War Requiem

British Queer auteur Derek Jarman probably never shot a real gun during his relatively short life yet his cinematic masterpiece is assuredly the combat-heavy war epic War Requiem (1989); a BBC-financed film adaptation of English composer Benjamin’s Britten’s 1963 music piece of the same name. Although centered around a musical requiem (Decca Records required that Jarman not include any audible sound in the film aside from Britten’s composition), War Requiem is indubitably first and foremost a visual tour-de-force in a category all of its own. In fact, I would argue that the musical score is the weakest attribute of the film. Unlike most of Jarman’s work, War Requiem neglects to feature hordes of nude gay men galloping along gayly but it does include a most intimate and physically and emotionally visceral look at the tragedy of martial masculinity and the bloody brotherhood of war. Unlike most popular anti-war films (i.e. Apocalypse Now, Platoon), War Requiem does the seemingly impossible by completely shying away from romanticizing and glorifying combat. Sure, the film may feature heavenly firebombings and sensual (but not sexual) soldierly camaraderie but the underlying message of, “war is destructive” permeates throughout the entirety of the bewitching brutality that is War Requiem. I am sure that Jarman – as a sensitive homosexual – saw war as the greatest evil as it kills the most beautiful and valiant of men for – at best – the most trivial and cryptic of reasons. Throughout War Requiem, a beauteous blending of real (stock footage) and fictional theatric deaths of young soldiers are successfully dramatized in a most horrifying manner. Ultimately, War Requiem is not only a tribute to the many British soldiers who needlessly bled blood on the earth’s soil, but, also, a virtual cinematic epitaph for the countless Europeans who died in battle since the dawn of Christianity. 

Aside from being a grand achievement in the realm of both art and filmmaking, War Requiem is a strangely spiritual work about the selfless and Christ-like sacrifice so many forgotten soldiers gave for their fatherland. Unlike many anti-war artists, Jarman peculiarly but pleasantly refrained from portraying the deaths of various soldiers as not being in vain, but, instead, as the inevitable "rite of passage" of every generation. In the end, the real victims of War Requiem are those unfortunate individuals who managed to survive the war. In the beginning of the film, the viewer is introduced to a thoroughly melancholic, wheelchair-bound war veteran (played by British veteran actor Laurence Olivier in his last acting role) whose wartime memories still haunt him at his advanced and exceedingly feeble age. While his loyal comrades died in their prime and are remembered for their gallant acts of soldierly nobility, the old war veteran cannot even relieve his bowels without the assistance of a nurse.  Had the old man lived during pagan times, his pathetic status as a crippled and elderly survivor would have most likely brought shame upon him as only the most courageous of fighters had the luxury of entering Valhalla upon the end of their mortal earthly existence. The only female charater featured in War Requiem is an angelic nurse (played by Tilda Swinton) who find herself caring for dying men that she acts as a pseudo-mother of sorts for. Although never setting foot on a battlefield, the nurse still encounters the most tragic and soul-shattering results of war. She is undoubtedly a Virgin Mary figure; the soldiers being the many Sons of the European Apocalypse. Like the war veteran, the nurse holds the burden of having to remember the short and painful deaths of those men that are forever lost to fate.

One of the most interesting and symbolic scenes of War Requiem is when a jolly snowball fight between a Brit and a Kraut (played by a youthful Sean Bean) turns into a deadly game all due to a sheer and petty misunderstanding.  During the scene, a German soldier appears from the shadowy entrance of a building and jovially throws a snowball at a British gentleman that is playing a piano outside in a most absurd manner. Of course, a fellow Brit (Wilfred Own – the film's lead protagonist – played by Nathaniel Parker) sees his comrade frolicking in the snow with the German but mistakes it for real battle. In the end, the previously friendly German and Englishman lay eternally dead for no reason; no doubt symbolic of war in general. Out of good and keen conscience, Derek Jarman also included a scene in War Requiem featuring a couple greedy and revoltingly effeminate, cigar-smoking Winston Churchill-like capitalists in pancake-make-up. While armies of European patriots slaughtered their fellow blood brothers in the belief that they were protecting their respective nations, the hotshot moneymen of these countries effortlessly relax in a state of constant hedonism as they count their endless downpour of shekels that they undeservedly earned from the noble blood of heroic men that they see as nothing more than ignorant peasants. As I mentioned earlier in the review, War Requiem does not feature a word of dialogue yet the entire story of war and its literal and figurative casualties are told in a most lucid and aesthetically-pleasurable manner.  Featuring innocent childhood flashbacks, delightful dirges, and real-life and extremely expressive theatrical deaths, War Requiem is nothing short of being one of the most (if not the most) important filmic war poems ever created.

