Heute keine Projektion: Von Sternberg/Angels

A Childhood Memory

„Eine der Damen, die Abstecher in meine Straße unternahmen, hieß Suleika, die fliegende Jungfrau. Ich weiß nicht, wie sie zu diesem Namen kam. Sie war Ungarin, keine Türkin, außerdem blond, hatte keine sichtbaren Flügel, und niemand wusste, wie es ihr gelang, ihre Jungfräulichkeit zu bewahren.“ (Josef von Sternberg)

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Only Prostitutes Have Wings

Lilja 4 ever

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Sleeps with Angels

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Los Angeles

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I heard an Angel singing

When the day was springing,

‚Mercy, Pity, Peace

Is the world’s release.‘

The_Wounded_Angel_-_Hugo_Simberg

Heute keine Projektion: Innocence/Jean Renoir

Some further thoughts on innocence:

Jean Renoir talking to James Blue in 1970:

“I am very bad at casting. I am very bad, and sometimes to be bad helps me. In the way that I am attracted by a certain innocence. I am afraid of clichés, tricks. I am afraid of repeating situations we already saw on screen. People with not too much skill sometimes help me to keep a kind of – I use a very ambitious word, excuse me – to keep a kind of innocence”

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Renoir loved Andy Warhol

Be a standing cinema

Dress my friends up

just for show

See them as they really are

The question remains: How to film innocence? How translate a feeling into film without manipulating it? (stupid thoughts)

Le dejeneur sur lherbe

Le dejeneur sur lherbe2

la vie de jesus

but the camera poisons

scene/obscene

L’AMOUR “MONSTRE” DE TOUS LES TEMPS – Walerian Borowczyk

 

Heute keine Projektion: Penetration/João César Monteiro

some further thoughts on penetration: penetration as loosing innocence

a question I asked Albert Serra two years ago:

Let’s continue with another feeling: In your film I felt a strong desire for the women, their innocence and the way you show them. But at the same time I also had the desire to die.

I am cold and I am passionate. Maybe it is the mix of those to attributes you feel there.  I am dangerous. I have a lot of determination but without a goal. The same is true for the characters in the film. They desire but they don’t have a true object of desire. There is no proper goal in my film. It is just a dead desire. There are no concrete feelings for me. Though it may be sensual and sometimes erotic the characters cannot feel true desire without objects. And as you mentioned the women in the film,  I like them, too. Especially one of them, she has a very provocative face. And that is exactly why I don’t use her face in my film. I think of filmmakers as spectators. Let me explain that. I see the girl and I like her. But I don’t want to interfere, I don’t want to touch her or give her any meaning. I feel very close to Andy Warhol in this aspect. He talked a lot about manipulating without touching. Of course, I manipulate. I shoot, I edit, I change things until long after the shooting. But I won’t touch materiality. It is almost a catholic thought. The idea of sacred materiality, it is a kind of spiritual metamorphosis for me. At the same time I feel it to be more respectful. What ultimately arrives is a strange mixture of naturalism and artificiality.

how to achieve innocence? how to film innocence? the moment you capture it on film, it is not innocent anymore…

„Wretches! ye loved her for her wealth and hated her for her pride,

And when she fell in feeble health, ye blessed her- that she died!

How shall the ritual, then, be read?- the requiem how be sung

By you- by yours, the evil eye,- by yours, the slanderous tongue

That did to death the innocence that died, and died so young?“

(Lenore-Edgar Allan Poe)

penetration as death of innocence

but then there is João César Monteiro (filming an innocent death of innocence; trembling in beauty)

Give me arms and horses, wars will be mine

Silvestre

Silvestre2

You have long tresses sister, you will be known.

– With sharp scissors they will be cut short.

Silvestre3

You have a shy look sister, you will be known.

– When I am with men, I will not look down.

Silvestre4

You have a pale face sister, you will be known.

– With three days on the road, the sun will darken it.

Silvestre5

You have erect shoulders sister, you will be known.

– May my weapons be heavy for my shoulders to fall.

Silvestre6

You have a high bosom sister, you will be known.

– I will shrink my bosom into my heart within.

Silvestre7You have gentle hands sister, you will be known.

– There will be wind and rain that will toughen them.

Silvestre8

You have broad hips sister, you will be known.

– They will be under my doublet, men will never see them.

Silvestre9

You have dainty feet sister, you will be known.

– I will put them in boots and they will never be shown.

Silvestre10

You will be afraid in battle sister, you will be known.

– I will know how to be a man with my lance in my hand.

Silvestre14

You will fall in love sister, you will be known.

– Those who speak to me of love will pay dearly for it.

Silvestre15

 

Heute keine Projektion: Wrong Cinema/Penetration

B: “the creator of the new composition in the arts is an outlaw until he is a classic, there is hardly a moment in between (…)” (Gertrude Stein)

ON HOW TO MAKE WRONG CINEMA

Au hasard Balthazar2

Au hasard Balthazar

C: Bresson: “The soundtrack invented silence”

“It is not because Robert Bresson is a voyeur – it is because he is a film director. His eye is not passive but active, and this action itself has a sexual dimension” (J.M. Frodon)

Jean Epstein: “One doesn’t look at life, one penetrates it.

F: The first duty of an artist is not to fear unpopularity (Pier Paolo Pasolini)

With Alain Robbe-Grillet we try to reach a mirror floating in the water…and we drown

Projection/Penetration