389-390 WR: Mysteries of the Organism and Sweet Movie

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mteller · #51 Post by **mteller** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 4:46 pm

bkimball wrote:I kind of get the sense these films might have a lot in common - in terms of presentation - with Godard's Weekend. Can anyone confirm or deny?

I can't speak for WR, but I can't think of any significant commonalities between Sweet Movie and Weekend. I guess both share a somewhat similar anecdotal narrative flow.

toiletduck! · #52 Post by **toiletduck!** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 4:48 pm

Let's get the on topic stuff out of the way first -- speaking of the Vienna Aktionists, apparently Otto Muehl is actually in Sweet Movie -- can anyone elaborate? Is it just a in-joke cameo or has sevenarts hit the nail on the head more than we realize?

mteller wrote:No, I really want to know what you think my type is, especially since it seems like you're writing off my opinion based on that perception.

Option A, in which I elaborate on what I meant with my original post: Really, it was just a casual remark -- I even made a point of saying that I had a type as well to specifically avoid this sort of conversation. I'm not writing off your opinion, I'm just using it against its purpose. The fact that you pair Allin, Manson, and Waters all in the same boat is enough for me to see that you don't appreciate transgressive art (Again, that's not a bad thing, it's just a matter of taste: I personally see those three artists coming from vastly different creative standpoints.) Therefore, if you have this strong of a reaction against SM, and primarily using the "shock for shock's sake" argument (on which I personally agree with sevenarts, that there is a great deal of value inherent in this approach and it is the farthest thing from simplistic (which I suppose would be complex)), I can quite safely assume that I will enjoy it, as I am a big fan of transgressive art.

Option B, in which I describe a perfectly valid type for you to rail against: You're the type that, while not requiring art to be pretty, still insist (whether in the internal or external monologue) that it 'look right' and 'provide a proper meaning' -- both of which coincide with what you think looks right and is a proper meaning.

Can we go with Option A and leave it at that?

-Toilet Dcuk

edit: Or we can go with godardslave's option (his is the sort of jadedness that comes from taking me too seriously -- a condition I find unusual from a fan of Godard)

mteller · #53 Post by **mteller** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 5:03 pm

toiletduck! wrote:The fact that you pair Allin, Manson, and Waters all in the same boat is enough for me to see that you don't appreciate transgressive art (Again, that's not a bad thing, it's just a matter of taste: I personally see those three artists coming from vastly different creative standpoints.) Therefore, if you have this strong of a reaction against SM, and primarily using the "shock for shock's sake" argument (on which I personally agree with sevenarts, that there is a great deal of value inherent in this approach and it is the farthest thing from simplistic (which I suppose would be complex)), I can quite safely assume that I will enjoy it, as I am a big fan of transgressive art.

But I didn't say I don't appreciate Allin, Manson or Waters, I just said I don't find them shocking. But for the record, I don't like Allin or Manson, but I love Waters. Also Jodorowski and Bunuel, although I'm not sure where they fall on the transgressive scale.

portnoy · #54 Post by **portnoy** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 5:17 pm

I guess I'm another in the camp that loves WR but finds Sweet Movie mostly unwatchable. This'll be a great opportunity for me to rewatch the film and maybe reevaluate it.

toiletduck! · #55 Post by **toiletduck!** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 5:17 pm

mteller wrote:But I didn't say I don't appreciate Allin, Manson or Waters, I just said I don't find them shocking. But for the record, I don't like Allin or Manson, but I love Waters. Also Jodorowski and Bunuel, although I'm not sure where they fall on the transgressive scale.

What I was going for when I said 'appreciate' was that you seem to feel that shock for shock is equivalent to the artists sitting around waiting for the squeals of disgust because it means they did something naughty. Granted there are some (perhaps even some you mentioned) artists who are in it for the bad boy factor, in which case 'they didn't shock me' does mark a failure. However, there are a bevy of motives behind transgressive art, and the success of a work isn't necessarily connected to the number of people who run from the room mentally scarred. And that's the starting point for an entirely different discussion which, while I'm always game for, doesn't seem to be good fodder for online forums, so I'll leave the pretension, intellectuality, and bullshit with that. (For the time being, at least.)

Although, your love of Jodorowsky did throw me for a bit of a loop -- playing against type, one might say.

