02/04 - 02/06: Play as Content

While viewing the "experimental" films in class, they left me confused and stretching to create some sort of meaning to them, with the exception of "Great Pumpkin Race". I could tell from the start that it was a lighthearted piece that wasnt grasping for any hidden meanings, which allowed me to sit back and enjoy rather than attempting to "unperplex" myself from viewing "At Land" and "The Lead Shoes." I felt that the camera tricks and camera play were meant for humor, and I was fascinated by several of the feets that Emil Cohl had achieved for it being 1910. I thought that the pumpkins bouncing up into a window and over a fence were especially amusing. However, in "At Land" and "The Lead Shoes", I felt as though I couldnt really sit back and enjoy myself because it was too wierd and there was no narrative what so ever, and I felt as though they were taking themselves too seriously. Therefore, I strained to analyze these films in search of some sort of palpable truth that I wished would have come from them. Maya Deren's essay "Creating Movies with a New Dimension: Time" laid my attempt to substantialize these pieces to rest. What was less important is the extremely loose, if possible, non-existant narratives in "At Land" and "The Lead Shoes", and what was more important was that these two films were exploring the medium of film and though it is harder to call these films ones "at play" because of their more serious tones, in general, they were exploring, playing, and creating something new. Deren spends the last part of his essay commending filmmakers for exploring new creativities and translating "the magic of thoughts and dreams" to film. Deren also concentrates most of his essay telling us that only in the medium of film may the relationships between time and space be explored in such a way. And similar to a few of Deren's films, "at Land" and " Lead Shoes" use many of the same editing tricks as Deren. For example, when Deren describes a movie in which the feet of an actor are filmed one step at a time, one step landing on pavement, the next on sand, the next in a jungle... reminded me of the woman in one of the films starting at see, then crawling through a jungle, then crawling across a table, all as if she were on one continuous journey. This was the producer's "exploration" of the medium and he used editing tricks very well to create his illusions. I hope that this will teach me for next time to first appreciate the filmmakers use of his camera instead of becoming uninterested because of it's lack of narrative style, etc.