenes From the Life of Andy Warhol (excerpt) (1966)

2007-06-14T12:12:00.001-07:00

John Cage - Water Walk (1960)

2007-06-13T18:58:00.000-07:00

John Cage performing "Water Walk" in January, 1960 on the popular TV show I've Got A Secret.

via WFMU:
http://blog.wfmu.org/freeform/2007/04...

"At the time, Cage was teaching Experimental Composition at New York City's New School. Eight years beyond 4:33, he was (as our smoking MC informs us) the most controversial figure in the musical world at that time. His first performance on national television was originally scored to include five radios, but a union dispute on the CBS set prevented any of the radios from being plugged in to the wall. Cage gleefully smacks and tosses the radios instead of turning them on and off.

While treating Cage as something of a freak, the show also treats him fairly reverentially, cancelling the regular game show format to allow Cage the chance to perform his entire piece. "

Jean Luc Godard - Sympathy for the Devil (One Plus One)

2007-06-12T15:37:00.000-07:00

Originally entitled One Plus One, the film was subsequently re-titled Sympathy for the Devil by a producer. It's back on DVD as "One Plus One."

Changes in Sociaty:

All About Eve:

Sympathy For The Devil
Dir: Jean-Luc Godard, France, 1968
A Review by Stephen Glynn, Open University, UK
http://www.scope.nottingham.ac.uk/filmreview.php?issue=7&id=196

This entry to the London pop scene was not entirely a surprise move for the enfant terrible of French cinema, since Godard had shown an interest in musicals from as early as Une Femme Est Une Femme / A Woman Is A Woman (1961) where characters briefly and incongruously dance as in a Stanley Dolen film. Here Godard is not so much criticising traditional genre cinema as registering its passing: 'the musical is dead' he said bluntly in interview. "You have to do something different: my film says this too. It is nostalgia for the musical" (Milne, 1986: 182). By 1968 the director was himself ready to do something different: a final-phase demolition job on the musical, with the Rolling Stones as the agents of his destruction. Cupid Productions, co-founded by the actor Iain Quarrier for this very venture, put up £180,000. A pittance compared to most full-length features, it nonetheless constituted a larger budget than usual for Godard, and the chance to work, or so he thought, carte blanche with attractive and absolute beginners. However, the project, known during filming as One Plus One, was beset by difficulties: the Olympic Studios, London, where Godard recorded the Rolling Stones in session, caught fire; his dockyard footage of the Black Panthers had to be reshot due to sound difficulties; Godard also dashed off in the middle of filming to shoot scenes of student protest back in Paris. None of these problems, however, matched the events preceding the film's premiere at London's National Film Theatre on 29 November 1968 - events that gained far greater press coverage than the film itself.

At his press conference, Godard denounced Cupid Productions for ruining his film by changing its end without his permission. "They want to make One plus One equal two. I don't" (Thump, 1968). In Quarrier's own, separate conference, he stated that the film had been given "a miniscule gloss so that the ten million teen boppers who were going to see the film in America would understand it better" (Anon, 1968). He explained that his company had 'merely' included a complete version of the Rolling Stones' song Sympathy For the Devil at the end of the film. To accompany the song a series of treated 'artistic' images of Eve, similar to the 'Lucy In The Sky' section from Yellow Submarine (1968) were also added. Prior to the premiere, Godard came on to the NFT stage to ask the audience not to watch his film, to demand their entrance money back and contribute it to the Defence Fund for Black Panther founder Eldridge Cleaver - his proposal was defeated on a show of hands. There followed a full five-minute argument between director and audience, Godard only leaving the stage after landing a punch on the jaw of producer Quarrier. Simultaneously, outside the theatre a group of young filmmakers were preparing to show Godard's own version (his own print) free to all comers. Godard argued briefly with this audience too, before disappearing over the bridge, vowing never to return to England, never to make another commercial film, and only to shoot on 16mm for people to see in the streets.