-Ty E

Night Tide

Many decades before fully developing the exquisite mental illness that would later contribute to the uncanny and iconic performances he gave as Frank Booth in David Lynch’s Blue Velvet (1986) and Feck in The River’s Edge (1986), Dennis Hopper played in a variety of Hollywood and Indy cult films. Some of these films are somewhat forgotten (and rightfully so) while others – like Curtis Harrington’s Night Tide (1961) – are thankfully not. Night Tide is a fantastic little cult item about a young navy sailor named Johnny Drake (played by a relatively mentally stable Dennis Hopper) who finds himself magnetized to the mysterious pheromones of a cutesy fishy lady named Mora who may or may not be a genuine mermaid.  During the film, the audience learns that Mora was found as a child on a Greek Island and adopted by a British sea captain named Samuel Murdock (played by Gavin Muir); a somewhat shifty Svengali man-of-the-world who makes Johnny seem like a boyish philistine. Marjorie Elizabeth Cameron – the Occultist wife of fellow Thelemite and rock scientist Jack Whiteside Parsons and star of Kenneth Anger's color short Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome (1954) – also plays a small but imperative typecast role in Night Tide as a mystery sea-witch who seems to hold psychic powers over Mora. Apparently, Parsons' thought his wife Marjorie was an incarnation of the goddess Babalon (who she played in Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome), thus her ghastly yet angelic appearance in Night Tide only makes the film seem all the more eerie. Night Tide director Curtis Harrington also directed the documentary The Wormwood Star; a work about Marjorie Cameron and her Magickal art. In a sense, the audience is in the same rocking boat as Hopper’s character Johnny as both he and the viewers are bewildered by the dubious motives of Mora and the mystery woman follows her throughout the entirety of Night Tide. Essentially, Night Tide is a Gothic haunted house flick without a ghost-ridden house but, instead, set in a strangely atmospheric beachside vacation spot that can be justly compared to Herk Harvey’s Cocteau-inspired cult masterpiece Carnival of Souls (1962). Curtis Harrington – being a lifelong Edgar Allan Poe fanatic (his first film was a short 8mm adaptation of The Fall of the House of Usher) – named Night Tide after a line from Poe’s popular poem Annabel Lee. At the conclusion of the film, it will be all the more apparent to the viewer as to why the title of Night Tide and its source are all the more fitting. 

 I must admit that I have some domestic prejudices in regards to my reverence of Night Tide as I live in a seaside habitat similar to the one featured in the film. In fact, I only have to walk about 30 seconds from my condo to reach the beach and the Atlantic Ocean. Like the small beach town featured in Night Tide, my local area is known for its various amusement parks and Oceanside boardwalk. Of course, the only thing scary about my area is the number of extremely unpredictable alcohol-addicted locals and the unneeded number of aggressive police that arrest them. My town also has a relatively popular vintage boardwalk haunted house ride that features the same sort of Gothic horror cheese atmosphere that Night Tide potently permeates. On top of featuring a number of scenes of Johnny strolling down the beach and boardwalk amongst midnight shadows in the hopes of tracking down his ghostly gal, Night Tide also includes a couple phantasmagorical dream-sequences composed of Ed Wood-esque sea-urchins which are quite similar to the ones that can be seen at my local haunted house ride. Simply put, Night Tide is one of those rare Gothic horror B-movies that one could describe as an example of, “they don’t make them like they used to.” The same can be said of counter-culture acting legend Dennis Hopper; one of the few actors in American film history who deserves to be described as a true veteran actor due to his notoriously volatile personal life and uneven and unpredictable acting career. Although Hopper seems seemingly sane in Night Tide; his infamous nervous stoner laugh is still quite noticeable in the film. Night Tide also features some elements that foretell the awakening of the popular hippie movement in American, including a lucid New Age-ish bongo dance performed by the thoroughly entranced Mora, an irrational tribe of drug-possessed youths, and a bombardment of degenerate Jazz. Hopper’s character Johnny is also the sort of emasculated male that is incapable of taming his dominant beastess; a revolting trait oh-so in post-hippie American. 

