More Nicole Brenez lists...

I will do some blogging other than just posting NB lists here, I promise! Even though those seem to be quite succesfull, I do want this blog to be something else than just lists.

But in the meantime, here is what Brenez contributed to the Film Comment poll at the end of the decade. I found it after typing "Nicole Brenez Perfect Day", after watching that film on Ubuweb. Of all the films on her end-of-decade list I've seen so far, this one had the least impact on me. It's a very strange mixed bag of moments of intense sideration, succeeding each other in what seemed an almost mechanical fashion. It's also a beautiful paen to the human face, and the "karaoké girl" is endlessly cativating. Maybe one of the issues I had with it was one of intertextuality: the credits at the end show how much comes from Ange Leccia's other works, and since I haven't seen any (exceot for Stridura which isn't included) I didn't quite know what I was watching, or how it fitted in(speaking of intertextuality and human face, I plan to watch Garrel's Les Hautes Solitudes sometime this year). It also brigns up a few thoughts about pop songs as the memories and dreams of our time, since images can be so endlessly modulated and modified (the splendid Saturday Night Fever sequence).

Anyway, without further ado:

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Even if pools about art are absurd, I participated because of my deep esteem for Gavin and Mark, and to leave some informations about rare and precious films. I’m feeling happy for the great and essential Peter Hutton. But I found the result almost totally americano-american, a usual problem in the world of images and even in the avant-garde/experimental field, who should be more vigilant about that.
So here was my own list, even if I could have mentioned hundred of other important films.

Nicole Brenez for Gavin Smith – Film Comment
50 great avant-garde films/events 2000-2009

