Dog Star Man (Parts I–IV)

Stan Brakhage: Dog Star Man (US 1962–1964).

US 1962–1964. D: Stan Brakhage. 16 mm, colour, silent, 51 min. Print: LUX. Viewed at the Finnish Film Archive, Orion, Helsinki, 30 March 2008. 

PRELUDE: DOG STAR MAN. 1961. See separate blog entry. 25 min

PART I. 1962. The accelerated motion of the clouds over Colorado. Planets, fog, clouds, the forest, water, snow, crystals, the corona, man and dog climbing the mountain slope, Sisyphus. 

PART II. 1963. Abstract flashes, a baby, broken images, crystals, red lava. 

PART III. 1964. Double exposure, a pregnant woman, the reality of the flesh. 

PART IV. 1964. The distorting lens, strong movement, a mosaic of the Madonna, outbursts of the Sun, giving birth, milk from the nipple, the clouds, shooting stars.

Prelude: Dog Star Man

Stan Brakhage: Prelude: Dog Star Man (US 1961).

US 1961. D: Stan Brakhage. 16 mm, colour, silent, 25 min. Print: LUX (colour ok). Screened at the Finnish Film Archive, Orion, Helsinki, 30 March 2008. Primal nebula, moving light, traffic, skin, clouds, colour, etching, fur, eclipse, snow, painting, water, nude woman, snowy landscape, clouds pass the moon, the corona, the mountains of Boulder, Colorado.

Dog Star Man. Parts I–IV (1961–1964). See separate blog entry. 51 min

Scenes from Under Childhood #1

US 1967-1970. D: Stan Brakhage. 16mm, colour, silent, 25 min. Print: LUX. Viewed at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 30 March 2008. The discovery of colours: red, black, blue. The constitution of vision.

Anticipation of the Night

US 1958. D: Stan Brakhage. 16mm, colour, silent, sources give 43 min, this print 40 min. Print: LUX, colour fading. Viewed at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 30 March 2008. The atavistic expectation of the night, the child's furtive look, constituting the look, traffic, fairground, trees without foliage.

Songs 23-36

US 1967. D: Stan Brakhage. 16mm, colour, silent. Announced at 110 min, 76 min. New (2008) LUX print 77 min. Viewed at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 29 March 2008. Great new 16mm print of the films originally shot on 8mm. Song 23 Part I: this is a strong commentary on war, inspired by the Vietnam war, visions of death, carnage, disaster, found footage. Paolo Cherchi Usai is following on the track of Song 23 Part I in his Passio. Song 23 Part II: Peter Kubelka's Vienna (with Kubelka on the flute), other sections include very dark images, bordering on the invisible, and then rewarded by some delicious Brakhage abstract image food (the fascinating mordants). Song 24: naked boy at the flute. Song 25: the birth of the image. Song 26: the road at night, the devastation of war, the silence of the nature. - The Songs cycle is a very uneven sketchbook linking the sublime with the monotonous.

Songs 1-22

US 1966. D: Stan Brakhage. 16mm, colour, silent, announced duration 107 min, actually 96 min. New print (2008) from LUX. Viewed at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 28 March 2008. Brakhage's sketchbook originally shot on 8mm, now seen in a brand new 16mm print. The elements, fire, woman, children, giving birth, the butterfly, San Francisco, the sea creatures, insects, rain, lines, etchings, mordants, horizons, portraits, religion, dance, etching on film creating abstract expressionism in motion.