The Soul of Wyoming.

Picture taken by me on the edge of the Teton National Forest, in Wyoming.

London is a Video Game.

I took this picture yesterday during a night walk in Southwark. London is a giant video game.

Corners of London.

Discovering new corners of London. Photo taken by my friend Roberto Alvau.

Perception – Short Film – 25/03/2014

Reality is wrong. Dreams are for real. (T.S.)

Final project of the Alternative Film and Video module, Brunel University, 2014.

WORDS COUNT: 4,353 WORDS

“Three Walks” And a Lot of Wondering – 18/03/2014

Inspired by the idea of drifting through the city without a clear destination I took my camera and went out for some dérives! I shot three very different parts of London: residential Battersea, in the middle of nowhere Hillingdon and commercial Oxford Street. Since I really like music, surprises and experiments, I decided to combine all those in the soundtrack of this psychogeographical video. After three afternoons of shooting I have selected the shots that I felt most for, put them in random order and screened this chunk of places that could be anywhere to a group of free improvisers.  I’ve recorded this experiment-like jam and synched the music to the video. Then I cut the video back to individual shots, but this time instead of street ambience I’ve had an instant musical response. Now when I am in any of those places, the tunes and motives reappear in my head, and they really fit there. I wonder why. (Kris Dirse, 24/03/2014)

Psychogeography: a subject that is an immense journey through the meanders of the city and of the soul itself. To address this issue I chose to refer to one of the souls that fascinate me more: the one of my friend Kris Dirse. I take into account the short film Three Walks (2014), made by him for the Psychogeography module here at Brunel University. A short film that is the expression of a journey, as mentioned above, in three different corners of London. Will Self in his book Psychogeography writes of this subject as being a very subjective concept and well away from a proper definition, acceptable to all. Merlin Coverley in his book of the same name as Self ‘s, accepts to summarize in broad terms the Psychogeography as “the point at which psychology and geography collide, a means of exploring the behavioural impact of urban place” (Coverley: Introduction). By analyzing what I see in the video made by Kris Dirse, this subject is an exercise of observation. Imagine for a moment to be able to put aside the commitments, to put aside the concerned images into our minds and to swap them with images of the reality that surrounds us. And just observe. The charm of the sky, the cutting of two symmetrical buildings, the colours of a poster on the street, the look of the people. What surrounds us? And how much influence does that surrounding have on us? Looking at the video I tried to put myself as much as possible in the eyes of the observer. I’ve been for a couple of minutes to hear and observe the contained noise of Battersea, the isolated silence of Hillingdon and the urban chaos of Oxford Street. I have found corners that I had never seen and recognised others that I have been staring at for hours before. What strikes me most is how, if you look closely, people become master of the stage one at a time, so that every time one’s look is framed or a gesture mentioned, I would like to continue to follow that man or woman to figure out what they will do next, what their lives are made of. I have always considered the people part of the geography of a place. They are influenced by the place but also affect the appearance and perception of the place itself. How would Oxford Street be if instead of being crowded with enterprising workers, young people and tourists, it was instead the designated destination for drug dealers and criminals? How would it be like if all of a sudden the Battersea Volkswagens were replaced by expensive limousines? I cannot conceive geography without a human factor. So here are some big new questions. The answer lies in a very early morning wake-up, a long walk and a path of empty streets in which to immerse myself in the urban environment.

References:

Dirse, K. (2014) Three Walks, Brunel University: London

Self, W. (2013) Psychogeography, Bloomsbury Publishing: UK

Coverley, M. (2012) Psychogeography, Oldcastle Books: UK

Dreaming to Make a Film About the Reality of a Dream – 11/03/2014

Next task: making a short alternative video. Put into practice what you have learned and researched in the last few months. It ‘s a challenge, and the topic I am going to face this challenge with is: dreams

The dream-like activity has always been a topic of great importance in various fields, from the scientific one to the artistic and philosophical ones. This involuntary activity of our subconscious in fact, has inspired a number of scientific minds who have tried to give a rational explanation to it, and philosophical and artistic minds, that instead tried to learn their secrets to get inspiration for their works. Many of them have given rise to real pieces of art about this topic. One of these, the oneiric distortion (from the Italian word: “distonirismo”), influenced the idea that led my group and I to the creation of the short film of the Alternative Film and Video Practices module.