0778 man.road.river – Marcellvs l, Brazil, 2004
11 000 km Far from New York – Orzu Sharipov, Tajikistan, 2004
13 Lakes – James Benning, U.S., 2005
365 Day Project – Jonas Mekas, U.S., 2007
The Action – David Matarasso, France, 2004
Addio Lugano bella – Francesca Solari, Switzerland/Germany, 2000
Aéroport Hammam-Lif – Slim Ben Chiekh, Tunisia, 2007
Aldebaran – Hugo Verlinde, France, 2001
Algérie Tours/Détours – Oriane Brun-Moschetti & Leïla Morouche, France, 2007
L’Arrière-saison – Philippe Grandrieux, France, 2006
As I Was Moving Ahead Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty – Jonas Mekas, U.S., 2000
Atomic Park – Dominique Gonzalez Foerster, France, 2004
At Sea – Peter Hutton, USA, 2007
Barbie también puede estar tristee – Albertina Carri, 2001, Argentina
Behind this Soft Eclipse – Eva Heller, U.S., 2004
Bouquets 25-30 – Rose Lowder, France, 2002-2005
Le bombardement la porte des perles – Richard Kerr, Canada, 2004
Border – Laura Waddington, Belgium, 2004
Boyzone – Clarisse Hahn, France, 1998-2009
Bingo Show – Christelle Lheureux, France, 2003
Camera War – Lech Kowalski, International, 2009
Capitalism: Slavery, Ken Jacobs, EU, 2006
Cargo – Laura Waddington, Belgium, 2001
Carps Swimming in Color – Helga Fanderl, France, 2007
Charlemagne 2 – Piltzer – Pip Chodorov, France, 2002
Chic Point. Fashion for Israeli Checkpoints – Sharif Waked, Israël, 2003
A Circle Around the Sun – Ali Cherri, Lebanon, 2005
Les Ciseaux – Mounir Fatmi, Morocco, 2003
Dans le noir du temps – Jean-Luc Godard, Suisse, 2002
Deep Play – Harun Farocki, Allemagne, 2007
Degradation #1, X-Ray : Shroud of Security – James Schneider, International, 2006
De Imago – Patrice Kirchhofer, France, 2009
Dithyrambe à Dionysos. Avec la nuit reviendra le temps de l’oubli – Béatrice Kordon, France, 2007
Double Take – Johan Grimonprez, Belgique/Allemagne/Pays-Bas, 2009
Dream Work (For Man Ray) – Peter Tscherkassky, Austria, 2001
Easter Morning – Bruce Conner, U.S., 2008
Elding – Marylène Negro, France, 2006
Empire – Edouard Salier, France , 2005, 4′
Escape – Alain Declerq, France, 2001
Etat de choc – Augustin Gimel, France/U.S., 2001
Europa 2005 – 27 Octobre – Jean-Marie Straub and Danièle Huillet, 2005, France, 11’
Filmer ce désert – Régis Hébraud, France, 2009
Flesh – Edouard Salier, France, 2005
Flòr da baixa – Mauro Santini, Italia, 2004
Geneva – Augustin Gimel, France, 2004
An Injury to One – Travis Wilkerson, USA, 2002
In Public – Jia Zangke, Chine, 2001
Instructions for a light & sound machine – Peter Tscherkassky, Austria, 2005
In This House – Akram Zaatari, Lebanon, 2005
Je comprends moi aussi le langage des oiseaux – Sabine Massenet, France, 2000
A Letter to Uncle Boonmee – Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thaïland, 2009
Manifeste – Hélène Deschamps et Hugo Verlinde, France, 2002
Meditations on Revolution, Part IV: Greenville, MS – Robert Fenz, USA, 2001
Meditations on Revolution, Part V: Foreign City – Robert Fenz, USA, 2003
Mirages – Olivier Dury, France, 2007
Mobile Men – Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thaïland, 2008
New York Zero Zero – Jérôme Schlomoff, France, 2006
Night for Day – HC Gilje, Norway, 2004
Nightshots (1, 2, 3) – Stephen Dwoskin, UK, 2006-7
Night Still – Elke Groen, Austria, 2007
Night Sweat – Sigfried Fruhauf, 2008
No Border – Sylvain George, France,
Nouba – Katia Kameli, Algeria, 2003
Nuits polaires. Première mesure : des non-lieux – Sylvain George, France, 2008
Nu lacté de Lionel Soukaz et Othello Vilgard, France, 2002
Oh ! Uomo – Angela Ricci Lucchi et Yervant Gianikian, Italia, 2004
Ogres – Jean-Paul Noguès, France, 2001
On Hitler’s Highway – Lech Kowalski, France/Germany, 2002
Operation Double Trouble – Keith Sanborn, U.S., 2003
La peau trouée – Julien Samani, France, 2004
Perfect Day – Ange Leccia, France, 2008
Performing S.C.U.M. – Angela Marzullo, Switzerland, 2005
Phantogram – Kerry Laitala, U.S., 2008
Philippe Garrel à Digne (Premier voyage) – Gérard Courant, France, 1975-2009
Profite Motive and the Whispering Wind – John Gianvito, EU, 2007
Primitive (exhibition), Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thaïlande/GB/Allemagne, 2009
Pulsar – Maria Klonaris, France, 2001
Requiem pour le XXe siècle – Maria Klonaris & Katerina Thomadaki, France, 2004
Return to the Scene of the Crime – Ken Jacobs, E.U., 2008
River of Anger – Antoine Barraud, France, 2007
Rosa Rot – Luc & Gisèle Meichler, France, 2001
Samouraï – Johanna Vaude, France, 2002
San Francisco Redux – Anthony Stern, UK, 2008
Sans correspondance – Chaab Mahmoud, Syria/France, 2009
The Screening – Ariane Michel, France, 2007
Sommovimenti/I Volti dell’Anonimo/Vita circolare – Paolo Gioli, Italie, 2009
Soviets + Electricity – Nicolas Rey, France, 2001
Star Spangled To Death – Ken Jacobs, U.S., 2003
Sur la piste – Julien Samani, 2007
Tarrafal – Pedro Costa, Portugal, 2007, Portugal
Themes and Variations for the Naked Eye – Caitlin Horsmon, U.S., 2007
Terrae – Othello Vilgard, France, 2004
Time to Stir (Work in Progress) – Paul Cronin, UK, 2008
Untitled part 3b: (as if) beauty never ends… – Jayce Salloum, Canada, 2002
We are winning don’t forget – Jean-Gabriel Périot, 2004
West of the Tracks – Wang Bing, China, 2003
A Whiter Shade – Marylène Negro, France, 2009
The White She-Camel – Xavier Christiaens, Belgium, 2006
Wild Song. Preamble to any possible history of cinema – Chaab Mahmoud, Syria/France, 2008
http://Www.web cam – Lionel Soukaz, France, 2005

Nicole Brenez said this on May 30, 2010 at 6:26 am | Reply


Found here.