Terrence Malick

2007-06-09T21:52:00.000-07:00

Badlands (1973):

Days of Heaven (1978):

The Thin Red Line (1998)

The New World (2005):

Fellini - 8 1/2

2007-06-08T13:30:00.000-07:00

Benjamin Smoke - DVD Trailer

2007-06-07T11:48:00.000-07:00

Trailer for the highly acclaimed documentary by directors Jem Cohen (FUGAZI: INSTRUMENT) and Peter Sillen (SPEED RACER) on legendary underground musician Benjamin. BENJAMIN SMOKE follows the crooked path of this fringe-dweller, speed-freak, occasional drag-queen and all-around renegade living in the hidden Atlanta neighborhood called "Cabbagetown," and playing with his band Smoke. This moving, heart-breaking and often funny portrait premiered at the 2001 Berlin Film Festival, won the First Prize Juror's Award at the 2001 Doubletake Documentary Film Festival and had a national theatrical release by Cowboy Pictures, garnering acclaim from critics throughout the country. The DVD edition includes over forty minutes of outtakes and interviews with Benjamin, bonus live footage of Smoke, and performances of unreleased tribute songs by Cat Power and Vic Chesnutt.

http://www.plexifilm.com

Kenneth Anger - Puce Moment (1949)

2007-06-07T11:34:00.001-07:00

Emma Goldman - Anarchist

2007-06-05T11:30:00.000-07:00

Part I:

Part II:

ANARCHISM: WHAT IT REALLY STANDS FOR (Excerpts)
Emma Goldman

Unfortunately, there are still a number of people who continue in the fatal belief that government rests on natural laws, that it maintains social order and harmony, that it diminishes crime, and that it prevents the lazy man from fleecing his fellows.

A natural law is that factor in man which asserts itself freely and spontaneously without any external force, in harmony with the requirements of nature. For instance, the demand for nutrition, for sex gratification, for light, air, and exercise, is a natural law. But its expression needs not the machinery of government, needs not the club, the gun, the handcuff, or the prison. To obey such laws, if we may call it obedience, requires only spontaneity and free opportunity. That governments do not maintain themselves through such harmonious factors is proven by the terrible array of violence, force, and coercion all governments use in order to live.

Order derived through submission and maintained by terror is not much of a safe guarantee; yet that is the only "order" that governments have ever maintained. True social harmony grows naturally out of solidarity of interests. In a society where those who always work never have anything, while those who never work enjoy everything, solidarity of interests is non-existent; hence social harmony is but a myth. The only way organized authority meets this grave situation is by extending still greater privileges to those who have already monopolized the earth, and by still further enslaving the disinherited masses. Thus the entire arsenal of government--laws, police, soldiers, the courts, legislatures, prisons,--is strenuously engaged in "harmonizing" the most antagonistic elements in society.

The most absurd apology for authority and law is that they serve to diminish crime. Aside from the fact that the State is itself the greatest criminal, breaking every written and natural law, stealing in the form of taxes, killing in the form of war and capital punishment, it has come to an absolute standstill in coping with crime. It has failed utterly to destroy or even minimize the horrible scourge of its own creation. Crime is naught but misdirected energy. So long as every institution of today, economic, political, social, and moral, conspires to misdirect human energy into wrong channels; so long as most people are out of place doing the things they hate to do, living a life they loathe to live, crime will be inevitable, and all the laws on the statutes can only increase, but never do away with, crime.

The deterrent influence of law on the lazy man is too absurd to merit consideration. If society were only relieved of the waste and expense of keeping a lazy class, and the equally great expense of the paraphernalia of protection this lazy class requires, the social tables would contain an abundance for all, including even the occasional lazy individual. Besides, it is well to consider that laziness results either from special privileges, or physical and mental abnormalities. Our present insane system of production fosters both, and the most astounding phenomenon is that people should want to work at all now. Anarchism aims to strip labor of its deadening, dulling aspect, of its gloom and compulsion. It aims to make work an instrument of joy, of strength, of color, of real harmony, so that the poorest sort of a man should find in work both recreation and hope.

To achieve such an arrangement of life, government, with its unjust, arbitrary, repressive measures, must be done away with. At best it has but imposed one single mode of life upon all, without regard to individual and social variations and needs. In destroying government and statutory laws, Anarchism proposes to rescue the self-respect and independence of the individual from all restraint and invasion by authority. Only in freedom can man grow to his full stature. Only in freedom will he learn to think and move, and give the very best in him. Only in freedom will he realize the true force of the social bonds which knit men together, and which are the true foundation of a normal social life.

Anarchism, then, really stands for the liberation of the human mind from the dominion of religion; the liberation of the human body from the dominion of property; liberation from the shackles and restraint of government. Anarchism stands for a social order based on the free grouping of individuals for the purpose of producing real social wealth; an order that will guarantee to every human being free access to the earth and full enjoyment of the necessities of life, according to individual desires, tastes, and inclinations.

Thirty Years of Tears

2007-06-04T15:30:00.000-07:00

Bob Dylan, The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll (1964)

Bob Dylan, The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll (1995)

John Cage - In Love with a Different Sound (1992)

2007-06-04T11:35:00.000-07:00

Directed by: Miroslav Sebestik

John Coltrane - Naima (1965)

2007-06-01T18:30:00.001-07:00

Harry Smith - 11 (excerpt)

2007-05-30T13:58:00.001-07:00

My Generation

2007-05-28T17:20:00.000-07:00

I didn't realize that the Who were getting so on in years.