The “distonirismo” is a movement created by the Italian musician Federico De Caroli, known with the pseudonym of Deca. At the end of the 80s, Deca invited various avant-garde artists to take part in publishing several articles in the journal Introipse. This initiative received a decent success and led its members to write a manifesto that outlined the principles on which this initiative was based on. While discussing these principles it became clear that the central point was this: what is dreamed has an interdependent relationship on equal terms with what is seen or heard during wakefulness, and the latter, in turn, depends on what is seen or heard in the dream.

So they came to the conclusion that there is not an actual reality, but that the reality itself is a unique phenomenon of visions, which is accessed through different modes of perception.

The assumption of these discussions was much more evident in the examination of the creative works of these artists, where the interactive mingling of different perceptions gave a very complete picture of the relationship of distortion of the various “signals”.

This discourse can in a way reconnect to the video we are trying to make; especially the second part of it can reconnect to the depiction of the dream of the protagonist. In fact, through the technique of the split screen (that will be adopted during the post-production of the film) it is possible to show at the same time the activities performed by the characters. This requires the use of four different windows (see Once Upon a Time Code”, posted on the 25^th of February 2014), two reserved for the representation of reality and the real world and two dedicated to the representation of the dream of the protagonist. The purpose of this short film is to show how the external activity of an individual is able to influence the “internal” one; i.e. the dream activity is influenced by reality through perception, even if the subject represented is not consciously aware of what is happening, as he is asleep.

In the windows dedicated to the representation of reality, despite the protagonist is asleep, he can perceive the dangerous situation that is taking shape around him, in the case of our short film, a thief who broke into his home, and who’s now staring at him. The protagonist can hear the sound of the thief’s breath and steps, and can feel his presence; this disturbs the sleep of the protagonist and is reflected in the dream, which presents the state of stress and anxiety experienced in the reality. The protagonist is then semi-conscious to be in danger, but his reaction and bound is within the dream itself. The found footage that we plan to use serves to reinforce the idea of ​​danger and fear from which the protagonist tries in vain to escape. The reason why it is in vain is because in the reality the danger is still present and real. The accelerated heartbeat and breath that the protagonist has in the dream is reflected in the reality with jerky movements in his bed. The desperate race of the protagonist within the dream does not stretch, however, the distance between him and the danger inside his room, in fact, the attacker, armed with a gun, shoots the protagonist in the final part of the short film, killing him and ending the dream as well as its life.

“Once upon a Time Code” – 18/02/2014

This post will be about the alternative cinema of Mike Figgins, in particular the film Timecode (2000) . The title I have given to this is based on the namesake article written on August 11, 2000 by Richard Williams in The Guardian, and based on an interview with the director made ​​a few days before the release of the film. I quote here a small part of the interview , which I was inspired from to develop this post.

“The marriage between editing and plot has got to such an extent now that the audience is hooked on this constant adrenalin delivery.”

As a result, he continued, viewers are reduced to a state of passivity. “I find that really distressing. In America they eat and go for a piss and talk the whole time, and it’s got something to do with the fact that there’s no interaction between them and the screen any more. I’ve been struggling the last couple of years to find different narrative forms. This film is delivering constantly the idea that you might be missing something, so you can’t afford to go and take a piss or take your eyes off the screen. People who watch it seem far more alert, whether they like it or not, because of the degree of attention required to watch the film.” (Williams, 11/08/2000)

Personally I was very impressed by the intentions behind this film. The attempt to bring something different both conceptually and visually succeeds very well. The actors that improvise, time that is real, the contextualization of actions through the division of the screen into four windows are very innovative things. In a first moment, what prompted me to watch the film was recognizing Salma Hayek in one of the quadrants. I thought, “That’s Salma Hayek! But isn’t she a Hollywood actress? I thought that this style of filmmaking had nothing to do with Hollywood!” So I went looking for some biographical data on Mike Figgins. “Beata ignoranza!”, people would say in my beautiful country: MIKE FIGGINS IS A HOLLYWOOD DIRECTOR!