-Toilet Dcuk

*edited for grammatical shit*

sevenarts · #56 Post by **sevenarts** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 5:45 pm

toiletduck! wrote:Let's get the on topic stuff out of the way first -- speaking of the Vienna Aktionists, apparently Otto Muehl is actually in Sweet Movie -- can anyone elaborate? Is it just a in-joke cameo or has sevenarts hit the nail on the head more than we realize?

Wow, this film sounds more interesting by the minute.

hieronymus · #57 Post by **hieronymus** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 5:51 pm

So the final word of those who like SWEET MOVIE is that it's "lotsa fun..." I have a vague memory of this movie but I remember it was one of the "feces-eating trilogy" along with SALO and PINK FLAMINGOS that rocked my late teens, when I was just breaking away from the confines of mainstream Hollywood. Seriously, that's usually how shock-for-shock's-sake-movies are remembered, by their famous fragments. Now that the shock ingredients are in my head, I wonder how the rest of the movie will play out when I see it again.

The Dada/Russian Constructivist-inspired cover for WR features not only tits but bush(es, if you take into account its symmetrical composition) as well. Now that's pushing the boundary for Criterion.

carax09 · #58 Post by **carax09** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 6:05 pm

Not having seen either of these films, I was wondering if my love of Vera Chytilova's Daisies might be a fair indication that I would be pre-disposed to appreciate one (or both). Daisies has such a wonderful anarchic spirit, and must have seemed transgressive at the time of it's production ('66). Any thoughts? Would Daisies just seem quaint compared to W.R. and SM?

ouatitw · #59 Post by **ouatitw** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 6:43 pm

toiletduck! wrote:Let's get the on topic stuff out of the way first -- speaking of the Vienna Aktionists, apparently Otto Muehl is actually in Sweet Movie -- can anyone elaborate? Is it just a in-joke cameo or has sevenarts hit the nail on the head more than we realize?

The scene with the commute of people (I think that Otto Muehl was in that part) lasted for about 10-15 minutes and those are the parts of the film which are usually mentioned as shocking. (That is unless I am wrong about who Otto Muehl is). So he was in a little more than just a in joke cameo.

The funny thing is according to this article on UBU Otto hated Sweet Movie.

"AG: Some filmgoers in North America-who may have not had a chance to see your avant-garde short films-are perhaps most familiar with you from your appearance in Dusan Makavejev's Sweet Movie (1975). Is the commune sequence in Sweet Movie an accurate representation of life in the actions-analytical commune?

OM: No, not at all. The film is downright kitch. I don't like this film at all. Today I would prefer that the film hadn't been made. There was not much to do. To a large extent, it was all prescribed."

zombeaner · #60 Post by **zombeaner** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 7:54 pm

Wow, Sweet Movie, I've been waiting for that for years!

mikeohhh · #61 Post by **mikeohhh** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 8:15 pm

so why are these listed as being from Germany by Criterion rather than Yugoslavia?

portnoy · #62 Post by **portnoy** » Fri Mar 16, 2007 10:24 pm

In the case of WR, most of the production money came from West Germany. Sweet Movie could probably best be described as Canadian, given its funding sources/production background, but both of these films are so international in production and thematic purview that it's hard to justify describing either of them as being from one particular country.

Nothing · #63 Post by **Nothing** » Sat Mar 17, 2007 12:41 am

wow! Sweet Movie Criterion!! DVD of the year if it actually hits the shelves...

javelin · #64 Post by **javelin** » Sat Mar 17, 2007 3:16 am

Makavejev came to the PFA in Berkeley last Spring for a screening of WR. It was a for an intro to film class - a pretty bold move, considering most of the people in the class weren't familiar w/ even the basics of "cinema" - stuff like L'Avventura, The 400 Blows, etc. Great professor, obviously - Russell Merritt, for those that care or care to know. I can't say that I "got" the film, but I wasn't averse. Definitely looking forward to another viewing. As for Dusan himself, the man was hilarious. He dodged and parried every question that tried to address the "weight" and "depth" of the film - a move I found both frustrating and funny.

Anonymous · #65 Post by **Anonymous** » Sat Mar 17, 2007 8:32 am

The Durgnat book compilation commentary will probably be like Bogdanovich reading Sesonske on La Règle du jeu. I hope they choose a tolerable speaker. Also, how do they decide which passages from the book to include? Durgnat is too great to omit even a single word.

