Just for the pleasure

My favorite scenes in Pretty in Pink are, pretty predictably, all the ones involving Ducky. Obviously, the disc shop scene is a monument, as is the one when he talks to the bouncer. But what strikes me in both cases is how little dramatic justification these two scenes have. They're there just for the pleasure of spending time with a character who ends up being a lot more than just the foil to the girl (which James Spader ends up being for the boy, although his charisma saves him). Duckie is the one stray element in the film, infinitely more physical than Molly Ringwald or Andrew McCarthy, and though he's probably, with Harry Dean Stanton, the one who suffers most in the film, he's the one most capable of inhabiting his body with sheer joy.

Likewise, Ferris Bueller's Day Off is one long string of scenes that are just for the pleasure. Which is why the least convincing bits (though they are still fun) are the ones involving Jeffrey Jones once Sloane has been picked up from school. They're there to provide some sort of narrative stake, which goes against the grain of the rest of the film: that day off is one big digression.

Also, what is it about museums and perfect scenes? Two great films find their souls in them.

Swingtime

Battle Royale

What's so surprising with Battle Royale, given its reputation and especially its pitch, is how many positive examples of humanity Fukasaku actually gives us. The film is full of quiet moments of cooperation, love, help... (This might explain why I don't find the "villain" who joins in the game for the killing that convincing. He acts like an invincible zombie more than any thing else, unlike the other two "monstrous" characters of the film, Mitsuko and Kitano). What makes it all the more poignant is how easily those are destroyed by the children themselves when they internalize the dynamics of adults bent on setting all forms of rebellion against each other. This means not only a despairing outlook in which rebellion becomes something that feeds into the plans of power, but also, more hopefully, a vision of simple humanity lending a hand to others as the most basic but most essential act of resistance.

And the ending is one of the great puzzles of modern cinema.

What's most disappointing in Haneke's The White Ribbon, especially given its aims (to represent how a repressive protestantism can destroy the community it tries to uphold) is how almost completely it fails at representing community. The diverse strands of the narrative (doctor, preacher, peasant, baron, teacher) are very rarely brought in contact with one another. The teacher, who narrates the story, seems to have little to no contact with either the peasant family or the doctor, and most of these narrative strands exist in isolation from one another. However many scenes happen in the streets, there is no sense of the village as a public space in which social forces interact (as villages go, Kiarostami's The Wind Will Carry Us or Shimizu's Children in the Wind or Four Seasons of Children could teach Haneke a thing or two... or fifty).

The case of the peasant family is the most typical: regarded with contempt more than empathy (but then the only attempts at empathy in the film are rather unconvincing, i.e. the too-naive to be touching romance between the teacher and a young woman he ends up marrying (probably)), they are represented as suffering from their economic quasi-enslavement to the baron, though that is denied any force: the father tells his son that they are now starving and cannot find work, but there is no depiction of any process, of any attempt to find food for the family, of anything other than the fighting between father and son. They never interact with any of the other characters, apart from one scene which really drives the failure home: at church, the baron makes a speech about those who mishandled his son and how the farmer's son mishandled his cabbages. Though in the communal milieu par excellence, the scene could almost be happening solely between the farmer and the baron: the shots of other members of the audience shown are faces of strangers, giving no opportunity to connect any of the characters we know to this particular issue. There is no sense of roaming, of opening up to other unforeseen interactions, either: Haneke implies, rather heavy-handedly, that the other peasants could be in that same uncomfortable situation one day, but since there is no sense of who these other peasants are, or of what community they form, the point is purely intellectual. There is no sense of how the same framework connects to the teacher, the doctor, the preacher (mentioned briefly at this point in the voice-over, but who carries in this scene zero dramatic significance).



The same could be said of the village ball scene, which serves, in a classical manner, as a superficial setting of joy before the chaos starts: Haneke only pays attention to individual interactions on the margins, except for one brief (and precious) shot highlighting the animosity between eastern European immigrant labourers and the local Austrians. Apart from that, the party might as well have been cancelled with no dramatic impact.

