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zedz wrote:

denti alligator wrote:Zedz, did you notice that you have effectively been given the honor of being listed as a "reviewer" at the Edition Filmmuseum page for the Kluge set.

Hah! I guess beggars can't be choosers. (And I suppose Franziska at the Filmmuseum knows who I am now - hi, Franziska!)

There's a distinct possibility that I may be quoting your "holy shit!" reaction to Wojciech Wiszniewski in a chapter I'm writing for a book on Polish avant-garde cinema...

Hah! Though I'm sure I'm not the only person to have had that response to Wiszniewski. (And I'm also sure that was much toned down from my actual, real-time reaction!)

I'm 4/15ths of the way through the ed. filmmuseum set.
Looks like from the 5th set on its primarily documentaries.

But was wondering if anyone had read Kluge's writing and what folks would recommend. Been intrigued enough by his films and thought processes that I wanted to read some of his words. Thx.

What language are you looking for?

Er, sorry, should have mentioned that.
I'd need Kluge in English translation.

For the moment i am only able to find The Devil's Blind Spot (Die Lücke die der Teufel lässt) via amazon.com. Strangly enough, the english translation seems to just have 336 pages whereas the original german has 949 pages. The book is a collection of short stories so the translation might be just a selection of the original. Anyway, I think this could be (as often with short stories) good for "starters" because the many short stories represent the "whole" bandwidth of Kluge, from Comedy to Tragedy (not different from his Film/TV work where he plays the different tones with ease). For such a prolific author there is not much translated into the english language (nothing new to what i heard), but maybe i am just not able to find out better sources. Someone else might have better informations.

accatone wrote:For the moment i am only able to find The Devil's Blind Spot (Die Lücke die der Teufel lässt) via amazon.com.

That's odd, as Case Histories, Cinema Stories, and Learning Processes with a Deadly Outcome are all readily available.

Yes, you are right. But Cinema Stories does only have 96 pages as opposed to the originals 350+. With Case Histories i have no idea what collection this could be. I have no idea to what original publication this refers to - so i can not recommend it. I have not read Lernprozesse - no recommendation from my side.

I would still recommend the The Devil's Blind Spot (Die Lücke die der Teufel lässt) because it presents the manifold themes (not just cinema stories) and style/short story editing Kluge is famous for. First to recommend would be Chronik der Gefühle, personally, but i can not find a translation. If the english translations are indeed just parts of the original works it would be quite disappointing because the sheer quantity of Kluges stories in these books make up (yes) the quality of reading, flipping through the pages….

What can you recommend Hopscotch?

So I guess this is the weekend will I finally sit down and gather up all of Zedz favorite film makers. I'm really curious as to how well Perplexed was actually distributed as it is one tough nut to crack. That thought I am simply blown away. Please tell me this is what most of his films are like.

More or less. Literally - it's something of a mid-point between the essayist and narrative strands of his feature work.

That's great news. Actually on the disc I rented my favorite was probably The Execution of an Elephant. Definitely going to risk the Filmmuseums after this. Oddly though I found the narrative elements the hardest to truly get into.

That might be because of the uneasy mix he was experimenting with at the time. Films like Occasional Work of a Female Slave and Strongman Ferdinand have much more secure fictional narrative focuses.

You're turning me into a dope addict, man. Wish I could respond with more, but I guess I'll have to save up for my B0Day is all this says.

Nice 43min feature on Kluge with lots of archival material. Unfortunately German language only - very interesting.

I'm listening to a podcast with Alex Ross Perry, and he mentions Kluge and Tarkovsky as similar filmmakers when it comes to ideas of memory. I've never seen a Kluge film, but Tarkovsky is one of my favorites. Do they share similar aesthetic qualities and methodical long takes (and I would extend to Bela Tarr)? Are they similar in anyway?

aox wrote:I'm listening to a podcast with Alex Ross Perry, and he mentions Kluge and Tarkovsky as similar filmmakers when it comes to ideas of memory. I've never seen a Kluge film, but Tarkovsky is one of my favorites. Do they share similar aesthetic qualities and methodical long takes (and I would extend to Bela Tarr)? Are they similar in anyway?

