Here’s one for the Aeon Flux fans. Peter Chung re/visions Tomb Raider:
It’s much more Chung than Lara Croft. Here’s an interview he gave about his view of film-making, in the context of the remastering of the Aeon DVD:
I was very aware from the beginning that the stories I wanted to tell were unconventional, experimental, nonliteral. They are based on personal experience, observation, insight. They are not meant to make the viewer feel comfortable, reassured or familiar. The kinds of stories I tell are the only kind that seem right to me. They aren’t linear because life isn’t linear. Linearity is reductive.
Among the other similarities with Chung’s oeuvre is the gnostic themes found in Reign the Conqueror as well as Aeon.
Dunno, I always thought that a little Aeon Flux went a long, long way. I rather liked Peter Chung’s contribution to “The Animatrix” anthology (although the best one by far was the one about the kids searching for the lost cat). But aside from that piece (and it was classically constructed, more inventive than idiosyncratic), mostly I feel his saying “the stories I wanted to tell were unconventional, experimental, nonliteral” is a species of simple abdication of the claims and responsibilities of being a storyteller.
And that’s fine, no one’s forcing him; I’d say Chung is more sort of a shaper of visual scenarios, rather than a storyteller. But the condescension inherent in his sideswipe of an ancient art is a little narrow; and his suggested replacements are kind of fun, but really, not all THAT impressive. “Linearity is reductive.” Well then I guess so is cognition, but without it we’d keep on bumping into the living room furniture. Not to mention that the first two minutes of this Lara Croft short (I couldn’t get any farther than that) were full of the most dreary cliches you can think of.
Hey, don’t get me wrong, I like folks like Robert Wilson and Elizabeth LeCompte as much as the next guy (:-)!), but I think they’re both conscious of standing slightly outside, or perhaps beside, a tradition, rather than above it.
Well you can’t please everyone. The movie version of Aeon Flux was, as far as I could tell (I could only stand about 10 minutes of it), about as original and daring as a piece of IKEA furniture. Whaddaya gonna do. I only mention it because I hope it will prompt Kim to post a lot of pix of Charlize Theron.
I bought the latest New Dawn magazine and I am satisfied.
Heh.
You didn’t save the last ones, j_p_z?
I think he makes it pretty clear in the interview he’s something of a classic modernist - someone who recognises that the shaping of experience is an active act of the imagination, as opposed to the idea of art as mimesis. Incidentally, as I observed with regard to Trollope and other canonical authors, this is an insight and a practice that long preceded postmodernism. Linearity is reductive. The best art and literature doesn’t try to impose a single or a restrictive meaning.
As to the Lara Croft vid, I’m surprised you can’t see the irony in his use of those motifs. He’s using cliches to point out they are cliches, and to arrange a few of them in surprising ways.
Fair enough, Mark, but I guess I just don’t think Chung’s work is sufficiently rich in scope to justify very many grand pronouncements. If Trollope were to tell me that ‘Linearity is reductive,’ I suppose I’d say ‘Please explain further what you mean, monsieur’; whereas if Chuck Palahniuk says so, then my only reply is, ‘Hey, ya think there’s any beers left in the fridge?’
As to “using cliches to point out they are cliches,” I wonder if that doesn’t come dangerously close to being plain old tired of art, and maybe even tired of life. Irony as an instrument has far healthier and more interesting and exacting uses. Except when Alanis Morrisette gets her hands on it, of course.
If you haven’t done so, j_p_z, I’d suggest getting hold of Reign the Conqueror on dvd - although Chung has collaborators on that series, I think its length and overall conception best represents his work. Though Aeon is in a class of her own.
All of Trollope’s novels, of course, are trying to tell you that!
That was a good one!