Re:Voir

Vinegar Syndrome, Deaf Crocodile, Imprint, Cinema Guild, and more.
Post Reply
Message
Author
User avatar
domino harvey
Dot Com Dom
Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2006 2:42 pm

Re: Re:Voir

#101 Post by domino harvey » Fri Mar 25, 2022 12:10 am

I didn’t like the Edge either, add it to the list!
domino harvey wrote:
Wed Jul 05, 2017 3:47 am
I haven't read through any of the critical appraisals from Cahiers yet, but I'm curious how much their fancy with it is related to the politics (it involves a young radical leftist who intends to assassinate President Johnson) and how much is the style of the film-- the movie employs that ol' crutch of many student films in which excessive narration replaces synchronized sound because it's easier to do so (maybe 20% of the film is synchronized). However, Kramer overlaps dialog onto scenes that rarely depict or show when/where/what the conversation is covering. I could see this appealing to a formalist or aesthetic reading, but honestly, it came across as just constant amateur hour. Most of the overlap looked to be a quick fix for not shooting necessary scenes and having too much coverage shot of other scenes. The dialog is also meandering, proto-mumblecore (but somehow worse and less interesting [!]), the film explores exactly zero actual moral or political quandaries inherent in the premise, and everything looks like it was made on the weekends by a friend-circle. It is a movie so poorly constructed that its flaws could be mistaken for art. Even if these techniques were intentional distancing/tone-muting tools on Kramer's part, it's still basically the A Night to Dismember of political films.

User avatar
zedz
Joined: Sun Nov 07, 2004 7:24 pm

Re: Re:Voir

#102 Post by zedz » Tue Mar 29, 2022 10:56 pm

Nice point about the film's incompetence possibly being mistaken for avant-garde invention. Here's some actual avant-garde invention.

Rouges Silences - Alain Mazars

Image
This is a collection of four genre-tainted but thoroughly experimental films from the 70s and 80s. The title film (1978) is the longest and probably the most ambitious. Ominous music, blurred frames, children's shadows appearing at windows, weird, overdetermined encounters. This is a film with the dramatic incoherence and emotional resonance of a good giallo, albeit one without even the slenderest pretence of plot. It's moody and effective, but it's also nearly an hour long, and doesn't manage to sustain its tension over the long haul.

Le Jardin des Ages (1982) is more concise and successful, a prismatic / psychedelic layering of dissolved and reconstituted horror movie tropes, with a Derenian concern for gestures, rituals and thresholds. Brilliant.

Visages perdus (1983) is the slightest film in the collection but it's still good: frantic superimpositions with a scuttling ping-pong soundtrack, and Actus (1984) is a heady, psychedelic record of an ominous religious ritual, and possibly my favourite film on the disc.

More info and trailer here.

User avatar
zedz
Joined: Sun Nov 07, 2004 7:24 pm

Re: Re:Voir

#103 Post by zedz » Tue Apr 12, 2022 5:32 pm

Figures of Absence - Dore O.

Image

A collection of early work by the recently deceased German filmmaker, who was the partner and collaborator of the venerable Werner Nekes. Good, hearty experimental filmmaking with an interest in liminal spaces (beaches, stairways, thresholds) and glimpses of veiled psychodrama, often referencing Maya Deren (I mean, who else are you supposed to think of when you see a woman in a black leotard running along a beach?).

Alaska (1968) is the prototype, and it's full of intriguing shots and idea (including some trippy inverted tides), set to a minimalist experimental soundtrack.

Lawale (1969) takes a bunch of similar ideas and develops them into a more coherent and ambitious half-hour. There's a thread of charged tableaux vivants - people standing around with their faces obscured, only gradually beginning to move, reveal their faces, or exchange positions as the film progresses. There's a strong narrative energy to the shots, but they never amount to an actual narrative, so the film ends up feeling like a mysterious, deracinated melodrama. It's accompanied by a striking musique concrete score that prompted me to think "somebody needs to oil that donkey!"

The other highlights of the disc were Kaskara (1974), made in collaboration with Nekes, a hypnotic compilation of superimposed and reflected windows and mechanical camera movement, and Frozen Flashes (1976), a less successful but still pretty great reworking of the cryptic tableaux vivants / suppressed narratives idea of Lawale.