1967:

2007:

For more visit: www.myspace.com/thezimmersband

E.L.O. / Jeff Lynne

2007-05-28T17:12:00.000-07:00

Livin' Thing:

Inner Light:

The Irish Rover - Pogues w/ the Dubliners

2007-05-27T18:27:00.002-07:00

The Kinks - Celluloid Heroes

2007-05-27T18:27:00.001-07:00

Beryl Korot - Three Tales (excerpts)

2007-05-26T14:08:00.000-07:00

Hindenburg - Part 1

Bikini - Part 1

Dolly - Part 1

The Flaming Lips

2007-05-25T14:13:00.000-07:00

Fight Test:

The W.A.N.D:

The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song:

Mark your calendars; UFOs at the Zoo comes out on DVD July 10th.

Tony Oursler

2007-05-23T13:26:00.000-07:00

Antsy

2007-05-16T12:17:00.001-07:00

Flat for a week now. I can't wait for the first boomer of the summer.

Hawai`i Aloha in Iraq

2007-05-15T11:47:00.000-07:00

Fish & Whistle - John Prine

2007-05-06T20:53:00.000-07:00

John Prine - Flag Decal (2004)

2007-05-06T18:30:00.000-07:00

Seven Dirty Words

2007-05-04T14:35:00.000-07:00

In honor of FCC v. Pacifica Radio Foundation, and because I can (thanks Reno v. ACLU):

Merle Haggard - Now and Then

2007-05-03T14:55:00.000-07:00

I Take a Lot of Pride in What I am (Then):

It's Such a Pretty World Today (Now):

Drive-By Truckers - God Damn Lonely Love

2007-05-03T14:54:00.000-07:00

October (1927) and Olympia (1938)

2007-05-03T13:50:00.000-07:00

Clip from October - Sergei Eisenstein (1927):

Made to celebrate the anniversary of the October Revolution of 1917.

Clip from Olympia - Leni Riefenstahl (1938):

Made to commemorate the 1936 Berlin Olympics.

I've always found the comparison between Eisenstein and Riefenstahl to be interesting. Both are celebrated for their advances in film aesthetics. Both were, essentially, propagandists. But they have their differences, as well. Eisenstein had an uneasy relationship with Stalinism. Though celebrated outside of the Soviet Union, his emphasis on the formal devices of filmmaking clashed with the ideas expounded by Soviet Realism. He was forced, in fact, to publicly apologize for October.

Riefenstahl, on the other hand, was a darling of Hitler and the Nazis. Recent scholarship has called into question her claims that she never supported the National Socialists and that she didn't know that she was making propaganda. Tide seems to be turning against her. Despite the brilliance of her filmmaking, I personally find it impossible to enjoy her films as films. For whatever reason, perhaps a failure of my imagination, I don't encounter the same problem with Eisenstein.

I first saw Eisenstein while in film school. Every semester we had a required film theory class. Part of that class was a "lab" that allowed us to watch full-length films. It was held once a week from 8 to 10 at night. Placing a bunch of college students in a dark room, unsupervised, and having them watch silent, B&W, Russian Formalist films is a recipe for trouble. Every semester in this lab we watched "Battleship Potemkin" (and, also, Flashdance - but that's another story). And, every semester, I fell asleep during it. Well, there was one semester that I enjoyed the company of a particularly friendly (and I would learn particularly crazy) fellow classmate, but I hardly watched the film.

It wasn't until a few years later that I saw the films in a different context. Then, I finally got what I was missing. I devoured Eisenstein's work (both films and writing) after that. I can only imagine that I bored my friends to tears during this time. But his work blew me away. Like all good film, I never saw the world the same way again after watching it.

Brakhage - Black Ice (1994)

2007-05-02T16:11:00.000-07:00

I hesitate to post any of Brakhage's films (especially his hand-painted films)here, because the medium doesn't really do them justice. They can't be sufficiently experienced outside of the traditional cinema apparatus. Plus, I figure it would be sort of an affront to the man who resisted for years all attempts to release his films on video and who seemed to sincerely believe that TV resulted in physical and mental disorders of the mind.

But, this is one of my favorite films and watching it today brought me some form of meditative peace. So, I thought I'd share it in a less than ideal form.