 Despite its somewhat crude special effects and superlatively wacky storyline, Night Tide, like Carnival of Souls and the surprisingly neglected work Incubus (1966) starring William Shatner, is a work that still holds up today. Bordering the line between American cinematic art and B-grade schlock, and being of interest to Occultniks, Night Tide is surely a work that deserves to have a larger cult following than it actually has. The film is also an excellent (albeit corny) attempt to adapt Edgar Allen Poe’s ideas for contemporary (at the time it was made) times. Night Tide director Curtis Harrington would end his film career like he started it with a short adaptation of Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher simply entitled Usher (2002); a work featuring Zeena Schreck (aka LaVey); the daughter of Church of Satan founder and High Priest Anton LaVey. Incidentally, to help finance Usher, Zeena acted as a broker for Harrington’s sale of his rare signed copy of Aleister Crowley’s Book of Thoth.  Another connection to Crowley in Night Tide is a somewhat unnoticeable street sign with the address 777 Saabek Lane; the number of the address being a favorite of the English Alpha-Occultist. Unfortunately, like most of Harrington’s work, Usher is apparently (I have been unable to track down a copy of the short to view it myself) a mediocre and thoroughly banal work. That being said, I do not think it would a stretch to say that Night Tide is nothing short of being Harrington’s “cinematic magna opera.” 

-Ty E

One Man's War

 

In many ways, the German World War I memoir Storm of Steel (1920) by Ernst Jünger is a spiritual antidote to Franco-German author Erich Maria Remarque's absurdly popular pussyfoot anti-war literary diatribe All Quit on the Western Front (1928); a work that would by utilized and adapted as anti-Teutonic filmic-ammo by the glorified gangsters of Sunset Boulevard. Not only was Jünger a superior writer but his work would have a much greater influence on the German populous than Remarque's cowardly defeatist work.  Although known for his romantic view of war, Jünger would later become quite disillusioned with the Second World War and most specifically; National Socialism and Adolf Hitler.  Apparently, Jünger even played an exceedingly shadowy role in the Stauffenberg bomb plot against Hitler. If one thing is for sure, Jünger never attempted to capitalize off his celebrity as a distinguished and nationalistic anti-liberal writer during the Third Reich era, thus one can only conclude that he was a man of honor who never fell so low as to compromise his idealism for the personal benefit of power and monetary return like so many artists and prominent German figures of his generation. In fact, the most telling example of Jünger's character is that he refused an offer to head the German Academy of Literature and was subsequently banned from writing during the Nazi era. Like sage Radical Traditional Baron Julius Evola (who admired and wrote a book on Jünger), Jünger advocated a sort of aristocratic individualism called “Anarch” in response to an increasingly chaotic and totalitarian world. Jünger also defied the stereotypical conventions of a German nationalist by regularly experimenting and writing about drugs, including (but not limited to) cocaine, weed, and LSD (he even went on “trips” with Albert Hofmann; the inventor of the drug). During the German-occupation of France, Jünger was assigned to an administrative position in Paris. Although banned from writing, Jünger kept an intimate diary about his personal experiences in the slimy frog city and his (for the most part, pessimistic) thoughts on the war. In the experimental documentary One Man’s War (1982) aka La guerre d'un seul homme directed by Argentine auteur Edgardo Cozarinsky, narrations of Jünger’s Parisian diaries are cleverly juxtaposed with German and Vichy propaganda newsreels. 

Upon first viewing One Man’s War, it will be quite obvious to the fanatic cinephile that the documentary is a lot like Max Ophüls overrated documentary The Sorrow and The Pity (1969); the main difference being that Cozarinsky’s work is all the more potent and groundbreaking due to its inclusion of Jünger’s narrated diaries. From his earliest diary entries on, it is apparent that Jünger feels his job in Paris is dubious at best. In between meeting fellow artists like poet polymath and cine-magican Jean Cocteau and fellow right-wing anarchist Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Jünger experiences the grand pleasure of witnessing a handsome German deserter being executed via firing-squad and hearing rumors about the mass liquidations of Jews in the East. Jünger also does not shy away from describing a friendly chat he had with a comical French prostitute who jokingly saluted him as if she were a patriotic German soldier. The newsreels featured in One Man’s War range from the latest in tacky Parisian fashion to footage of numerous Frenchmen boarding trains to join the German National Socialist military campaign. The greatest irony of the documentary being that Jünger – a committed lifelong proponent of war and a lover of pain (After all, Jünger is the author of the pro-pain/anti-bourgeois book On Pain) has no faith in the greatest war of the twentieth century and fails to take pleasure in occupying a country which has arguably been Germany’s greatest enemy throughout all of European history. In the excellent book on the intellectual history of National Socialist ideology, Metapolitics : from Wagner and the German Romantics to Hitler (1941), written by German-American Peter Viereck (the son of Nazi propagandist/Philo-semite and purported bastard Grandson of Kaiser Wilhelm I; George Sylvester Viereck), the author makes the claim that German nationalism largely sprung from an inferiority complex Germany obtained by being so severely beaten and brainwashed (with ideas of "liberty") by the French throughout a number of wars over a number of centuries. I don’t know about other people but I personally derived some pleasure from seeing various newsreels of the snobbish French being occupied by a nation that they had once felt infinitely superior to. 