More info and trailer here

My Home Movies - Taylor Mead

Image

What it says on the box: home movies by the iconic Mead. He's not especially known as a filmmaker rather than a performer / muse, and the interest in these films isn't formal so much as right place / right time / oooh, look at that famous person. The Italian / Greek film is faster paced and more fragmentary - more Mekas, really - and thus more interesting. The films were presumably originally screened silent. Now they're slathered with anachronistic needle-drops in the manner of Kenneth Anger's unfortunate dalliance with ELO.

More info and trailer here

Sunlove - Jean-Jacques Lebel

Image

Two Kounter Kulture Klassics from 1967. Sunlove is a total time-capsule: painted nudists frolic with inflatables in a pool, until the sun goes down, the dancing begins, and a shaman with a vacuum cleaner shows up. Spoiler: the vacuum cleaner is set to BLOW, and he's aiming it at your MIND, man. It sounds like a mere curio, but I actually found it kind of compelling, because the facile celebratory aspects of the material are undercut by growling, clanging, dissonant music and the frequent puncturing punctuation of still images, suggesting slippage from a hippy dream to a Boschian nightmare. The second part of the film collages old film stills, mostly depicting violence against women, and the third section depicts more colourful, florid and ominous rituals in a forest. l"Etat Normal is very different, a silent scrambling of newsreels and stag films. The disc is filled out with two contemporary documentaries about the chaotic 1967 International Experimental Film Festival of Knokke-le-Zoute, in which Lebel features (as does Yoko Ono in a bag). It served as a kind of bande-annonce for May '68: lunatics, asylum and so forth.

More info and trailers here

User avatar
zedz
Joined: Sun Nov 07, 2004 7:24 pm

Re: Re:Voir

#104 Post by zedz » Tue Apr 19, 2022 12:00 am

(Art) Core - M M Serra

Image

A host of cine-provocations that vary wildly in quality. Enduring Ornament (2015), a collation of decomposing sex films, is pretty, if hardly groundbreaking, but many of the others are unremarkable experimental fare with porn images interpolated or dirty talk on the soundtrack, yelling "look at me, I'm transgressive!" Yawn. There are also several documentaries intended to shock - e.g. L'Amour fou, a beginner's guide to S&M, and Chop Off, a portrait of a guy who is slowly and methodically self-amputating bits of his body. The content is interesting at times 9there's also a tour of Jack Smith's apartment), but the delivery is Access Cable basic.

More info and trailer here

Le Film est deja commence? - Maurice Lemaitre

Image

A pioneering Lettrist film from 1951, or more precisely, one component of a pioneering Lettrist event of 1951, during which the screening was to be intentionally disrupted and not declared over until the gendarmes arrived. Although necessarily incomplete, this is a fascinating text, with lots of the hallmarks of the movement: woozy self-reflexivity (even baked into the title: has the film started yet?), competing spoken and on-screen texts; detourned found footage. The set contains BluRay and DVD, and the typical excellent booklet.

More info and trailer here

Flowers and Leaves - Marguerite Harris

This was a total washout. The first film-loop of five minutes or so is a "will this do?" Brakhage knock-off, in which the titular flowers and leaves are sellotaped to film and "projected" (optically printed). It's murky, random and with none of the earthy poetry or basic skill of Brakhage's experiments in this form.

The second loop is something else. Same procedure, but after a very short while it's like the optical printer, or the film projector, broke down, and Harris has to carry on for twenty interminable minutes with only a lecture-hall overhead projector at her service, so we get not cinematic abstraction, but Harris's messy sellotaped film strips being dragged manually past the camera. It's briefly gob-smacking in its inept audacity but soon becomes stultifying.

The disc is one of those ultra-barebones affairs that I suspect were intended more for galleries than the general public. No booklet, just one auto-playing disc for each loop. They didn't even include a flopsweat scratch 'n' sniff card.

More info and no trailer here.

Oh lucky me. Looks like I got the last copy.