Best musicals of the decade, part 2

Incomplete notes on the character of the new cinema

"Incomplete notes on the character of the new cinema

The cinema is in crisis. It neither apprehends our reality in an honest way nor does it aid us in imagining a different kind of future. It is suffocated by a set of anachronistic conventions dictated by the agents of commerce. What follows are incomplete notes on the basis for a new cinema practice:

The absence of verisimilitude in the corporate cinema has reconfirmed the essential radicalism of critical realism. But the new cinema will also reflect the fact that, as bb [Bertolt Brecht] has observed, “realism is not simply a matter of form.”

Instead of asking whether images change the world (a question whose answer now seems obvious), the new cinema seeks to discover what should be changed, and how.

The new cinema recognizes that any apprehension of the present is predicated upon an understanding of the past. Likewise, a new future can only be imagined after an understanding of the present is attained.

The new cinema doesn’t concern itself with technological debates, particularly the antagonisms of analogue against digital. It employs, without prejudice, any and all tools available to it.

The new cinema can only exist in a state as unfinished and incomplete as the world it aims to mirror and engage.

The new cinema should strive for beauty, but never perfection.

That which has been viewed as beautiful, the new cinema will regard as ugly;

That which has been seen as ugly, the new cinema will regard as beautiful.

Clarity is a form of beauty. Mystification is a form of defeat.

The new cinema refuses to recognize national borders. It identifies itself neither as fiction nor as documentary. Likewise, it is unconcerned with genre, which is useful only to the agents of commerce.

Popular culture is neither. The new cinema will strive to return popular culture to the people themselves."

Travis Wilkerson, here.

I stumbled on this interview while looking for the links to downloading An Injury to one, which I had just seen, in order to send it to a friend.

The "mysteries" and mysteries of Uncle Boonmee

I'm still trying to sort out my thoughts about Uncle Boonmee, which I've seen twice in two days and preferred the second time. But one of the things I'm already reasonably sure about is that there is something more than slightly irritating about the discourse surrounding it (I mean the articles by writers I would take seriously, i.e. who take the film seriously). I'll probably come back to this when (if?) I get around to reading the Cahiers and Positif articles on it, but one of the dominant characteristics of all the articles I've read so far has been to take a stand on the film rather than discuss it. Mark Peranson's article, sublime in its enthusiasm, in a way falls prey most of all to this trap. Thankfully, the articles accompanies an interview in which Peranson is more acute and searching in trying to explore the film the way he would any other film, but what of the Inrockuptibles review? (I will one day discuss the Inrocks more in detail, how they represent a triumph of taste over insight, with all the losses in intellectual curiosity implied) Even Le Temps has at least one better insight (bottom of page 1). Mystery is a very important word to describe a lot of very good art, and is an essential one to describe Uncle Boonmee, but so far it has been used as a shield, to deflect any attempt to really evaluate what is going on.

With this in mind, I'll attempt to set down a few inroads.