I'll never forget the week I spent watching Brakhage films for two hours a night during some symposium or another several years ago in New York. Brakhage was there, though somewhat weak due to his recent bought with cancer - a cancer that he blamed on the markers he used to create many of my favorite films. I miss Brakhage, too.

Paul Simon - Whither Good Taste?

2007-05-02T11:50:00.000-07:00

You know, Paul Simon takes a lot of shit from the cognoscenti. And my own opinion of his work is pretty ambivalent. I saw the humor in Bob Dylan's scorching parody of "The Boxer," and I pretty much always agreed with my old friend who said, "Do we really have to listen to THIS shit" every time anyone tried to play Simon & Garfunkel. But I'm overworked, underslept, and stressed, so I've been grooving on some fairly tame stuff lately.

Too mentally deficient to wrap my head around anything more challenging right now.

Father and Daughter:

Enjoy Every Sandwich

2007-05-01T14:12:00.000-07:00

Today New West Records released "Preludes" a collection of Warren Zevon's rare and unreleased recordings. For more information, visit: http://www.warrenzevon.com/. Sign the petition while you're there.

Damn, I miss Warren. There won't be another artist like him.

Clips from his last Letterman appearance:

Splendid Isolation (from 1993):

Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner (2002):

Lawyers, Guns, and Money:

Alain Resnais

2007-04-30T14:42:00.000-07:00

Excerpt from "Hiroshima, Mon Amour" (1959):

And Nuit et Brouillard (Night and Fog) (with a multi-language lesson)

The entire film is available (in French w/ Spanish subtitles) on YouTube. Search for "Noche y Niebla."

The Fog of War

2007-04-30T14:35:00.000-07:00

I'm swamped with finals-related junk. So, here's the trailer for Errol Morris' "The Fog of War"

And a clip from the Same:

Lubbock Lights and Jimmie Dale Gilmore

2007-04-26T14:03:00.000-07:00

Trailer from the film, Lubbock Lights:

http://www.lubbock-lights.com/

And something extra from Jimmie Dale Gilmore:

Ramblin' Man

2007-04-26T13:32:00.000-07:00

Remember, sometimes even the most dedicated followers of art grow weary and just want to watch Waylon Jennings videos:

Ed Emshwiller

2007-04-25T12:02:00.000-07:00

Thanatopsis (1962):

Sunstone (1979):

Carabosse - Lawrence Jordan (1980)

2007-04-24T12:48:00.000-07:00

" Animation, also of a new order in the recent series of short works. Mostly on black space, the figures in blue perform a very compact and jewel-like opera in surreal form, again to Satie's piano music. Ideally, the film should be projected on a 30" wide white card sitting on a music stand, center stage of a large auditorium or music hall, with sound from the projector piped into the big speaker system. The film is most effective this way, but can be shown normal-size also."

Take the 5:10 to Dreamland - Bruce Conner (1976)

2007-04-24T12:36:00.000-07:00

"A poet from the 20th century named Carl Sandberg read a poem at a reading and somebody asked him to please explain it. He said, 'Do you want me to use worser words?'" - Bruce Conner

All My Life - Bruce Baillie (1966)

2007-04-24T12:35:00.000-07:00

Be Here to Love Me: A Film About Townes Van Zandt

2007-04-23T19:44:00.000-07:00

Trailer for Margaret Brown's documentary on musician and songwriter Townes Van Zandt. Featuring interviews with Willie Nelson, Lyle Lovett, Kris Kristofferson, Steve Earle, Emmylou Harris, Guy Clark, Steve Shelley (Sonic Youth), Cowboy Junkies and more.

"Townes Van Zandt is the BEST SONGWRITER in the whole world and I'll stand on Bob Dylan's coffee table in my cowboy boots and say that" - STEVE EARLE

One Too Many Mornings

2007-04-23T19:36:00.000-07:00

Dylan, 1966:

Dylan, 1986:

30 Years of Like a Rolling Stone

2007-04-23T19:12:00.000-07:00

1966:

1966:

1976:

1978:

1981:

1994:

I've always been partial to the coked-out, Jesus-loving, gospel-background-singer concerts of the late '70s and early '80s. I think I'm pretty much alone in that opinion.

Andy Warhol - Blowjob (1964)

2007-04-20T15:11:00.000-07:00

Peter Greenaway - Windows (1974)

2007-04-20T14:55:00.002-07:00

As an aside, if anyone knows where I can get a copy of "The Baby of Macon" please let me know. Aloha.

Brakhage on Brakhage II

2007-04-20T14:55:00.001-07:00

Brakhage on Brakhage I

2007-04-19T02:03:00.001-07:00

Wild.