User avatar
Matt
Joined: Tue Nov 02, 2004 12:58 pm

Re:Voir

#105 Post by Matt » Tue Apr 19, 2022 11:58 pm

Re: Kenneth Anger’s unfortunate dalliance with ELO

Somehow I have been an Anger fan for decades without ever knowing this (the 1977/1978 “Eldorado Edition” of Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome) existed. Having seen a clip, I think I might actually prefer it to the original! It seems to suit the druggy “costume party with my cool friends” vibe of the film better than Janáček’s Glagolitic Mass, which always seemed to me far too bombastic and grand for what is essentially a rather quaint film.

The Marguerite Harris sounds like something I’d love to see. Once. Inept avant-garde has its charms.

EDIT: Wait. These are from the 21st century? From your description I would have imagined them to be artifacts from the postwar era, like she was a contemporary of Marie Menken. That might have been charming.
Last edited by Matt on Tue Apr 19, 2022 11:58 pm, edited 1 time in total.

User avatar
zedz
Joined: Sun Nov 07, 2004 7:24 pm

Re: Re:Voir

#106 Post by zedz » Wed Apr 20, 2022 12:11 am

Matt wrote:
Tue Apr 19, 2022 11:58 pm
The Marguerite Harris sounds like something I’d love to see. Once. Inept avant-garde has its charms.
I admit it was literally laugh out loud funny when it first happened, but then it carried on for twenty fucking minutes! (Without going through the boring / annoying / funny again cycle.)

User avatar
zedz
Joined: Sun Nov 07, 2004 7:24 pm

Re: Re:Voir

#107 Post by zedz » Wed Apr 20, 2022 12:25 am

Matt wrote:
Tue Apr 19, 2022 11:58 pm
Re: Kenneth Anger’s unfortunate dalliance with ELO

Somehow I have been an Anger fan for decades without ever knowing this (the 1977/1978 “Eldorado Edition” of Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome) existed. Having seen a clip, I think I might actually prefer it to the original! It seems to suit the druggy “costume party with my cool friends” vibe of the film better than Janáček’s Glagolitic Mass, which always seemed to me far too bombastic and grand for what is essentially a rather quaint film.
I don't recall which version(s) appears on the recent DVDs and BluRays, but back in the 90s Anger used the ELO version in his touring Magick Lantern Cycle (and also a version of Rabbit's Moon with even more jarringly anachronistic music. It was this track, repeated a few times to fit the length of the film.) Typically for Anger, there was a fair bit of bullshit surrounding all of this stuff (e.g. that ELO composed the soundtrack especially for the film.)

User avatar
Matt
Joined: Tue Nov 02, 2004 12:58 pm

Re: Re:Voir

#108 Post by Matt » Wed Apr 20, 2022 12:43 am

I don’t even have to click your link to start hearing that stupid song from Rabbit’s Moon in my head. Bum-te-bum-te-bum-te-doo-doo-doo, etc. Seeing the restored, original speed version several years ago with the original doo-wop soundtrack was a revelation. Suddenly his worst film became one of his best.

User avatar
barbarella satyricon
Joined: Fri Jun 21, 2019 7:45 am

Re: Re:Voir

#109 Post by barbarella satyricon » Sat Apr 23, 2022 10:30 am

For anyone who’s had experience picking up Re:Voir blu rays new, do they come packaged in shrink wrap or sealed cellophane like standard home media releases?

A gallery shop that has a few titles for sale seemed to have all the blu ray releases in sleeves, the kind with an adhesive flap to close. The dvd releases I saw were all shrink-wrapped. Wondering if this is just how Re:Voir ships out their blu rays, or if these had been opened for some other purpose then repackaged.

The blu rays I saw were Anticipation of the Night, L’enfant secret, and Un rêve solaire, for what it’s worth.

billfitzgerald
Joined: Sun Jun 08, 2014 12:28 pm

Re: Re:Voir

#110 Post by billfitzgerald » Sat Apr 23, 2022 12:35 pm

I've bought a few Blu-rays directly from Re:Voir and they were packaged in the resealable sleeves instead of shrink-wrap.

User avatar
swo17
Bloodthirsty Butcher
Joined: Tue Apr 15, 2008 10:25 am
Location: SLC, UT

Re: Re:Voir

#111 Post by swo17 » Sat Apr 23, 2022 1:49 pm

Same

User avatar
barbarella satyricon
Joined: Fri Jun 21, 2019 7:45 am

Re: Re:Voir

#112 Post by barbarella satyricon » Sat Apr 23, 2022 11:22 pm

Thanks, bill and swo, appreciate it!

