There's a distinct possibility that I may be quoting your "holy shit!" reaction to Wojciech Wiszniewski in a chapter I'm writing for a book on Polish avant-garde cinema...

Hah! Though I'm sure I'm not the only person to have had that response to Wiszniewski. (And I'm also sure that was much toned down from my actual, real-time reaction!)

I'm 4/15ths of the way through the ed. filmmuseum set.
Looks like from the 5th set on its primarily documentaries.

But was wondering if anyone had read Kluge's writing and what folks would recommend. Been intrigued enough by his films and thought processes that I wanted to read some of his words. Thx.

What language are you looking for?

Er, sorry, should have mentioned that.
I'd need Kluge in English translation.

For the moment i am only able to find The Devil's Blind Spot (Die Lücke die der Teufel lässt) via amazon.com. Strangly enough, the english translation seems to just have 336 pages whereas the original german has 949 pages. The book is a collection of short stories so the translation might be just a selection of the original. Anyway, I think this could be (as often with short stories) good for "starters" because the many short stories represent the "whole" bandwidth of Kluge, from Comedy to Tragedy (not different from his Film/TV work where he plays the different tones with ease). For such a prolific author there is not much translated into the english language (nothing new to what i heard), but maybe i am just not able to find out better sources. Someone else might have better informations.

That's odd, as Case Histories, Cinema Stories, and Learning Processes with a Deadly Outcome are all readily available.

Yes, you are right. But Cinema Stories does only have 96 pages as opposed to the originals 350+. With Case Histories i have no idea what collection this could be. I have no idea to what original publication this refers to - so i can not recommend it. I have not read Lernprozesse - no recommendation from my side.

I would still recommend the The Devil's Blind Spot (Die Lücke die der Teufel lässt) because it presents the manifold themes (not just cinema stories) and style/short story editing Kluge is famous for. First to recommend would be Chronik der Gefühle, personally, but i can not find a translation. If the english translations are indeed just parts of the original works it would be quite disappointing because the sheer quantity of Kluges stories in these books make up (yes) the quality of reading, flipping through the pages….

What can you recommend Hopscotch?

So I guess this is the weekend will I finally sit down and gather up all of Zedz favorite film makers. I'm really curious as to how well Perplexed was actually distributed as it is one tough nut to crack. That thought I am simply blown away. Please tell me this is what most of his films are like.

More or less. Literally - it's something of a mid-point between the essayist and narrative strands of his feature work.

That's great news. Actually on the disc I rented my favorite was probably The Execution of an Elephant. Definitely going to risk the Filmmuseums after this. Oddly though I found the narrative elements the hardest to truly get into.

That might be because of the uneasy mix he was experimenting with at the time. Films like Occasional Work of a Female Slave and Strongman Ferdinand have much more secure fictional narrative focuses.

You're turning me into a dope addict, man. Wish I could respond with more, but I guess I'll have to save up for my B0Day is all this says.

Nice 43min feature on Kluge with lots of archival material. Unfortunately German language only - very interesting.