As in Tarantino's uninteresting Inglorious Basterds, which for all its load of hype contained one of the most beautiful images of the last ten years (Shoshanna projected ona burning screen, her face seen in the smoke), Das Weisse Band contains one of the most beautiful shots of the year, which starts off as the most perfect vision of a child's fear I know of, but sadly ends up rejoining the film with its obsession of making a point over observing its unfolding. The doctor's young son climbs down the stairs, calling his sister in a trembling voice, making the supreme effort of entering a dark room (but only moving within the ray of light projected from the door), not finding her there, going back to look for her in a room he has already seen... The first half of that shot is priceless; it conjures a sense of primal fear more effective than the rest of the film put together.

Nicole Brenez and the avant-garde, vol. II

Here is the second part of that list I started a post earlier. My first impression is that though more of the titles are familiar, less of them seem readily available on youtube or such easy sources. Maybe I'll get around to posting links for those I can find, but no guarantees.

1970-1980:
Cuadecuc-Vampir de Pere Portabella, Esp., 1970, 75'
Sochaux 11 juin 68 du Collectif de cinéastes et travailleurs de Sochaux, 1970, 20'
No Pincha de Tobias Engel, Guinée-Bisseau, 1970, 80'
Jean Genet parle d'Angela Davis de Carole Roussopoulos, Fr, 1970, 8'
Brésil: rapport sur la torture de Saul Landau et Haskell Wexler, USA, 1971, 60'
Punishment Park de Peter Watkins, USA, 1971, 88'
Numéro Zéro de Jean Eustache, Fr, 1971, 120'
Main Line de Michel Bulteau, Fr, 1971, 102'
Two-Lane Blacktop de Monte Hellman, USA, 1971, 102'
Island Fuse de Arthur et Corinne Cantrill, Australia, 1971, 11'
L'Extase des anges de Koji Wakamatsu, Jap., 1972, 89'
Letter to Jane de Jean-Luc Godard et Jean-Pierre Gorin, Fr, 1972, 60'
Sous les drapeaux, l'Enfer de Kinji Fukasaku, Jap., 1972, 96'
Winter Soldier de Winterfilm Collective, USA, 1972, 96'
Sex Garage de Fred Halsted, USA, 1972, 35'
La dialectique peut-elle casser des briques? de René Viénet, Fr, 1972, 90'
Silver Surfer de Mike Dunford, GB, 1972, 15'
L'Autre Scène de Dominique Avron, Claudine Eizykman, Guy Fihman et Jean-François Lyotard, 1972, 6'
Mourir pour des images de René Vautier, Fr, 1973, 45'
La Société du spectacle de Guy Debord, Fr, 1973, 88'
Images of Asian Music (A Diary from Life) de Peter Hutton, USA, 1973-74, 29'
L'heure de la libération a sonné de Heiny Srour, Liban/Yemen, 1974, 52'
Honky Tonk de Tav Falco, 1974, USA, 26'
Avec le sang des autres de Bruno Muel, Fr, 1974, 49'
Edvard Munch de Peter Watkins, Sweden-Norway, 1974, 210'
Quand on aime la vie on va au cinéma du Groupe Cinéthique, Fr, 1975, 90'
Ali au pays des merveilles de Djouhra Abouda et Alain Bonnamy, Fr, 1975, 49'
Les Saisons de Artavazd Pelechian, USSR, 1975, 29'
Leave Me Alone de Gerard Theuring, RFA, 1975, 120'
Underground de Emile De Antonio, USA, 1976, 88'
Sodom and Gomorrha, New York 10036 de Rudy Burckhardt, USA, 1976, 6'15
S.C.U.M. Manifesto de Carole Roussopoulos et Delphine Seyrig, Fr, 1976, 20'
Allée des signes de Gisèle et Luc Meichler, Fr, 1976, 21'
Salomé de Téo Hernandez, Fr, 1976, 65'
Guacamole de Chick Strand, USA, 1976, 10'
New York Portrait: Chapter One de Peter Hutton, USA, 1978-79, 16'
Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome de Kenneth Anger, USA, 1978, 39'
Cinématons de Gérard Courant, in process since 1978
Roulement, rouerie, aubage, de Rose Lowder, Fr, 1978, 15'
Bon pied bon oeil et toute sa tête du Groupe Cinéthique, Fr, 1978, 80'
Soma de Maria Klonaris et Katerina Thomadaki, Fr, 1978, 50'
Retour d'un repère de Rose Lowder, Fr, 1979, 19'