Uncle Boonmee is less hypnotic than the two other Apichatpong films I've seen, Tropical Malady and Syndromes and a Century. Part of this, at least for me, has to do with the lack of camera movement, though I'm still trying to tease out why he completely renounces something he'd used for both previous films. Overall, though, it seems this is more a film of surfaces, less prone to withhold its treasures. There's nothing like the motorcycle ride from Tropical Malady or the Black Hole from Syndromes and a Century here. Doubtless my expectations were also what confounded me the first time, what with the tendency of great artists to do everything except what you expect of them. Especially since in this film, Apichatpong plays with his audience even more than in the previous ones.
This is all the more unsettling since the narrative is in many ways more straightforward than in Tropical Malady or Syndromes and a Century. Apart from a catfish episode, essential thematically but a blast out of nowhere in terms of the narrative, and a dream sequence not very hard to assimilate when it appears (though understanding it is another story), the film is linear. Even the two possible realities at the end (truly superb. I'm reminded of an Arthur C. Clarke article in which he called for greater but more simple imagination on the part of SF writers, using the example of a man walking into a room and switching on the light only to find out that it was already on) happen concurrently, equivalently, but after the time warp that gave them birth.
Yet for all this straightforwardness, Apichatpong is playing a very serious game with audience expectations.
Almost every single scene announces a conflict that will go completely unresolved, that principle extending also to the overall narrative scheme (Jaai, the Laotian helper, so important in the first scenes, announces he will leave soon and is not seen again. Even his departure is neither witnessed nor mentioned by the other characters or us) and even the title: unless we accept the Princess or the Catfish as a previous avatar of Boonmee (there's nothing to indicate this is or isn't the case), we don't see any of Boonmee's previous lives, only his relatives' current after-lives and his own future life. The scene of the Catfish is, once again, essential in this aspect: what is set up as the key elements of the narrative, her quest for her lost beauty and the love of her palanquin bearer, is made completely irrelevant in the face of what turns out, a posteriori, to be essential: the possibility of a relationship between man and nature.

I don't know yet quite how to relate all of this to the rest of the film, except to note that the theme of man's relationship with nature is also present almost everywhere else (Aunt Jen coming from the city and trying to adapt to the rural house, the jungle as place of possibility and danger simultaneously...), but the Princess and the Catfish is one of the supreme instances of man's fusion with the natural world in the whole of cinema. And, of course, it's also a question of man's relationship with cinema, as the Princess's vision of her former beauty in the silver screen of the water makes clear. But what is so beautiful in that scene is not just the sexual nature of the fusion, but how literal it is, and how cinema itself is included in the equation. The encounter is not presented as sexual, it is sexual. And cinema itself becomes a participant in this epiphany: first of all a curious and tender observer of this physical bliss, the camera then suddenly gives up on its status as an outside observer to fuse completely with its surroundings, annihilating itself in a shot which echoes the previously observed movement from abandonment of human contingencies (ornamental status symbols) to pure oneness with the elements.

For the record, it's a very good film, but for the moment, I still think Kagemusha, Apocalypse Now and La Dolce Vita are better, without mentioning Syndromes and a Century. Or even Film Socialisme. Not that this is really the point. Maybe this is one of those films...

By a strange coincidence...

It's something of a blessing that the first tennis match I have watched in years would be none other than Mahut-Isner. Ok, I walked in when they were already in the 50s, expecting my Common Room to be showing the World Cup (the only occasion on which I watch football), but still...
So I thought I'd just point out that though Daney is the most famous to have written about Tennis in the context of cinema, Chris Marker had prophesied this phenomenon long ago...

Le Cri (part 2)

Japan in the 2000s:
Bicycling Chronicles, by Wakamatsu Kôji, and All About Lily Chouchou, by Iwai Shunji.

Femme et Fatale vont en bateau

It might be partly provocation on my part, but what Femme Fatale reminds me of most, is the explorations of Rivette's house: when is a fiction a construction? Is a fiction a construction, or is it a destruction, an unravelling of something that exists? Is vision understanding? There's something about (the idea of, since it happens off-screen) Antonio Banderas rushing down to help a beautiful woman he doesn't know get up that reminds me of one post-68 girl running after another on a huge parisian flight of stairs.
Haven't seen Sliding Doors, but I strongly doubt I would find it half as enjoyable as Femme Fatale. From what I've understood of SD, it's fate that creates the opportunity for choice. In Femme Fatale, choice is always there. It's the consequences that create fate. Which is why Brian DePalma is still miles away from Inarritu's world of coincidence: the ending comes ambiguously close, but it's free choice that dominates.
And this is probably the best heist scene of the 2000s (the other one I can think of, Inside Man, is made into a whole film, which is kind of cheating).