Edgardo Cozarinsky also added some more subtle contrasting ingredients to One Man's War that might not be apparent to most viewers upon first viewing the film. Throughout One Man’s War, scores by Aryan composers like Hans Pfitzer and Richard Strauss are coalesced together with music works by Jewish degenerate musicians like Franz Schreker and Arnold Schonberg. Surprisingly, the blending of varying musical styles is fairly unnoticeable and is undoubtedly complementary of the film itself. Speaking of blending Aryans and Jews, a rare newsreel of ¼ Jewish-British fascist propagandist John Amery is also featured in One Man’s War. Not only was Amery a committed fascist of royal Jewish ancestry (his father was Lord and conservative UK MP Leo Amery) but he was also a well known sexual libertine who – like many of the prominent French Vichy collaborators (writers Pierre Eugène Drieu La Rochelle and Robert Brasillach included) – was executed for treason by his respective nation of origin at the conclusion of World War II. That being said, One Man’s War not only proves to be an intriguing and solacing portrait of Vichy France but also an important and equally inventive quasi-Cinéma vérité cultural and artistic visual testimonial like no other.  I certainly can not think of another film that so seamlessly weaves cinematic poetry with historical document for a most celestially unruly mix. Despite the sometimes depressive narration of Jünger’s writings and the war torn brutality of the imagery, One Man’s War is for the part a relaxing and mellow cinematic timeline that offers a quite pleasurable experience for World War II fanatics (myself including) and cinephiles alike.  Although Jünger’s tone may be melancholic and pessimistic throughout One Man's War, he certainly proves comic (whether intentional or not) in his random ramblings, especially when he remarks in a cynical manner regarding Mongolian volunteers (Germany had the largest multicultural army in human history at the time), "whole tribes of yellow ants have been enrolled."  If one is to learn anything from One Man's War, it is that the authoritarian racial collectivism of the National Socialist regime was not up to par with Ernst Jünger’s aristocratic Anarch Weltanschauung.

-Ty E

Valhalla Rising

 

I do not think it would be an exaggeration for me to say that Valhalla Rising (2009), directed by Danish auteur Nicholas Winding Refn, is the greatest Odinist film that has ever been made. Unlike the multicultural-sensitive and blasphemously cartoonish Marvel Comics movie Thor (2011), Valhalla Rising is an anti-pacifist masterpiece that is lavishly steeped in the old Nordic Odinic religion. The protagonist of the film is One-Eye, who like the Germanic God Odin, is missing an eye. Also like Odin, One-Eye displays a keen affinity for war, battle, victory and death as his life revolves around these things, even as he tragically meets his untimely but prophetic demise. Valhalla Rising can also be seen as a metaphorical portrayal of the birth of Christianity and the death of Odin in ancient Europa.  After escaping and killing a group of men who forced him to fight-to-the-death other captured men, Odin meets up with a degenerate Männerbund of hopelessly holy Christian Crusaders who are sailing for the homeland of their alien Christ; Jerusalem, but instead they land in the New World; the Americas. It is immediately apparent upon their initial meeting that, despite being members of the same race, One-Eye and the Crusaders are of a wholly different nature as the band of Christians display nothing short of weary and wimpy behavior when around the unpredictable Heathen Cyclops One-Eye; a man who may have one unflinching eye but seems to have ten more in the back of his all-seeing head. As Valhalla Rising progresses, it is all too apparent that Christianity has severely pacified the blond beast Crusaders of the film. Whereas One-Eye is a bestial barbarian whose instincts are fully intact, the Crusaders display a sort of incertitude and deracination that is most certainly the result of adopting an alien religion that is at odds with their forefather's religion of battle and war.  Although Odin apparently sacrificed himself for himself, Jesus Christ (as mentioned by a Crusader in the film) sacrificed himself for all of humanity. In Valhalla Rising, the Crusaders sheepishly become the victims of Amerindians yet One-Eye proves to hold his own, until something changes his mind and he takes an unexpected path……