1980-1990:
Au bon peuple portugais de Rui Simoès, Portugal, 1980, 110'
Stridura de Ange Leccia, Fr, 1980, 13'
3rd Degree de Paul Sharits, USA, 1982, 24'
Selva de Maria Klonaris, Fr, 1982, 75'
Les Tournesols de Rose Lowder, Fr, 1982, 6'
Nuestra Senora de Paris de Teo Hernandez, Fr, 1982, 6'
Beach Umbrella de Raphael Montanez Ortiz, USA, 1985, 8'
L'Affaire des Divisions Morituri de F.J. Ossang, Fr, 1985, 81'
You Can Drive the Big Rigs de Leighton Pierce, USA, 1986, 15'
The Inspector d'Arthur Omar, Brésil, 1988, 12'
Le troisième oeil d'André Almuro, Fr, 1988, 35'
Impressions en haute atmosphère de José Antonio Sistiaga, Esp, 1989, 75'
Images du monde et inscription de la guerre de Harun Farocki, RFA, 1989, 75'
Cruises de Cécile Fontaine, Fr, 1989, 10'
Test d'ouverture pyrotechnique sur conteneur (CP1) Optomat "R" d'Alexis Martinet, Fr, 1989, 13'

1990-2000:
See You Later/Au revoir de Michael Snow, Canada, 1990, 18'
Sanctus de Barbara Hammer, USA, 1990, 19'
La Plage de Patrick Bokanowski, Fr, 1991, 14'
A Child Garden & the Serious Sea de Stan Brakhage, USA, 1991, 73'
Red Shovel de Leighton Pierce, USA, 1992, 8'
VRFilm de Joost Rekveld, Netherlands, 1994, 2'
Meni de Karel Doing, Netherlands, 1994, 6'
The Color of Love de Peggy Ahwesh, USA, 1994, 10'
50 Feets of String de Leighton Pierce, USA, 1995, 51'
Prigioneri della guerra de Yervant Gianikian et Angela Ricci Lucchi, It, 1996, 62'
Vertical Air de Robert Fenz, USA, 1996, 28'
Ile de Beauté de Ange Leccia & Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster, Fr, 1996, 70'
Tribologie de Yves Berthier et Jean-François Dalle, Fr, 1996, 11'
En une poignée de mains amies de Jean Rouch et Manoel de Oliveira, Portugal, 1997, 35'
Docteur Chance de F.J. Ossang, Fr-Chili, 1997, 97'
Ma 6-T va crack-er de Jean-François Richet, Fr, 1997, 95'
Starship Troopers de Paul Verhoeven, USA, 1997, 129'
Retrospectroscope de Kerry Laitala, USA, 1997, 4'
L'Envers de Patrice Kirchhofer, Fr, 1998-2000, 20'
Va te faire enculer de Yves-Marie Mahé, Fr, 1998, 10'
Sombre de Philippe Grandrieux, Fr, 1998, 110'
Il n'y a rien de plus inutile qu'un organe d'Augustin Gimmel, Fr, 1999, 9'

