Experimental Project - Influences and Inspiration

Unfortunately I was not well so missed the first seminar back so Natalie and Sophie had to explain our initial idea and I missed the films shown but was still able to watch most of them on Youtube. ne of the films shown was Maya Deren's Meshes of the Afternoon and luckily I had already watched that film along with At Land and A Study in Choreography for Camera because Maya Deren was the focus of my Approaching Research presentation. I watched them again though as they're not the easiest films to understand and I thought they may help with some inspiration when thinking about how to create a film that is experimental. After researching into Maya Deren previously I also have a bit more of an insight into what she wanted to create and achieve and for me one of her most interesting points is that experimental film isnt about filming what's already there in front of you but doing something different with it by using things like camera and editing techniques (which today is practised a lot but in the 40's when she was making films and writing was seen as quite a new and adventurous thing)

'Meshes of the Afternoon' Maya Deren (1943) - This is quite a strange film and took a while for me to get my head around and even now I'm not too sure of what it's about but I can appreciate the many techniques she has used in it. There is a lot of time and space manipulation (which Deren was very big on) and you can see that for example when the woman is chasing after a weird hooded person but it appears she is not getting any closer despite the fact the cloaked figure is not moving very fast and the woman herself is running but still seemingly to be in the same place. There are also times in the film where there are multiple figures of the woman (played by Deren herself) so it looks like she is sat at the table with herself but infact these women are all playing out a different moment in time and a different outcome but they are happening parallel to each other so you see them all at the same time ( this is my interpretation of it anyway). Because the same thing keeps happening, within a slightly different way or with a slightly different outcome, there is a lot of repetition throughout the film and it is in black & white which gives a very monotonous feel to it and the repeated eerie music over the top just adds to the strangeness of the whole thing along with many other elements in the film.

'Ballet Mecanique' Fernand Leger (1924) - This film didn't really hold my engagement and after a few minutes I'd already lost interest in it although there were some elements that I did like. In this short film there are lots of different images juxtaposed together and repeated many times throughout, it's very centred around movement and its literal name would be machanical ballet so I think it's aim is to show how the movement of machines and other things being repeated over can mimic that of a ballet, all the swirling, turning and swaying movements are meant to represent the movement in dance. I think to remind us that it is being compared and contrasted to that of peoples movement there are also images of a girl on a swing and a girls mouth smiling and then going back to normal and the woman walking up the stairs is repeated and by doing that we can see that if our own movements were repeated in the same cycle like that of a machine that we would also begin to look mechanical. There are also images that you are seeing through a prism and also looks a bit like looking through a kaleidoscope in particular the womans face which I think may have been done to take away the human quality and symbolise that of the machines e.g. the pistons used in one shot are all working together and there is nothing special about them, they're all doing the same thing at the same time and all look the same and by using the glass prism you create multiple images of the woman that all look the same. 

The Chemical Brothers 'Star Guitar' directed by Michel Gondry - This music video is much more modern than the short films above so did appeal to me more, despite the fact of it being decades newer it still held on to the principle of repeating the sames things throughout and the video is also kept very simple with this train journey all the way through. The fact it never stops moving also reminds me a bit of the ballet mecanique because they too encorporate movement as one of the main elements as the shots (even if they are stills) are edited in a way that keeps them moving all the time so you never get a break or chance to have a rest. what stood out to me most about theis video is how the pictures are related to the music e.g. when a part of the song came on when there were voices the train would then be driving past people at a station and that same sequence would be repeated until the music changes, so when the beat changes or a particular beat or sound comes in the images on the video will move and match that so the picture is edited to fit the music really well.

What I've learnt from watching experimental films is that although seemingly to be made up of sometimes quite random shots that there is actually a pattern or specific idea behind them and that repeating the same shots or the same shots but edited differently is something quite common throughout. To mirror that the music always tends to be quite repetitive as well and although the notes and beat might change to go with the images they tend to stick with the same piece of music through the whole film, using the changes in notes and beat to highlight certain parts and help it flow. From watching these films I am now leaning towards using black & white for all of or predominantly throughout my piece as I think it looks very effective and especially if you are going to play around with lighting and shades it makes it simpler if you keep it in monotones. A big inspiration for me is Maya Deren's thoughts on camera and editing techniques, but mainly the editing as this is something I enjoy a lot and I love playing about and discovering new effects and ways of editing so this is something a really want to get stuck into and will probably be my favourite part during the process of making our experimental film. 
 Sound is one thing I have not really thought about in as much depth as the actual images and this has made me think about it more now. We did come up with ideas of it being recorded with no sound and then maybe having a bit of internal narrative over the top of the 'dark' side saying things to torment the 'good' side now and again but we didn't really have many ideas with regards to music so I think we need to start considering that a bit more now and searching for things that we could use.