I wouldn't really say so, to be honest. Kluge is a great filmmaker and I can see what Perry means about both his and Tarkovsky's films being edited in memory-like styles, but I wouldn't suggest Kluge's films are all that filmically similar to Tarkovsky. In much the same way that Tarkovsky's 'Mirror' moves about from one situation to another in a comparable way to how memory drifts, seemlessly flowing from one period of our life to another without consideration to epoch or location, Kluge's films frequently jump around in time and space, but the cuts in Kluge's films are much more abrupt and rapid. Kluge's films are generally highly political and are put together in a way that's often quite experimental; the way his films jump from one idea to the next is more like how an alert memory might grab many ideas at once and jump between them noisily, rather than the much slower, more poetic way that's familiar from Tarkovsky's work. Kluge has been compared to Godard a few times, so if you're familiar with the way many of his films are edited then you probably have a closer comparison to Kluge's style.

neilist wrote:

aox wrote:I'm listening to a podcast with Alex Ross Perry, and he mentions Kluge and Tarkovsky as similar filmmakers when it comes to ideas of memory. I've never seen a Kluge film, but Tarkovsky is one of my favorites. Do they share similar aesthetic qualities and methodical long takes (and I would extend to Bela Tarr)? Are they similar in anyway?

I wouldn't really say so, to be honest. Kluge is a great filmmaker and I can see what Perry means about both his and Tarkovsky's films being edited in memory-like styles, but I wouldn't suggest Kluge's films are all that filmically similar to Tarkovsky. In much the same way that Tarkovsky's 'Mirror' moves about from one situation to another in a comparable way to how memory drifts, seemlessly flowing from one period of our life to another without consideration to epoch or location, Kluge's films frequently jump around in time and space, but the cuts in Kluge's films are much more abrupt and rapid. Kluge's films are generally highly political and are put together in a way that's often quite experimental; the way his films jump from one idea to the next is more like how an alert memory might grab many ideas at once and jump between them noisily, rather than the much slower, more poetic way that's familiar from Tarkovsky's work. Kluge has been compared to Godard a few times, so if you're familiar with the way many of his films are edited then you probably have a closer comparison to Kluge's style.

Perfect. I am very familiar with Godard (your post almost seemed to be describing early Oshima). Thanks for your response.

Stylistically, Kluge and Tarkovsky are radically different. The common element is probably 'moving freely between different kinds of material', but the comparison really only pertains to Mirror, and they do this vaguely similar thing in very different ways. Tarkovsky's drift is explicitly subjective, whereas Kluge assembles his films as essay-like arguments, and can be extremely whimsical with his detours. His films have dramatic shifts in tone that you don't find in Tarkovsky.

I think it's a specious comparison, and there are dozens of other auteurs who offer much more meaningful points of similarity.

Just announced by Anthology Film Archives in Manhattan:

October 21-22
ALEXANDER KLUGE IN PERSON
Alexander Kluge will be here in person to present screenings of a selection of his classic theatrical films as well as his recent television work.

No specifics yet.

I thought i posted this before, but hmm - In the last years Kluge allready published some book co-works with Gerhard Richter and i even think that i allready saw an interview with him and Anselm Kiefer on TV. Anyway, here is something like a complete thing, incl. engl sub (says the web site): https://absolutmedien.de/film/584/Der+m ... dern+tanzt" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
I do not own the DVD myself so i can not verify the subtitles though!
I expect this to be a little different to the rather conventional documentary Over your cities grass will grow.

accatone wrote: Tue Aug 22, 2017 7:55 am I thought i posted this before, but hmm - In the last years Kluge allready published some book co-works with Gerhard Richter and i even think that i allready saw an interview with him and Anselm Kiefer on TV. Anyway, here is something like a complete thing, incl. engl sub (says the web site): https://absolutmedien.de/film/584/Der+m ... dern+tanzt" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
I do not own the DVD myself so i can not verify the subtitles though!
I expect this to be a little different to the rather conventional documentary Over your cities grass will grow.

Just bought and watched the DVDs and think they are fantastique! Its 2 DVDs, each almost 300min long. At the start of each disc you can chose "English" so i guess there are subtitles. The website confirms this as well. Not every short and Minutenfilm by Kluge is a masterpiece, but the dialoges with Kiefer alone are really great. Highlight for me was Kluges speech upon the receipt of the Heinrich Heine prize. The DVDs are cheap at the moment!

There is also a rather funny conversation between Anselm Kiefer and Ferdinand von Schirrach, no subs though: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OaYW1Ncvsn0

I noticed that EditionFilmmuseum's website is having a special the rest of this year to honor Kluge's 90th birthday--their complete 30-disc set of his works is only €83.99, which is presumably a huge steal (how much has this cost in the past? I'm guessing something like 3 times that) though the shipping is possibly a dealbreaker (€135 flat cost). Playing around in the cart though, it looks like I can buy up to 12 copies of the box without the shipping cost changing.

Does anyone located in the U.S. want to go in on a group buy? Even splitting that shipping up between 2-3 people would help a lot. Depending on how many people might go in on this, it looks like the total cost of the box plus shipping to me and then to you would range from as little as $105 to no more than $165 (vs. like $227 to buy it on your own)

Good idea, I would join.

I think I paid $200 for the box so that price is a steal. I also highly recommend the set.

I'd be interested in a group buy too.