 In many regards, Valhalla Rising is an anti-action-adventure flick as it is a work that is recognized for its breaking of redundant genre conventions, most notably due to its artful and atmospheric prowess and its static yet strangely unpedantic pacing. Simply put, Valhalla Rising is an oh-so unfortunately rare thinking man’s action-adventure film, thus it will most likely leave your typical alcoholic American football fan in an even more drunken stupor of hopeless bewilderment and restless agitation. Although the film may not include as many battles and bloody corpses as Zach Snyder’s absurdly overrated work 300 (2007), Valhalla Rising is ultimately a more visceral and brutal work that – like the ancient Germanic barbarians – takes no prisoners. Also, unlike 300, Valhalla Rising – despite its various bloodstained dream sequences – has a truly organic feel that makes it stand eminent over its superfluous CGI-stylized contemporaries. The themes featured in Valhalla Rising are more in tune with nature and the “law of the claw," thus the film makes for a truly unique cinematic experience that the world has not seen since the films of the Third Reich. In Valhalla Rising, the Crusaders who follow anti-organic Christian laws fall prey to their theological pacifism while One-Eye – a man who still “feels” the Odinist paganism of his ancestors – seems to be invincible.  One-Eye can even be seen in Valhalla Rising staring at a Crusader-made crucifix with a smirk.  To One-Eye, the cross is nothing more than a false idol that has no more intrinsic value to him than an opera by Richard Wagner has to a crack-smoking and 40 oz.-chugging rapper.

 The conclusion of Valhalla Rising – not unlike Ingmar Bergman’s The Virgin Spring (1960) –  can be seen as a symbolic metaphor for the death of Odinic German paganism in Europe. When One-Eye – like Jesus Christ – sacrifices himself for someone other than himself, he also takes the religion of his ancestors with him into oblivion. After all, Gods and religions only die when the adherent of these beliefs are no more but it has also been stated reputable psychologists that these religions are passed on (albeit dormant) through the blood of ancestors. In Swiss psychoanalyst C.G. Jung’s essay Wotan (aka Odin), he theorized that the spirit of Odin continues to slumber in the collective unconscious of all Germanic peoples, stating of Germans during the first half of the twentieth century, "But what is more than curious -- indeed, piquant to a degree -- is that an ancient god of storm and frenzy, the long quiescent Wotan, should awake, like an extinct volcano, to new activity, in a civilized country that had long been supposed to have outgrown the Middle Ages. We have seen him come to life in the German Youth Movement, and right at the beginning the blood of several sheep was shed in honour of his resurrection. Armed with rucksack and lute, blond youths, and sometimes girls as well, were to be seen as restless wanderers on every road from the North Cape to Sicily, faithful votaries of the roving god." Jung believed that the National Socialist revolution in Germany was an atavistic awakening of Wotan in the German populous and that every so often, the rouse of the old pagan gods was only nature, adding "If we apply are admittedly peculiar point of view consistently, we are driven to conclude that Wotan must, in time, reveal not only the restless, violent, stormy side of his character, but, also, his ecstatic and mantic qualities -- a very different aspect of his nature. If this conclusion is correct, National Socialism would not be the last word. Things must be concealed in the background which we cannot imagine at present, but we may expect them to appear in the course of the next few years or decades. Wotan's reawakening is a stepping back into the past; the stream was damned up and has broken into its old channel." Although One-Eye Sacrifices himself for the life of another, he does so in an honorable manner by allowing himself to be killed in battle, thus securing a position in Valhalla; the heavenly “hall of the slain” that Odin reigns over. To the ancient Germanic peoples, sins (in the Christian sense) like rape, pillaging, and murder were considered nothing short of honorable. Throughout Valhalla Rising, One-Eye sneers at the Christian Crusaders in a most sinister but deserving manner. In his mind, by killing these passive Christians, he is altruistically giving them a sense of honor that they are indubitably undeserving of. 

Recently, a class action lawsuit was taken against FilmDistrict, the distributor of the film Drive (2011), by a soulless and philistinic wench due to her exceedingly petty and pathetic belief that the film’s trailer is misleading, the film features very little driving/chase scenes, and that it promotes violence against Jewish people. I am sure that this disgruntled money-siphoning she-bitch would be even more angered if she were to watch Drive director Nicholas Winking Refn's previous film Valhalla Rising; a work that pisses on the scrolls of the Hebraic Judeo-Christian religions and the very weak and meek kind of society that she is symbolic of.  Needless to say, such class action lawsuits would be nothing short of an absurdity in a world where Odin reigns. With the transvaluation of all values and destruction of a master morality that formed in Europe via the slave-morality of Christianity came a lamentable “taming of the blond beast." Although disguised as a mere Viking action-adventure film, Valhalla Rising portrays this suicidal change in a somewhat subtle manner. Through Christianity eventually came the liberal humanism that is now common in the Occident today. If modern Germanic peoples continue to uphold these deracinating and apocalyptic self-destructive trends, they can expect to meet a similar fate to that of One-Eye when he passively offers himself to hostile Amerindians. Aside from being an exquisite work of bloody martial art, Valhalla Rising features an important Odinic philosophy of the warrior spirit that can only bring strength to the post-Christianized Europoid.  Set to a score of ambient noise, Valhalla Rising, like a religious ceremony, is first and foremost, a work that is meant to be felt and wholly embraced by the viewer.  If any film can inspire a person or a collective to go on the Wild Hunt, it is Valhalla Rising.