User avatar
hearthesilence
Joined: Fri Mar 04, 2005 4:22 am
Location: NYC

Re: Re:Voir

#113 Post by hearthesilence » Tue May 24, 2022 10:27 pm

furbicide wrote:
Tue Feb 19, 2019 7:20 pm
Marcel Hanoun's seminal Une simple histoire is out on DVD on the 5th of March, according to Re:voir's social media. Looks beautiful, particularly in comparison with the murky online copy that most people would be familiar with.

https://www.facebook.com/ReVoirVideos/v ... 816048662/
I just saw this at MoMA via a DCP from Re:Voir. It looks GREAT! It was originally shot on 16mm, correct? I imagine they must've scanned the OCN (at 4K perhaps?) because it was a pretty fine grain, nothing heavy or clumpy - it was comparable to an excellent exhibition print of something shot in 35mm. It also looked like a raw scan with NO touch up whatsoever - like you had all the little bits of damage and scratches flying up all the time, but it was hardly distracting - the picture quality itself was top notch despite the visible damage. It's too bad it's not available on Blu-ray, but at least it can be rented on Vimeo and streamed in HD.

User avatar
zedz
Joined: Sun Nov 07, 2004 7:24 pm

Re: Re:Voir

#114 Post by zedz » Tue May 24, 2022 11:15 pm

This bump reminded me that I didn't finish my write-ups, and I was saving the best for last.

Image
Nature and Abstractions - Siegfried Fruhauf
This is a DVD / BluRay combo of pure experimental eye candy that takes on centuries of imagemaking (pre-cinema photography, phantom ride films, geometrical abstraction, Arnulf Rainer, installation art), doses it up with LSD and shoots 80,000 volts through it. I don't want to go into too much detail and spoil the treasure trove of surprises in this set, but one look at the trailer should let you know if this is the disc you've been waiting for. I think it's one of the best things Re:Voir has ever released.

More info and trailer.

User avatar
swo17
Bloodthirsty Butcher
Joined: Tue Apr 15, 2008 10:25 am
Location: SLC, UT

Re: Re:Voir

#115 Post by swo17 » Tue May 24, 2022 11:32 pm

Fruhauf is awesome! I love the Index DVD, and it looks like this release has only moderate overlap with it

User avatar
zedz
Joined: Sun Nov 07, 2004 7:24 pm

Re: Re:Voir

#116 Post by zedz » Tue May 24, 2022 11:35 pm

swo17 wrote:
Tue May 24, 2022 11:32 pm
Fruhauf is awesome! I love the Index DVD, and it looks like this release has only moderate overlap with it
The films in this set really benefit from the HD presentation.

User avatar
therewillbeblus
Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm

Re: Re:Voir

#117 Post by therewillbeblus » Wed May 25, 2022 12:21 pm

Sounds incredible. I'm sure this has been asked before, but is purchasing direct from Re:Voir the only/easiest way to get their stuff for international customers?

User avatar
zedz
Joined: Sun Nov 07, 2004 7:24 pm

Re: Re:Voir

#118 Post by zedz » Wed May 25, 2022 3:58 pm

therewillbeblus wrote:
Wed May 25, 2022 12:21 pm
Sounds incredible. I'm sure this has been asked before, but is purchasing direct from Re:Voir the only/easiest way to get their stuff for international customers?
Yeah, they're great, and most of their stuff isn't carried by the big online stores, in my experience (unless it's a co-production with Potemkine or something).

User avatar
zedz
Joined: Sun Nov 07, 2004 7:24 pm

Re: Re:Voir

#119 Post by zedz » Wed May 25, 2022 4:18 pm

zedz wrote:
Sat Sep 30, 2017 2:46 pm
That Breer situation remains mysterious.
Breerwatch update: still no sign of the box set on Re:Voir's site; still available from the Govett Brewster. Has it ever been available anywhere else?

