gshanger
Joined Apr 2004
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Anais Nin is best known for her diaries depicting her psychological and artistic growth, published House of Incest in 1958. This dream-journey features Nin reading an extract from her novella House of Incest, in particularly the line "I remember my first birth in water," Bells of Atlantis evokes the watery depths of the lost continent of ourselves, and the images suggest the aqueous beauty of that lost world. It is a lyrical journey into another time, an imaginative film exploration of a poet's world. Her episodic text recites a narrative of the agonizing birth of consciousness from the indistinct fluid realms of Atlantis, the film's metaphor for the subconscious. The visual track of the camera sways gently in contrasting directions over each of the three layers of superimposed images that are usually present.
Born Hugh Parker Guiler in Boston, Ian Hugo lived his childhood in Puerto Rico (a "tropical paradise" the memory of which stayed with him and surfaces in both his engravings and his films). Parker then spent his school years in Scotland and at Columbia University where he studied economics and literature. He was working with the National City Bank when he met and married Anais Nin in 1923; they moved to Paris the next year, and in that city Nin's diary and Parker's artistic aspirations flowered. Parker feared his business associates would not understand his interests in art and music, let alone those of his wife, so he began a second life, as Ian Hugo. In 1940 he took up engraving and etching, studying under S.W. Hayter of Atelier 17, producing surreal images that often accompanied Nin's books. For Nin his unwavering love and financial support were indispensable, he was "the fixed center, core...my home, my refuge" (Sept. 16, 1937, Nearer the Moon, The Unexpurgated Diary of Anais Nin, 1937-1939).
A fictionalized portrait of him appears in Philip Kaufman's 1990 Henry & June. Responding to comments that viewers saw motion in his engravings, Hugo chose to take up film-making. He asked Sasha Hammid for instruction, but was told "Use the camera yourself, make your own mistakes, make your own style."
What Ian Hugo did was to delve into his dreams, his unconscious, his memories. With no specific plan when he began a film, Hugo would collect images, then reorder or superimpose them, finding poetic meaning in these juxtapositions. These spontaneous inventions greatly resembled his engravings which he described in 1946 as "hieroglyphs of a language in which our unconscious is trying to convey important, urgent messages."
In the underwater world of Bells of Atlantis all of the light in the film is from the world above the surface - it is otherworldly, out of place yet necessary. In Jazz of Lights, the street lights of Times Square become, in Nin's words, "an ephemeral flow of sensations"; this flow that she also calls "phantasmagorical" had a crucial impact on Stan Brakhage who now says that without Jazz of Lights (in 1954) "there would have been no Anticipation of the Night" (in 1958). Hugo lived the last two decades of his life in a New York apartment high above street level; in the evening, surrounded by an electrically illuminated landscape, he dictated his memoirs into tape recorders and would from time to time polish the large copper panels that had been used to print his engravings from the worlds of the unconscious and the dream.
Louis and Bebe Barron show their pioneering strength with one of the earliest use of electronic music ever used in a film. They also composed the infamous Hollywood film Forbidden Planet (1956), and worked with John Cage, Frank Zappa, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Pierre Boulez.
Born Hugh Parker Guiler in Boston, Ian Hugo lived his childhood in Puerto Rico (a "tropical paradise" the memory of which stayed with him and surfaces in both his engravings and his films). Parker then spent his school years in Scotland and at Columbia University where he studied economics and literature. He was working with the National City Bank when he met and married Anais Nin in 1923; they moved to Paris the next year, and in that city Nin's diary and Parker's artistic aspirations flowered. Parker feared his business associates would not understand his interests in art and music, let alone those of his wife, so he began a second life, as Ian Hugo. In 1940 he took up engraving and etching, studying under S.W. Hayter of Atelier 17, producing surreal images that often accompanied Nin's books. For Nin his unwavering love and financial support were indispensable, he was "the fixed center, core...my home, my refuge" (Sept. 16, 1937, Nearer the Moon, The Unexpurgated Diary of Anais Nin, 1937-1939).
A fictionalized portrait of him appears in Philip Kaufman's 1990 Henry & June. Responding to comments that viewers saw motion in his engravings, Hugo chose to take up film-making. He asked Sasha Hammid for instruction, but was told "Use the camera yourself, make your own mistakes, make your own style."
What Ian Hugo did was to delve into his dreams, his unconscious, his memories. With no specific plan when he began a film, Hugo would collect images, then reorder or superimpose them, finding poetic meaning in these juxtapositions. These spontaneous inventions greatly resembled his engravings which he described in 1946 as "hieroglyphs of a language in which our unconscious is trying to convey important, urgent messages."
In the underwater world of Bells of Atlantis all of the light in the film is from the world above the surface - it is otherworldly, out of place yet necessary. In Jazz of Lights, the street lights of Times Square become, in Nin's words, "an ephemeral flow of sensations"; this flow that she also calls "phantasmagorical" had a crucial impact on Stan Brakhage who now says that without Jazz of Lights (in 1954) "there would have been no Anticipation of the Night" (in 1958). Hugo lived the last two decades of his life in a New York apartment high above street level; in the evening, surrounded by an electrically illuminated landscape, he dictated his memoirs into tape recorders and would from time to time polish the large copper panels that had been used to print his engravings from the worlds of the unconscious and the dream.
Louis and Bebe Barron show their pioneering strength with one of the earliest use of electronic music ever used in a film. They also composed the infamous Hollywood film Forbidden Planet (1956), and worked with John Cage, Frank Zappa, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Pierre Boulez.
As soon as this short film ended I wanted to sign a Union Card and join The Seafarers International Union. Great benefits package by-the-way.. Produced for the SIU, Atlantic & Gulf Coast District, which is head-quartered in Sir Stanley's birthplace & then home, New York City.