-Ty E

Lot in Sodom

Between 1930-1968, Puritanism indubitably reigned in American cinema due to Hollywood's self-censorship via the Hays Code. Of course, most of the big Hollywood movie moguls and stars were committed purveyors of sin but very rarely were such hedonistic and heretical lifestyles portrayed on the silver screen. Thankfully, a couple independent filmmakers had the audacity to produce libertine films that rivaled the most subversive of works found in comparably morally-free Europa. One of the most notable and greatest of these early American independent films is Lot in Sodom (1933); a silent Avant-Garde short full of surly sins and homoerotic sexual sadism.  In fact, Lot in Sodom may be the only film ever made featuring a nude man being dangled upside down by two extremely militant yet androgynous sodomites.  The short also features some of the first female breasts and buttocks ever committed to celluloid in the United States. Lot in Sodom was co-directed by Melville Webber and James Sibley Watson; the latter (somewhat strangely) being a Harvard University-educated medical doctor and philanthropist. Before collaborating on Lot in Sodom, the two filmmakers co-directed The Fall of the House of Usher (1928); a brilliant 12-minute-long hyper-surrealist adaptation of Edgar Allen Poe’s short story of the same name. In a mere 28 minutes, Lot in Sodom manages to feature a variety of sacrilegious cinematic ingredients that are comparable to the biblical blasphemy of Häxan: Witchcraft Through The Age (1922), the phantasmagorical homoeroticism of Jean Cocteau’s The Blood of a Poet (1930), and the majestic body-worship of Leni Riefenstahl’s Olympia (1938). As one would expect from the film’s title, Lot in Sodom is based on the Biblical story of Sodom and Gomorrah. Unlike most other films based on the story, Lot in Sodom is surprisingly faithful to the bible tale. In the short film, a character named Lot (who is featured in chapters 11-14 and 19 of the Book of Genesis) – an individual known for his dual-vice of drunkenness and incest in the Hebrew bible and as a prophet of Islam – is warned by an angel to leave Sodom so as to avoid having homo-sex with the sinful city's many shameless sexual deviants and horny homosexuals. Eventually, the Hollywood Babylon-esque metropolis is devoured by a holy holocaust and Lot’s overly inquisitive wifey morphs into stone after making the deadly mistake of taking one last glance at her much cherished ex-homeland. 

Despite the extremely religious nature of the short, Lot in Sodom is undoubtedly a tribute to comrade Satan and his celestial vacation spot Sodom. The fact that the film was directed by an ultra-altruistic doctor makes it all the more interesting. I hate to say it but Lot in Sodom even makes F.W. Murnau’s Faust (1926) – another Satanic masterpiece that features nudity and Luciferian themes – seem rather tame by comparison. Aesthetically, Lot in Sodom is worthy of being compared to the greatest of early surrealist and expressionist works. I can only assume that Lot in Sodom has fallen somewhat into the realm of obscurity due to its relatively short length and its artsy fartsy “European-ness.” Like Murnau’s Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927); Lot in Sodom is surely a work that baffled the average hopeless American philistine filmgoer due to its abstract artfulness and blatantly erotic nature. Admittedly, upon first viewing the film, I assumed it was European. Of course, like the films of Kenneth Anger, Lot in Sodom is the kind of American film that could have only been produced independently. I would not be surprised if Melville Webber and James Sibley Watson created Lot in Sodom to fulfill their personal void for sadistic homoerotic pornography. Modern viewers would probably only find the film offensive due to its inclusion of stereotypically despicable hook-nosed Hebrews comparable to the caricatures featured in Nazi propagandist Julius Streicher’s infamous newspaper Der Stürmer. Naturally, rainbow-power-bolsheviks will also most likely find Lot in Sodom to be quite objectionable due to its less than flattering portrayal of sexual inverts. Whether one finds the material featured in Lot in Sodom to be offensive or not, it will be hard for the viewer to deny that the short is one of the first and few examples of authentic American cinematic art.  Lot in Sodom was made at a time when film was still in its infancy and the medium still seemed to have endless possibilities.  Despite only churning out a couple short films, Melville Webber and James Sibley are certainly important (albeit mostly forgotten) pioneers of Avant-Garde filmmaking.  In short, Lot in Sodom is mandatory viewing for all serious fans of cinema and truly transgressive art.