User avatar
swo17
Bloodthirsty Butcher
Joined: Tue Apr 15, 2008 10:25 am
Location: SLC, UT

Re: Re:Voir

#120 Post by swo17 » Wed May 25, 2022 4:21 pm

zedz wrote:
Wed May 25, 2022 3:58 pm
therewillbeblus wrote:
Wed May 25, 2022 12:21 pm
Sounds incredible. I'm sure this has been asked before, but is purchasing direct from Re:Voir the only/easiest way to get their stuff for international customers?
Yeah, they're great, and most of their stuff isn't carried by the big online stores, in my experience (unless it's a co-production with Potemkine or something).
I've also bought some from the BFI Shop, but that's not necessarily better/easier unless you're already placing an order there and the price is right for a particular title

User avatar
therewillbeblus
Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm

Re: Re:Voir

#121 Post by therewillbeblus » Fri May 27, 2022 9:20 am

I'm looking to place a considerable order for the first time (I missed the free shipping window a couple years back), and trying to whittle down my list. Unfortunately shipping just escalates to overwhelming proportions and it's difficult to justify paying like $70 for it. So far, this is what I got in the cart:

-SIEGFRIED A. FRUHAUF : Nature and Abstractions
-Rose Lowder 2 Pack DVDs
-Pack of 3 DVD/Blu-ray Patrick Bokanowski boxsets
-Pack 2 DVD/Blu-ray Jacques Perconte
-Jeff Scher - Reasons to be Glad
-Sandy Ding - Psychoecho
-Dominic Angerame - Cityscapes
-Paul Clipson - Landscape Dissolves
-Virgil Widrich - Short FIlms
-Fluxfilm Anthology
-Peter Rose - Analogies
-Paul Sharits - Mandala Films

I've seen about half of these already, but curious what seems droppable and/or a necessity to add to the pile, or what should be prioritized amongst the list? I'm going to need to get rid of some at least, as these are expensive!

User avatar
swo17
Bloodthirsty Butcher
Joined: Tue Apr 15, 2008 10:25 am
Location: SLC, UT

Re: Re:Voir

#122 Post by swo17 » Fri May 27, 2022 10:53 am

My first thought was that there are a couple collections of Peter Rose's films that render the Re:voir redundant. However, the one with most of the crossover (which I bought just a year and a half ago) appears to be no longer available. The other one is $50 and always has been, but Amazon says there's only one copy left so it may be worth jumping on. Pressures of the Text is the standout from that collection. You can also email Rose directly at esorp@aol.com if you are interested in obtaining his work.

Otherwise, I own all of these (other than the Fruhauf, which I intend to correct soon enough) and find them all worthwhile. Some are more acquired tastes but I assume you know what you're getting into. Definitely don't drop the Widrich and consider adding some Gunvor Nelson and the Joost Rekveld set. Do you already have Dreaminimalist or are you planning to buy a Gaspar Noe film to acquire The Flicker?

User avatar
therewillbeblus
Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm

Re: Re:Voir

#123 Post by therewillbeblus » Fri May 27, 2022 11:17 am

Thanks for the suggestions! I know I explored Gunvor Nelson and Peter Rose a couple years ago but don't recall whether or not they were my thing, so I'll have to sample again. I already preordered the Noe just to get The Flicker in HD of course

Since shipping seems to be based on how much you're buying without any obvious reinforcers to lump orders together, is there any benefit to placing one large order, or can I just split this up and not lose out on any economic incentives?

User avatar
swo17
Bloodthirsty Butcher
Joined: Tue Apr 15, 2008 10:25 am
Location: SLC, UT

Re: Re:Voir

#124 Post by swo17 » Fri May 27, 2022 11:33 am

There's another discounted 3-pack available for Nelson. At least try the lovely, abrasive True to Life before making up your mind.

Oh, and you absolutely have to spend the €80 + whatever it costs to have a 3D setup and get the Ken Jacobs 3x3D set. It will change your life, in that you will now have to live your life with that much less money. But also the films are cool.

I don't know about your shipping question. Maybe experiment with different combinations of things in your cart and see what works best

User avatar
therewillbeblus
Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm

Re: Re:Voir

#125 Post by therewillbeblus » Fri May 27, 2022 12:07 pm

I actually have a bunch of digital files of Nelson unwatched, so I'll do that. Also, the Joost Rekveld set looks cool.

Wrong thread of course, but how can one get a 3D setup? I imagine you need a 3D TV for starters... I don't want to shell out a million dollars to see my KL Goodbye to Language properly, but I also want to do that

Post Reply