And not just a random one, he is the director of Internal Affairs and Leaving Las Vegas. Well, we are here to learn. Anyway, I was surprised that such an experimental movie was born in the Hollywoods’ home, but then, if you think about it, what Figgins did was nothing more than trying to overcome the limits of an aerea that he is very familiar with. And that’s where I think he has hit the point. That’s why Timecode, in opposition to all the other experimental films I’ve watched so far, is something I can accept both consciously and not. You can not create something innovative, alternative, if you do not know in depth what you are against to. You are more likely to just say a bunch of random things. The name says it all: “alternative” is to give an alternative to something you do not want to adjust to. But it must be an efficient alternative for it to work. And deep down you know that the only way to stay one step ahead of your opponent is to learn to know him very well. Unless you want to create something completely new, but that’s another story.

References:

Williams, R. (11/08/2000) Once upon a Time Code, The Guardian: UK [ONLINE] available at http://www.theguardian.com/film/2000/aug/11/culture.features [ACCESSED ON 25/02/2014]

Blank Mind – 11/02/2014

From the very first moment I put my signature to enrol in the study module on the Alternative Cinema I knew this moment would come. For a fan of animated films and the Hollywood tradition this was presented as a challenge from the very beginning. And so here’s the moment when I find myself in total panic and without anything to say. I thought a whole week about how to deal with the topics discussed in the last two lessons, and except for the creation of the short film on space (uploaded last week), not much came out in terms of productivity. Although I have deepened my research on topics such as the avant-garde cinema of Jean-Luc Godard, developing the very interesting connections with the realist films by the Italian director Pier Paolo Pasolini, I can still not hit a precise point. So I thought I’d put aside for a moment the research on this and rethink a bit about the last examples of abstract film production analysed during class on February 10^th, one of which was Cat’s Cradle by Stan Brakhage (1959). The movie was shot on a film that was supposedly red, characterized by an infinite series of jump cuts that interspersed the narrative of the everyday actions of three adults, observed by a cat. The cat acted as a mediator in the narrative, to any action or look of the cat corresponded the action of one of the characters. When I came home and searched for Cat’s Cradle on Google to see if it was possible to take a second look at the video online, I discovered that the cat’s cradle is nothing but the children’s game based on weave and loosen straps between the toes through a series of tricks. I do not know if this has a real connection with the film, I would not find difficult to suppose that the cat’s cradle game already existed in 1959 and maybe the whole succession of sequences in the film is inspired by none other than the complex interweaving threads of the game. But this is not necessarily true and it does not mean that the film necessarily has any sense or logic, which brings me back to the main reason for my mental block.

HOW DO I DO NOT GIVE ANY SENSE TO A FILM?

Two weeks ago in class we were given a delivery to make a very short video, devoid of narrative and that did not follow any particular film technique. The delivery was saying, in essence, to film and nothing else. It said to play with the levels of the camera, with the focus and to be carried away by instinct. Total panic. This might be linked to the same reason why I cannot have more than two beers on a Saturday night for fear of losing too much control and let myself go! At this point I’m considering everything. Though I have tried to follow the delivery given, doing so in the end gave me no satisfaction. I felt as if it was a waste of time, which is probably related to the fact that I was not doing it the right way. Provided that there is a right way and a wrong way to do it. That’s what drives me crazy. There are no rules to follow, there are no posts, there is no right or wrong and there is no logic and no teaching in this way of making films. I’ve always seen art as virtuosity; for me art is what the painted rooms in the Vatican transmit to a person when one looks at them and cries because they are so beautiful. The art should definitely reflect emotion and provoke a feeling in return; it must be spiritually overwhelming and at least give pause for a second. The reflection leads to change, and the art should be able to bring change. I cannot conceive the possibility of not understanding something in any way, not even unconscious, when I look at it. This means that I will have to keep trying. And this means that in the end I will either find a sense even in this, or maybe this will help me to figure out how to see things differently and let myself go.

Into Space – Short Film – 04/02/2014

What can possibly happen if you play with lights and a toy from the Science Museum?