-Ty E

Savage Streets

Considered by few to be a masterpiece in exploitation, Savage Streets is first and foremost a vehicle for Linda Blair to "professionally" bare her breasts. Even though this scene only stretches about a minute long with a slow and calculated pan across a bathtub, it is painfully obvious that her impunity paired with attitude was the second mark to meet. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if production of Savage Streets was funded simply from the premise of Linda Blair in leather wielding a crossbow, cleavage absolute. Caught on the rebound by director Danny Steinmann, who would later direct the runt of the Friday the 13th series (A New Beginning), Savage Streets pumps up the vigilante formula with effervescent colors, leg-warmers, and a typical 'tude to tease and flaunt a harsh and particular sexuality on the winners ground. Opening with a contrast of the Satins and the Scars, even adhering to a Venn diagram of sorts in comparing and contrasting the extremities of pack formations, in this case suburban violence - Vince is first introduced duping his parents into believing he's pursuing honest intentions, only then trading his would-be letterman jacket for a leather jacket. These actions justify a means, the obligatory summation of "do you know where your children go at night?". This (presently) pointless question is soon answered as we witness Vince jump into the back of a Bel-Air convertible, rendezvousing with his gang, The Scars. These boisterous boys are heeded only by their ignorance for at first they seem as if they could fit the archetype of being generally rowdy, even playful. But the light soon parts and their darker intentions are shown in a serious of shakedowns which include ripping off the shirt of a buxom blonde in front of her boyfriend. It was a shame Steinmann didn't seize the opportunity or the advantage while he had it. God knows how much good would have came out of a single tear streaming down her cheeks as her breasts are groped by strange men. More-so, a simple look of dismay did not emphasize what could have been an above excellent (as well as arousing) scene. Note of interest - why not rape the beautiful aforementioned blonde rather than the timid, handicapped sister? Then again, power is the play and the Scars have more than enough sexual curiosities to work out.

With the Satins at the core of the story, we are indebted to enjoy the company of Brenda, Francine, and Heather, Brenda's deaf sister. The several hilarious and tragic (maintaining hilarity) confrontations between the sexes can have ample blame rerouted back to the Satins. It is them who strike first by stealing the convertible of the Scars while busy attempting to collect a nigh mentioned sum of money from the local jocks on account of "blow". Never mind the scene in which The Scars almost hit Heather with a car. Why the imperfect vessel of chastity is trotting around decrepit city streets at night with a gang of collected loose inhibitions is beyond me. It would appear that the Scars terrorize while the Satins tease, giving both sides a gender-specific lethality - men control and abuse while women seduce and destroy. That's not to bring the role of Heather into this mix though. That's not to say I don't believe in inklings of innocence. The fact of the matter is, Heather is cattle. Created by a Norman Yonemoto, Heather's character is a senseless shell serving a strict purpose for rape. She exists solely to be violated, thrusting our cast of women into a level of aggression and panic. As comes the revenge, so must the inciting incident. Soon enough will the Scars repay a small slight against their street credibility by raping a deaf/mute girl and as per aged rape-revenge talents, will force the runt of the group to savage their forcefully seized property.

An interesting aspect of The Scars is their general homoerotic behavior, frequently at play. You'll see the leader of the Scars, Jake, grab the crotches of his kinsfolk as well as tugging the pants down off Vince in a heated fury. Gearing Vince's libido towards a potential victim, sure, but the spark in Jake's eyes as well as his lecherous stare either suggest that the character in which Robert Dryer portrayed fostered homosexual condolences or Robert Dryer himself found himself an on-set muse. Do I even need to mention the locking of lips as a form of taunting, of which was allegedly improvised, so stated Danny Steinmann in an interview? I like to consider Dryer's part of improvisation to concede towards a form of theatrical subconscious submission. The frothing hyper-sexuality of the Satins intermittently clash with the flamboyantly feral Scars, as well. To bring about, again, the questioning of the Scars motivations - I find it interesting to note the choice of victim on Jake's part. The Scars definitely succeeded in hand-selecting the mousiest and most timid girl of all, somewhat resembling a creature from The Secret of Nimh. If Savage Streets were to be acknowledged for anything other than a brief spurt of crossbow vigilantism or Linda Blair's dirty pillows it would be for a neon-bathed battle of the sexes in which the body count outweighs the potential requirement for a viewing. I found the city of Savage Streets to boast clever flickers and splotches of light, fruitful characters whose moral scale has been past compromised, and enough hearty violence to spread evenly across 93 minutes. However, I cannot place a crown on a film unworthy of exploitation royalty, especially one whose smoldering legacy refuses to burn out after left to the elements. Babes, bolts, and badgering - Savage Streets is a silly relic of simpler times. I won't cut the ribbon of approval yet but I wholeheartedly agree its investments into revenge have more benevolence than that of the wavering vigilante pool that is modern cinema.