2000-(the book is dates september 2006)
Battle Royale de Kinji Fukasaku, Jap, 2000, 114'
Le profit et rien d'autre ou (réflexions abusives sur la lutte des classes) de Raoul Pevk, Fr, 2000
Cargo de Laura Waddington, Netherlands, 2001, 30'
Où gît votre sourire enfoui? de Pedro Costa, Fr/Portugal, 2001, 104'
Pulsar de Maria Klonaris, Fr, 2001, 15'
Exposed de Siegried A. Fruhauf, Austria, 2001, 9'
Les Soviets + l'électricité de Nicolas Rey, Fr, 2001, 175'
Meditations on Revolution, Part IV: Greenville, MS de Robert Fenz, USA, 2001, 29'30
Escape d'Alain Declerq, Fr, 2001, 11'30
Aldebaran de Hugo Verlinde, Fr, 2001, 9'
Marocaine à deux dimensions de Brahim Bachiri, Fr, 2002, 10'
La Vie nouvelle de Philippe Grandrieux, Fr, 2002, 102'
Untitled part 3b: (as if) beauty never ends... de Jayce Salloum, Liban-Canada, 2002, 11'22
Manifeste de Hélène Deschamps et Hugo Verlinde, Fr, 2002, 12'
Samouraï de Johanna Vaude, Fr, 2002, 12'
Nu lacté de Lionel Soukaz et Othello Vilgard, Fr, 2002, 5'
Charlemagne 2 - Piltzer de Pip Chodorov, Fr, 2002, 22'
Nouba de Katia Kameli, Algérie, 2003, 5'
Azé de Ange Leccia, Fr, 2003, 72'
A l'Ouest des rails de Wang Bing, China, 2004, 540'
11000 km Far from New York de Orzu Sharipov, Tajikistan, 2004, 17'
Man. Road. River de Marcellvs L., Brésil, 2004, 10'
Night for Day de HC Gilje, Norway, 2004, 28'
Une Visite au Louvre de Jean-Marie Straub et Danièle Huillet, Fr, 2004, 49'
Terrae de Othello Vilgard, Fr, 2004, 7'
Border de Laura Waddington, Bel., 2004, 30'
Instructions for a Light and Sound Machine de Peter Tscherkassky,Aust., 2005, 17'
Degradation #1, X-Ray: Shroud of Security de James Schneider, International, 2006, 3'30.

A Nicole Brenez, les spectateurs reconnaissants...

Nicole Brenez writes like nobody else at the moment. What gets me every time is the sharpness of her pen: she's able to express an idea with more clarity and less words than most people I know, yet she can make it incisive, tough and biting (yet always generous) in a way very few people can match without sounding fanatical.
Her small pamphlet on the Avant-garde for Les Petits Cahiers is no exception. While it's probably more of a warm-up for her Jeune, Dure et Pure than a full-fledged detailed discussion of avant-garde cinema, it's still one of the most refreshing reads in a while (though I'm currently in the middle of The Material Ghost which isn't bad either...). She ends with some documents from the history of the avant-garde, and a reading list and a viewing list. I might get around to posting the reading list as well, though I doubt it, but for the moment here's the first part of the viewing list:



1900-19210:
The Big Swallow de James A. Williamson, USA, 1901, 2'
L'Homme-Mouche de Georges Méliès, Fr, 1902, 3'
Série 1 (vols d'insectes) de Lucien Bull, Fr, 1904, 4'
Les lunettes féeriques de Emile Cohl, Fr, 1909, 5'

1910-1920:
Onénisme Horloger de Jean Durance, Fr, 1912, 5'
Les tourbillons cellulaires de Henri Bernard et C. Dauzère, Fr, 1912, 9'
La Folie du docteur Tube d'Abel Gance, Fr, 1915, 10'

1920-1930:
Symphonie Diagonale de Viking Eggeling, All, 1921, 9'
Rythmus de Hans Richter, All, 1921, 4'
Entr'acte de René Clair, Fr, 1924, 22'
Strike de S.M. Eisenstein, URSS, 1924, 95'
Ballet Mécanique, Fernand Léger, Fr, 1924, 18'
Anemic Cinema de Marcel Duchamp, Fr, 1925, 7'
Ménilmontant de Dimitri Kirsanoff, Fr, 1926, 35'
Combat de Boxe de Charles Dekeukelaire, Bel, 1927, 8'
Inflation de Hans Richter, All, 1927, 3'
La P'tite Lilie de Alberto Cavalcanti, Fr, 1927, 20'
Sur un air de Charleston de Jean Renoir, Fr, 1927, 21'
The Fall of the House of Usher de Hames S. Watson et Melville Webber, USA, 1928, 12'
Un Chien Andalou de Luis Bunuel, Fr, 1928, 16'
Disque 957 de Germaine Dulac, Fr, 1928, 6'
L'Etoile de mer de Man Ray, Fr, 1928, 17'
La Marche des machines d'Eugène Deslaw, Fr, 1928, 9'
Etudes sur Paris d'André Sauvage, Fr, 1928, 76'
La Petite marchande d'allumettes de Jean Renoir, Fr, 1928, 29'
Les Nuits électriques d'Eugène Deslaw, Fr, 1929, 10'
Marseille Vieux-Port de Laszlo Moholy Nagy, Fr, 1929, 9'