Yes this is Sir Stanley's (not knighted yet & will never be, because he only lived in England for almost 40 yrs & is American born--for shame Gov's)), ANYHOW, its his first colour film, his second was Spartacus. Kubrick never actually wanted to do this film, in the first place, but he needed the money - that was the motivation for this film. As usual, it was not up to Sir Stanley's standards and is why it remained 'buried' for so long until it resurfaced in the early-80's--but only the VHS copy survives. I guess dee prints are somewhere in Sir Stanley's vault outside London? Anyhow, his first feature FEAR & DESIRE, suffers the same fate, no prints available, because in the early-80's, Kubrick took the film prints out of circulation, only two copies of F&D, survive - at George Eastman House archives (Rochester, NY); but those can't be screened publicly.
I love THE SEAFARERS, you see Kubrick's love of the camera showing through every grain of colour. The narration track is very traditional Kubrick, this is only his third film, and had only been making films for three years & a still- photographer for about 13 years at this point in 1953. He never went to film school, never actually finished high school (it bored him), and was self taught as a filmmaker by reading both Pudovkin's FILM THEORY & FILM ACTING.
Religiously attending MONA film screening in late forties (Jay Leyda, was a curator there), was all he needed, to propel him into dee film world and abandon photography - more-or-less!!!
This film was used by SIU as a membership-drive tool. They let workers know the benefits of organized labour and why the SIU in particular. The benefits package alone was worth the monthly union fee. Sir Stanley did a bang-up film here. The seafarers were the men & women that worked on the ships, and not to be confused with the longshore men. OK, now go out and get a copy for yourself!!! GO.....
Gio.
Yes this is Sir Stanley's (not knighted yet & will never be, because he only lived in England for almost 40 yrs & is American born--for shame Gov's)), ANYHOW, its his first colour film, his second was Spartacus. Kubrick never actually wanted to do this film, in the first place, but he needed the money - that was the motivation for this film. As usual, it was not up to Sir Stanley's standards and is why it remained 'buried' for so long until it resurfaced in the early-80's--but only the VHS copy survives. I guess dee prints are somewhere in Sir Stanley's vault outside London? Anyhow, his first feature FEAR & DESIRE, suffers the same fate, no prints available, because in the early-80's, Kubrick took the film prints out of circulation, only two copies of F&D, survive - at George Eastman House archives (Rochester, NY); but those can't be screened publicly.
I love THE SEAFARERS, you see Kubrick's love of the camera showing through every grain of colour. The narration track is very traditional Kubrick, this is only his third film, and had only been making films for three years & a still- photographer for about 13 years at this point in 1953. He never went to film school, never actually finished high school (it bored him), and was self taught as a filmmaker by reading both Pudovkin's FILM THEORY & FILM ACTING.
Religiously attending MONA film screening in late forties (Jay Leyda, was a curator there), was all he needed, to propel him into dee film world and abandon photography - more-or-less!!!
This film was used by SIU as a membership-drive tool. They let workers know the benefits of organized labour and why the SIU in particular. The benefits package alone was worth the monthly union fee. Sir Stanley did a bang-up film here. The seafarers were the men & women that worked on the ships, and not to be confused with the longshore men. OK, now go out and get a copy for yourself!!! GO.....
Gio.
Is it safe? Is it safe? Is it safe?
I don't think so!!!
"1.0" will serve'n'dice you up into Kubrick-esque mind games. Clockwork Orange does come to mind here. In the very near future, one company (F.A.R.M) controls 90% of the worlds food products and most other supermarket items. To reap more greedy profits, it starts conducting experiments in 16 unsuspecting apartment buildings. Mysterious packages arrive, but contain nothing in them. They keep coming and coming, but still they are empty? F.A.R.M. buys up local hospitals, to cover up the mysterious deaths of an experiment gone insanely wrong. Its hard to tell more without giving away the rest of dee story. Well worth the watch, folks. Sir Stanley Kubrick would be proud of these two "first-time directors", already Renfroe and Thorsson were aptly named by Variety magazine as the 2004 top-ten hot new directors to watch out for.
Ensemble cast of characters, "Six Feet Under" star, Jeremy Sisto (Simon J), luscious Deborah Unger (nurse Trish), Lance Hendrickson (Howard), Udo Kier (Derrick), and others should easily win dee SAG (Screen Actors Guild) ensemble acting prize for 2004. As of yet, its still not released, but when it does, it will be the sleeper film of dee year folks, and quite possibly, in the top-ten grossing film of 2004...can't wait..........SHANG SHANG...y'all!!!
I don't think so!!!
"1.0" will serve'n'dice you up into Kubrick-esque mind games. Clockwork Orange does come to mind here. In the very near future, one company (F.A.R.M) controls 90% of the worlds food products and most other supermarket items. To reap more greedy profits, it starts conducting experiments in 16 unsuspecting apartment buildings. Mysterious packages arrive, but contain nothing in them. They keep coming and coming, but still they are empty? F.A.R.M. buys up local hospitals, to cover up the mysterious deaths of an experiment gone insanely wrong. Its hard to tell more without giving away the rest of dee story. Well worth the watch, folks. Sir Stanley Kubrick would be proud of these two "first-time directors", already Renfroe and Thorsson were aptly named by Variety magazine as the 2004 top-ten hot new directors to watch out for.
Ensemble cast of characters, "Six Feet Under" star, Jeremy Sisto (Simon J), luscious Deborah Unger (nurse Trish), Lance Hendrickson (Howard), Udo Kier (Derrick), and others should easily win dee SAG (Screen Actors Guild) ensemble acting prize for 2004. As of yet, its still not released, but when it does, it will be the sleeper film of dee year folks, and quite possibly, in the top-ten grossing film of 2004...can't wait..........SHANG SHANG...y'all!!!