-mAQ

Pink Narcissus

 

I cannot for the life of me think of another film with such as suitable name as Pink Narcissus (1971). I discovered the film after watching an episode of the (unfortunately) short-lived film anthology series John Waters Presents Movies That Will Corrupt You. As one would most likely guess from the title, the film is about a narcissistic gay man but, fortunately, not in the violently cliche, sardonically shameless and repellant self-obsessed-Hollywood-drama-queen-tabloid-formula that is oh-so common and contagious today. At its worst, Pink Narcissus is a barely-feature-length silent surrealist arthouse journey through quasi-pornographic phallocentric-purgatory that is worthy of being compared to the work of F.W. Murnau, Jean Cocteau, Kenneth Anger, Derek Jarman and Jean Genet but filmed on a budget (estimated at $27,000.00) one would expect from an ultra-gritty realist work directed by Paul Morrissey (it was originally rumored that Andy Warhol had produced Pink Narcissus). The history of Pink Narcissus is almost as strange as the film itself as no one even knew who directed the film (the film concludes with the inter-title “Produced by Anonymous”) until the mid-1990s when a writer named Bruce Benderson, who was fanatically obsessed with the work, went on a stalker-like journey to eventually discover that it was directed by Manhattan-based photographer James Bidgood. Although featuring a variety of flesh-colored Netherworld realms worthy of any Kenneth Anger fan’s total gaze, Pink Narcissus was almost entirely shot in Bidgood’s small New York City apartment during a 7 year stretch (1963-1970). After watching Pink Narcissus and later discovering how it was made, I was nothing short of shocked and awed as the various magical worlds contained within the film left me nothing short of strangely enthralled. Although shot on consumer-grade 8 mm film stock, Pink Narcissus features a keen alpha-aesthetic all of its own that takes the viewer on a journey through scenarios that are more colorful than a mongrel circus performer jumping over a neon rainbow on fire. 

 Like F.W. Murnau’s magnum opus Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927), Pink Narcissus begins with a long atmospheric shot in a seemingly organic wilderness setting, but, is in fact, a completely contrived apartment set. After this breathtaking introductory shot, the viewer is introduced to a youthful prostitute who – like the Narcissus of Greek mythology – cannot help but look at his own reflection in a most satisfied manner. Eventually, the young gigolo fantasizes about a variety of subversive erotic scenarios where he is naturally the central figure. Not only is this prostitute hopelessly perverted but he is also a dilettante student of history who hopelessly fantasizes about traveling through various historical periods and places. For instance, the young man becomes a Spanish matador who finds himself antagonizing a young Aryan biker that resembles Scorpio of Anger’s Scorpio’s Rising (1964). The young prostitute also trancedly dreams of the prospect of being a slave who is routinely sexually manhandled by a sadistic Roman emperor and becoming the virtual dick-tator of a male harem. The film also features a gay urban street where pants-less perverts with exaggerated members wander like ghosts on the midnight prowl. The downtown street scenes foretell the world Rainer Werner Fassbinder would create with his final work Querelle (1982), including a gay sailor who roams the streets in the hopes of satisfying wholly unsavory desires. Like Querelle, most objects (including messy hotdogs and slimy snails) are phallic in form. Despite its miniscule budget, Pink Narcissus is undoubtedly strangely more hypnotic and phantasmagorical than Fassbinder’s infamous film. 

 Despite featuring surreal cumshots and a boner-swinging belly dancer, Pink Narcissus is barely pornographic, thus the film is not restricted solely to sexually inverted male audiences. In fact, I believe that Pink Narcissus is a film that every serious cinephile and aesthetic addict should see as it is a work that certainly brings withstanding scopophiliac glee long after it concludes. Echoing back to the silent film era, Pink Narcissus features not a single line of dialogue but instead demands that the viewer refrain from blinking an eye so as to enjoy the thoroughly enamoring visual ride. Despite being over 40 years old, this delightful cinematic daydream is most certainly as potent and controversial as when it first appeared mysteriously in underground arthouse cinema theaters during the early 1970s.  Like all great works of art, Pink Narcissus is indubitably the truest and most honest expression of a wonderfully self-indulgent filmmaker, hence the original anonymity of the film's clearly embarrassed creator (although Bidgood claims he removed his name from the film because editors "changed his vision").  Indeed, Pink Narcissus may be a figurative and literal work of cine-masturbation on the auteur filmmaker's part but that is to be expect from all truly great and authentic works of art.  After all, it is not often that one is treated to such an adroit kaleidoscope extravaganza of killer colors like Pink Narcissus.

-Ty E