Tuesday, April 2, 2013

Movie night!

This is why no one ever lets me be in charge of movie night. Here is what I am watching.

Michael Snow, La Région Centrale (1971) Running time 4:25

A half-soothing, half-nauseating tribute to the hushed truth that we are perched atop a spinning ball that is further spinning through spinning space.

Paul Sharits, T,O,U,C,H,I,N,G (1969) Running time 9:59

I don't even recommend you watch this; it might be the most annoying experimental film ever made, and that is saying something.  Paul Sharits' claim to fame is Flicker, basically a strobing of colors that has been known to induce seizures, and this film follows that path. Ten minutes of Sharits saying "destroy destroy destroy destroy..." while it flickers around and image of a guy about to get his tongue cut out. Perfect date movie. 

The interesting thing about Sharits' films is not the films, because they are egregiously not interesting in content but in the sculptural objects the images become, the space they take up by sheer persistence and insistence. They also show the limitations of digital video vs film. YouTube cannot keep up with this handmade terror form four decades ago.

Ingmar Bergman, The Seventh Seal (1957) Running 1:36:13

Considered one of the greatest movies ever made. I'm not really watching it but have it brooding and lilting in the background as I grade papers and do some computer work. In fact, I'm shutting it off to watch...

Jack Cardiff, The Girl on the Motorcycle (1968) Running time 1:27:24

Groovy-as-hell, plotless wonder starring a painfully hot Marianne Faithfull in a leather riding outfit, suggested to me after I posted this recent interview with her in The Guardian. There is Faithfull nudity therein.

Interestingly, both this and The Seventh Seal involve scenes at the circus. That's how you can tell if it's a foreign film: You don't know what's going on and then you are at the circus.




1 comment:

  1. I would say that GIRL ON A MOTORCYCLE is an icon of late sixties pop culture. Thus it is worth viewing, not only for those interested in the period, but also for those (like I) who lived through it. Indeed - I recall wanting to see this movie when it was first released. But I was too young (12). The original UK rating was X. To see more info please visit http://essayswriters.org/college/

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