1930-1940:
A Propos de Nice de Jean Vigo, Fr, 1930, 31'
Lot in Sodom de J.S. Watson et M. Webber, USA, 1930, 25'
Lichtspiel Schwarz-Weiss-Grau de Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, All, 1930, 5'30
Le Fleuve Sumida de Zen Amaya, Jap, 1931, 20'
Limite de Mario Peixoto, Brésil, 1931, 120'
Taris ou la natation de Jean Vigo, 1931, 10'
Les Berceaux de Jean Epstein, Fr, 1931, 5'
Les Berceaux de Dimitri Kirsanoff, Fr, 1931, 7'
Que Viva Mexico de S.M. Eisenstein, Mexique, 1931-32, unfinished
Le Bonheur d'Alexandre Medvedkine, URSS, 1932, 95'
Rapt de Dimitri Kirsanoff, Suisse, 1934, 88'
Rainbow Dance de Len Lye, GB, 1936, 5'
Early Abstractions de Harry Smith, USA, 1939-1956, 22'
Meshes of the Afternoon de Maya Deren et Alexander Hammid, USA, 1943, 13'

1940-1950:
Jammin' the Blues de Gjon Mili, USA, 1943, 12'
Le Tempestaire de Jean Epstein, Fr, 1947, 15'
Fireworks de Kenneth Anger, USA, 1947, 15'
Le Sang des bêtes de Georges Franju, Fr, 1949, 22'
Lost, Lost, Lost de Jonas Mekas, USA, 1949-63-1976, 178'

1950-1960:
Le Film est déjà commencé? de Maurice Lemaître, Fr, 1951, 62'
L'Anti-concept de Gil J. Wolman, Fr, 1952, 70'
In the Street de Helen Levitt, Janice Loeb, James Agee, USA, 1952, 16'
Under Brooklyn Bridge de Rudy Burckhardt, USA, 1954, 20'
Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome de Kenneth Anger, USA, 1954, 38'
Weegee's New York de Arthur "Weegee" Felling, USA, 1954, 20'
Les Maîtres fous de Jean Rouch, Fr, 1954, 36'
Visages dans l'ombre de Peter Weiss, Suède, 1956, 6'
Free Radicals de Len Lye, NZ, 1957-1979, 5'
Flesh of Morning de Stan Brakhage, USA, 1956-86, 21'
Une simple histoire de Marcel Hanoun, Fr, 1958, 68'

