After watching Ant Farm's Media Burn, I couldn't help but see the film as not only being satirical for when it was made, but critical of contemporary media culture. The "President" character, which was an obvious cartoonish impersonation of John F Kennedy, also seemed to ridicule how our current president has odd relations with media and attending public events.
Similarly, when the car drove the the mountain of televisions, it reminded me of watching America's Funniest home video's, when a group of people videotape themselves doing something stupid. After watching the film, I wondered how difficult it would be to stage my own television demolition. If I did create my own demolition display, instead of playfully acting as if it would be shown on TV, my video of the destruction could be displayed on youtube, possibly even inciting more acts of media "burning."
Media Burn of course allowed its audience to look at "media," specifically television, in quite an odd way. But after viewing their performance, I was unsure what they were prompting their audience to view, and felt that their performance was visually amusing, but not as thought-provoking as they might have hoped. However, their intervention was one of the most entertaining I've had the pleasure of viewing, since the visual destruction of a flaming television pyramid is almost impossible to turn away from.
Sunday, May 4, 2008
George Kuchar
Kuchar's films Hold Me While I'm Naked and The Inmate seemed to be an experimental documentary version of a Woody Allen narrative. A comical, self-narrated story that related to a possible interpretation of what seemed to be real events in George Kuchar's life.
The narration offered a sense of comedy to the film that seemed personal, almost like an old version of the modern web blog video or youtube video. Except in Kuchar's case, the narrative was far more experimental, forcing a sense of curiosity on the viewer. This idea of a more conceptual youtube.com video is strengthened in Kuchars prolific film making career, as he has numerous shorts on similar subjects and lengths.
One can only wonder how related the actual life of George Kuchar is to his films/videos. Does he really have a friend thats travelled the globe, but still visits with him in Oklahoma? Is Kuchar really an obsessive pervert when it comes to nudity in his films, or does he have a more artistic expression on the subject that is not as easily understood by his friends, cast, and crew?
The narration offered a sense of comedy to the film that seemed personal, almost like an old version of the modern web blog video or youtube video. Except in Kuchar's case, the narrative was far more experimental, forcing a sense of curiosity on the viewer. This idea of a more conceptual youtube.com video is strengthened in Kuchars prolific film making career, as he has numerous shorts on similar subjects and lengths.
One can only wonder how related the actual life of George Kuchar is to his films/videos. Does he really have a friend thats travelled the globe, but still visits with him in Oklahoma? Is Kuchar really an obsessive pervert when it comes to nudity in his films, or does he have a more artistic expression on the subject that is not as easily understood by his friends, cast, and crew?
The Way Things Go & Why We Keep Watching
While viewing The Way Things Go (Der Lauf Der Dinge), I was of course amazed by the technicality of the physics knowledge and time required to create such a performance. After pondering the physics behind how a tire can roll up an inclined plane with steps on it, or how a table of green sludge can possibly be used as part of a Rube Goldberg Machine. I realized that something more simplistic was the reason I couldn't peel my eyes away from the screen.
What was this reason? The filmmakers of course put hours of work into their machine, and performed countless test runs, especially since it was shot on 16mm. But as a viewer, if one watches assuming that the whole time, everything happening in the film is a fluke, what captivates the viewer. The chance physics of a candle lighting bottle rockets strapped to a tire that can climb up a set of stairs?
Maybe the fact that we are watching objects move that normally require human hands to operate them, or in the case of a tire, a motor, built by a human. Even after twenty minutes of objects manipulating objects, I did not bore of watching sludge interacting with wood and tires. The idea of the film being narrative comes from the characters of the film being the materials used in the machine. These inanimate, silent characters seem to be just as interesting as a famous actress playing the heroine role in the latest epic Hollywood drama.
What was this reason? The filmmakers of course put hours of work into their machine, and performed countless test runs, especially since it was shot on 16mm. But as a viewer, if one watches assuming that the whole time, everything happening in the film is a fluke, what captivates the viewer. The chance physics of a candle lighting bottle rockets strapped to a tire that can climb up a set of stairs?
Maybe the fact that we are watching objects move that normally require human hands to operate them, or in the case of a tire, a motor, built by a human. Even after twenty minutes of objects manipulating objects, I did not bore of watching sludge interacting with wood and tires. The idea of the film being narrative comes from the characters of the film being the materials used in the machine. These inanimate, silent characters seem to be just as interesting as a famous actress playing the heroine role in the latest epic Hollywood drama.
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