Dog Star Man: Part I

Like Wavelength, nothing happens. Skip this movie! The "best" part is the random topless woman. Oh, and there's a mountain climber. Well that's it. Don't see this movie? Have you seen....any other movie? Can you name one? Go see that instead!

You may be bored silly or you may be mesmerised. You might find yourself slipping into a catatonic state. You might glance away from the screen for a moment, but you'd be advised not too. Stan Brakhage's remarkable mythopoetic epic brought back a rush of 8mm memories for me from my childhood. There are incredible images of beauty and there are bizarre images that will have you rewinding the tape to ask yourself if you just saw what you thought you saw. (You did.) Highest recommendation!

This 5-part montage is clearly a technical masterpiece, but like most surreal art pieces, it is dangerous to conceptualize with any confidence. It is highly recommended that that viewer experience all five parrts as they are certainly related. Although I am ignorant of the technical aspects of filmmaking, this film surely is mandatory viewing for film students since it appears to use every trick in the book for imagery-based, fast-cut filmmaking. Conceptually (as one viewer's take on the film), the film is about a young male in a cold, snowy alpine-like setting and his dog as they work their way along through the cold, harsh, dangerous elements. We experience what hapens in the mind and body of this individual during the ordeal, including scenes of the outdoors, biomedical footage of the inner workings of the body's tissue and organs, interactions between this man and a woman's body, his dog, celestial shots, the birth and first year of a new born baby. All of this is put together with great artistic talent (I was often reminded of work by Paranjanov, Tartovsky and Greenaway but I am not sure that any connection is warranted anywhere except in my own reaction) and depicts one man's fast-paced struggle with all of these experiences. The full-length feature is long and taxes one's attention, but the journey is worth it for those willing to take such an adventure.

The trouble with Brakhage, and most avant-garde film, is that, while experimentation is valuable to the artist, it isn't necessarily art in itself. This 60's film is simply an experiment in visual manipulation, which occasionally has some interesting ideas that go nowhere in particular. The division of the film into sections seems unnecessary and, as far as I can tell, follows no particular reasoning. If you're on acid, you might love this film. If you're a filmmaker, you might find it interesting here and there. In general, however, it's not worth the time.

If you like to feel like you are better than other people, see this movie and pretend to like it. This film combines short, chiefly unrelated shots in order to explore the viewing experience. Though there is basic technical skill involved and Brakhage must have certainly spent a long time making Dog Star Man, if the film were cut up and recombined in much any other way, it is doubtful anyone would know the difference. This film comes from the same sort of mentality which created color field painting and other such things which chiefly interest people who don't have anything useful to do with their time. If you haven't seen it yet and aren't on acid, avoid this film at all costs.