1960-1970
Actions de rue de Ben, Fr, 1960-1972, 25'
The House is Black de Forough Farrokhzad, Iran, 1962, 20'
Saïn de Masao Adachi, Jap, 1962, 56'
Prison de Robret Lapoujade, Fr, 1962, 13'
Cosmic Ray de Bruce Conner, USA, 1962, 4'
Ai (Love) de Takahiko Iimura, USA, 1962, 10'
Towers Open Fire de W.S. Burroughs et Anthony Balch, USA, 1963, 10'
Lapis de James Whitney, USA, 1963-1966, 10'
A Caça de Manoel de Oliveira, Portugal, 1964, 21'
Film de Samuel Beckett, GB, 1964, 22'
Quixote de Bruce Baillie, USA, 1964-65, 40'
Walden (Diaries, Notes and Sketches) de Jonas Mekas, USA, 1964-69, 180'
Now de Santiago Alvarez, Cuba, 1965, 6'
Pestilent City de Peter Emanuel Goldman, USA, 1965, 16'
Oskar Langenfeld, 12 fois de Holger Meins, RFA, 1966, 13'
Méditerranée de Jean-Daniel Pollet, Fr, 1966, 40'
The Chelsea Girls de Andy Warhol, USA, 1966, 195'
Meet Marlon Brando de Albert et David Maysles, USA, 1966, 28'
Breakaway de Bruce Conner, USA, 1966, 8'
Films Fluxus, USA, 1966sq (George Maciunas, Albert Finne, Yoko Ono, John Cale...)
Off the Pig - Black Panthers de Newsreel, USA, 1967, 15'
Chronique d'Anna Magdalena Bach de Jean-Marie Straub et Danièle Huillet, All, 1967, 94'
Fuses de Carolee Schneeman, USA, 1967, 25'
The Hour of the furnaces de Fernando Solanas et Octavio Getino, Argentine, 1968, 260'
Préparation d'un Cocktail Molotov, anonyme (Holger Meins), RFA, 1968, 3'
Mickey Mouse au Vietnam de Lee Savage, USA, 1968, 1'
T,O,U,C,H,I,N,G de Paul Sharits, Usa, 1968, 12'
Ciné-Tracts, collectif, Fr, 1968, length unknown
Film-Tract no 1968 de Gérard Fromanger (avec Jean-Luc Godard), Fr, 1968, 3'
Le Révélateur de Philippe Garrel, Fr, 1968, 60'
El Chacal de Nahueltoro de Miguel Littin, Chili-Mexique, 1969, 95'
La premièrecharge à la machette de Manuel Octavio Gomez, Cuba, 1969, 80'
Grève et occupation d'Apollon de Ugo Gregoretti, It, 1969, 76'
The Gladiators de Peter Watkins, GB, 1969, 80'
Comment pouvons-nous le supporter de Christian Boltanski, Fr, 1969, 0'30''
Vite de Daniel Pommereulle, Fr, 1969, 35'
Deux Fois de Jackie Raynal, Fr, 1969, 72'
Le Rouge de Gérard Fromanger, Fr, 1969, 3'
Nouvelle société no 5, 6 et 7 du Groupe Medvedkine de Besançon, Fr, 1969, 30'
British Sounds de Jean-Luc Godard et Jean-Henri Roger, GB, 1969, 52'
Graphyty de Jean-Pierre Bouyxou, Fr, 1969, 20'
HWY: An American Pastoral de Paul Ferrara, USA, 1969, 50'
Necrology de Standish Lawder, USA, 1969, 1970, 12'


I'll post the other half at some point soon... Some of the short ones are available on internet, so I'll make it a pleasure of watching many over the next few days!

Films of a man who should have been free

Boris Barnet makes films that defy viewing, for the simple reason that he's almost completely uninterested in narration. For both Okraina and By the Blues of Seas, the first reaction has been one of admiration and curiosity, with little emotion, whereas the second viewing in both cases has been a major event. I suspect that his narrative (non-) technique might be the source of that initial confusion, as well as the source of the subsequent endearment.

What is striking when seeing Okraina again is how little he cares about classical narrative structure. He doesn't even rebel against it (à la L'Avventura), he just works as if every scene were the next's equal, as if every moment deserved to make as much sense as the previous (and of course, in his hands, they do) without necessarily leading to the next, except maybe following a logic that lies in small details as much as in narrative events per se. That might make his films slightly harder to get a grip on (simply put, they don't fit any other model of narrative), but it also makes every moment a quasi-epiphany.

This refusal to priviledge any event can make for the most free inventions/surprises in thirties cinema. The scene when the soldiers leave is already remarkable for its refusal to dwell in any length on the father's sorrow, showing him only as often as trains departing or crowds rushing by, but when Barnet cuts back to him for the last time, it is to show him leaving the frame, only to reveal Manka standing beside him, still looking in the direction the soldiers left to. Manka, until now not part of the scene, and yet, as the constant beacon of pre-politicized humanist tenderness, always at the heart of the film...