The Surrealism in “Requiem for a Dream” (2000) by Darren Aronofsky – 28/01/2014

One’s identity with the world, with oneself, with others, and ultimately with society. (Conley and Taminiaux: 98)

To explore the topic of surrealism (chosen for the lecture of the last week), I chose the movie Requiem for a Dream, directed by Darren Aronofsky. Inspired by the aforementioned description given by Katharine Conley and Pierre Taminiaux in their book Surrealism and Its Others, if we consider the expression of the surrealist artists as a comparison of themselves with the world, with themselves and with the society, then the film directed by Aronofsky and starring Jared Leto and Jennifer Connelly serves as a good example to represent all three of these aspects. Starting from the end, the relationship between the film’s characters and society is described by the comparison between the life and dreams of the young Harry (Leto’s character) and those of his mother Sara Goldfarb (Ellen Burstyn). The clash between the two generations is reflected in the expectations of the two characters: Harry tries to differentiate himself and to escape from society, while his mother tries hard to be part of it. Michael Richardson in his book Surrealism and Cinema speaks of surrealism as a provocation against the concept of excellence that the bourgeoisie has, and as a revolt against a society perceived by these artists as decadent. (Richardson: 15) Harry is a drugs’ slave to the point of “looting” his mother’s house to resell the items and be able to buy more of it. On the other side, the mother, troubled by the absence of her dead husband and frightened by the behavior of her son, spends her days in front of the television, following a television program with prizes. Both are slaves to something, Aronofsky distorts reality by showing how what makes Sara an addicted can become deleterious exactly as  the drug that his son takes. When she is called for the program and then is no longer contacted by the producers, she enters a downward spiral that leads her to completely lose her head. Hence, the ” moral” is: putting your hopes on addictions does not lead anywhere. The view that the director shows of the reality is extremely negative and pessimistic and rather disturbing and frightening. We are all in the same boat and we are all slaves to bad habits, manipulated by something.

I hope you brought a friend with you because you’re going to have trouble getting home after watching this film. It’s very upsetting. I’m sorry. (Ellen Burstyn, 2000)

The aims of surrealism in terms of the film’s visual choices is to captivate the viewer and drag him deeper into the narrative: the story is told through a series of real-world images that follow one another as if in a dream, disorderly, disruptive and very raw. (Levy: 109) The introspection of the characters is brought to light by amplifying their own foibles and showing them increasingly eroded by these, emotionally and physically. The more obsessed Harry is for the drug and Sara for fame, the more their relationship with other people and with the world becomes difficult. Both are fascinated by the idea of a better life, and they see the possibility of this happening in the false hope given by the drug (Harry and the girl Marion who plan to make a better life attempting a career as drug dealers) and television (Sara waiting for the day when she will receive the call to be part of the TV program that will change her life). Illusions that are in fact not very different from those that are instilled recently by television programs such as reality shows and talent shows, which do nothing but create shortcuts for success obtained with really poor effort and little merit, to the face of those who break their back and work for what they love. The idea that everyone nowadays has an obsession to escape reality brought to the surface by Aronofsky is very impressive and certainly gives food for thought. The idea that everyone seeks to fill a hole, if we stop and think about it, can question the reason why we do even more than half of the things we do. How would we behave if we were completely free? And can anyone of us actually be considered free?

What’s brilliant about Selby (the author of the novel that inspired the film, e.d.) is that he shows us that anything can be an addiction to fill that hole when we’re trying to escape reality. It can be TV, it can be coffee, it can be sex, it can be someone saying ‘I love you’. I wasn’t really interested in junkies and the word heroin is never mentioned in the movie. So for me, it was really about how anything could be a drug. (Darren Aronofsky, 2000)

References:

Aronofsky, D. (2000) Requiem for a Dream, Artisan Entertainment: USA

Conley, K. and Taminiaux, P. (2006) Surrealism and Its Others, Yale University Press: New Haven

Richardson, M. (2006) Surrealism and Cinema, Berg: Oxford and New York

Darren Aronofsky Online (2000) Aronofsky Darren: Requiem for a Dream, Talk Recorded by Alistair Harkness from UrbanCinefile.Com concerning Darren Aronofsky’s pre- and post- film speech for “Requiem For A Dream” [ONLINE] available at http://aronofksy.tripod.com/interview26.html [ACCESSED ON 02/02/2014]

Levy, S. (1996) Surrealism: Surrealist Visuality, Keele University Press: Edinburgh