Oh, another question. These Makavejevs are coming in June, right?

colinr0380 · #66 Post by **colinr0380** » Sat Mar 17, 2007 11:38 am

davidhare wrote:(How many epiphanies have I had in the company of raincoated gents? Or wearing a raincoat?)

One of those epiphanal experiences must have been watching Singin' In The Rain (see how I took a rhetorical question that I could have made a smutty joke about and turned it into something sweet!)

These sound interesting. Was that recent Taxidermia film in a similar vein to Sweet Movie? I've only seen Montenegro out of Makavejev's work - how do these two films compare to that later film?

Wasn't WR the film with the psychadelic censorship patches covering genitals?

EDIT: I thought there had been previous discussion on the films on the forum. Should this thread be merged?

MichaelB · #67 Post by **MichaelB** » Sat Mar 17, 2007 1:22 pm

colinr0380 wrote:Wasn't WR the film with the psychadelic censorship patches covering genitals?

I think you're referring to the famous/notorious Channel Four version that went out in the early 1990s. What happened was that C4 wanted to screen it uncut, but were advised by whoever was the regulator at the time that certain parts (and I use the word in multiple senses) were unacceptable for broadcast on terrestrial television.

So C4 asked Makavejev if he could advise them as to how to make the film suitable without significantly affecting its content, and they ended up giving him access to a Quantel Paintbox and letting him run riot.

The two examples I remember were goldfish swimming across the screen and just happening to obscure bits that could deprave and corrupt the audience, and the erection towards the end being replaced by somewhat Kenneth Angeresque fireworks.

Apparently Makavejev was so taken with the end result that he asked if he could give the whole film a similar going-over, but C4 refused (though I bet their refusal had more to do with the budget than a desire to protect the film's artistic integrity!)

Nothing · #68 Post by **Nothing** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 3:10 am

noooo, colin, there is no similarity between Taxidermia and Sweet Movie.

French completist · #69 Post by **French completist** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 11:42 am

Never seen them. The way it is described, WR sounds like a remote ancestor of Real Sex from HBO.

MichaelB · #70 Post by **MichaelB** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 2:12 pm

davidhare wrote:Fortunately the passage of time has rendered the ludicrous C4 version of WR redundant. Despite being Makaveyef's own concoction the digital animations are invoked so often, even over background artwork of female genitalia (And things that did not even need "obscuring" in the 90s for television)- the digital nonsense's only conceivable value is as a protest over censorship.

This may well have been the intention - it was screened during Channel 4's 'Banned' season of films and television programmes that had run into censorship difficulties (full list here), and there's every chance Makavejev was fully aware of this, as he was the subject of a documentary-cum-interview, 'Nicely Offensive', broadcast the same evening.

thebedbreakinkid · #71 Post by **thebedbreakinkid** » Mon Mar 19, 2007 2:04 am

if sweet movie and WR were both facets releases, does that mean we're gonna be seeing daisies and valerie and her week of wonders sometime soon? and i thought janus had the rights to valerie (or at least back in the 70s)

#72 Post by **domino harvey** » Mon Mar 19, 2007 2:24 am

thebedbreakinkid wrote:if sweet movie and WR were both facets releases, does that mean we're gonna be seeing daisies and valerie and her week of wonders sometime soon? and i thought janus had the rights to valerie (or at least back in the 70s)

they were VHS releases, I don't think Facets ever released them to DVD (?), so since Daisies and Valerie are both out on DVD, probably not, but man I'd love to be wrong on this count

Jean-Luc Garbo · #73 Post by **Jean-Luc Garbo** » Mon Mar 19, 2007 12:22 pm

Where's Valerie and Her Week of Wonders on DVD?

Steven H · #74 Post by **Steven H** » Mon Mar 19, 2007 12:27 pm

Jean-Luc Garbo wrote:Where's Valerie and Her Week of Wonders on DVD?

Here and here.

MichaelB · #75 Post by **MichaelB** » Mon Mar 19, 2007 12:29 pm

They're both crap, though - I have the British Redemption edition, and the print quality is what I'd expect from a film twice as old. In particular, it's riddled with damaging splices that play havoc with the soundtrack - my guess is that the transfer was sourced from a print that had already undergone two decades' worth of abuse at assorted rep cinemas..

Apparently the Facets is even worse, and while there's a Czech edition available that looks markedly better than either, it doesn't have English subtitles.

(Mind you, this particular film doesn't really need any...)