In the Realms of the Unreal

Henry Darger was a janitor. He lived in one room. He cleaned a Catholic hospital for fifty years, and then died with a 15,000 page manuscript and yards and yards of artwork, unknown and unpublished, in his room. You can find out more about Henry Darger and his life work, chronicling the adventures of "The Vivian Girls" at the Henry Darger entry on Wikipedia.

"In the Realms of the Unreal" is a documentary about his life. The narrative comes through a few different sources: There are interviews with those who knew of Darger in his last days, including the landlords who discovered his work. There is an old man's voice reading Darger's autobiography. There are pieces of Darger's novel. Then there is a narrator who is about 5 years old, providing a little summary and connectivity now and then. The visuals behind the readings are sometimes photos of relevant locations, like the state farm where Darger spent his late childhood, or the hospital where he worked most of his life. Sometimes they are stills or animations of Darger's artwork.

The life of Henry Darger is fascinating. It's especially intriguing to think that there are people around us who are silently, secretly living these incredibly rich and complicated internal lives. It's sad that Darger was never "discovered," but even that sadness is complicated. I'm not sure what the world would have done with him, had we known what he was about. His was not the type of art that's comfortable to package and sell. Hard to contemplate a lonely old man drawing pictures of naked children, unless you put it in the context of his whole life. Not easy to reduce to a few key words.

The movie was kind of distancing. I came away knowing more about Darger but I felt unsatisfied somehow, like some primary source had been held back, like everything had been too filtered, too disjointed. Maybe it just goes with the subject matter -- Darger was a recluse, not open to interpretation or summary. The most meaningful parts to me were the pieces read from his autobiography. It was surprisingly kind, chatty, a bit apologetic, and patient. No bitterness. No angst. Isn't that strange.

The Henry Darger story is fascinating, and it made a terrific documentary for Jessica Yu and her animation team. She approaches it partially as a narrative, partially as a fantasy, and overall as as documentary. The animation is beautiful as it really transforms us in the world of Darger's artwork and life. There is rarely a dull instant in the piece, and I found myself just awed at this beautiful piece.

This was a very impressive documentary. Although it was different from the films I generally go to see, I remained interested in Henry Darger's life throughout the whole movie. He was portrayed as quite an interesting person. As a child, he is taken to an asylum and thought to be insane. When he finally escapes this life, he becomes a janitor and later, a part of the army. His neighbors play an important role in the movie because they describe his personality and what they knew about him. It was interesting to hear each perspective. Much of what they had to say about him was the same, but some of it varied at least through word choice which I felt was significant because it revealed each of their attitudes toward who they thought he was. Henry Darger's artwork was amazing. The illustrations of the Vivian sisters provided insight into his eyes. The most impressive thing was how the lives of these girls seemed to represent his life and feelings toward it. If you are interested in learning something, I encourage you to see, "In the Realms of the Unreal."

A brilliant documentary, which wisely avoids the speculations about Darger that most of the books on him are prone to. There is no *evidence* about Darger's sexuality, nor any about his psychological status. This film covers the known information about Darger thoroughly and coherently, while also capturing something of the magic of his art and his invented world. I am so tired of casual, sloppy claims made about Darger, based on nothing but the speaker's own opinions about the work. Similarly, art scholars have rarely treated Darger's work well--labeling it "outsider" or trying to fit it into the Pop movement, or something.

I was pleasantly surprised to see that this film has none of that crap. Yay for no bloviating talking heads! Instead, it pieces together and interweaves Darger's biography with a sketch of the saga of his novel and the artworks that go with it.

In addition, the filmmaker has found some connections between the known facts of Darger's life and his art--the source of some of the names of recurring characters, for example. Some of the info in the film does not appear in any of the books, as far as I can tell. Good research was done here.

If I have any quibble, it's that the full story of "The Adventures of the Vivian Sisters in the Realms of the Unreal" is not clearly set forth. The story has a narrative line and many episodes. There's a geography, with city and nation names. There are numerous kinds of monsters and many side stories. This was not described as fully as I'd have liked. And a little more of the details of the art would have been nice. I imagine that rights for reproduction of the artworks in the supplemental "gallery" were restricted to just a few works. That's a shame. But at least this was not the Ken Burns blahblah treatment.

Henry Darger was a man damaged in childhood who went on to lead a reclusive, long life. As with many of us, he pulled into a fantasy world. Unlike nearly all of us, he found a way to reify that world in text and images. He had no intentions of ever sharing I am sure, but share we can. He is known first for his eccentricity, then his paintings which really are quite remarkable. They illustrate his alternative world where pure little girls formed the army of good against evil. Evil clearly was close to the "real" world. And Darger himself appears in the stories he wrote to supplement the images. And of course he is in the images as well. It is a fascinating story and possibly highly cinematic. There are some facts of his life that were good to learn; and very effective to hear so many conflicting memories of the man. It is valuable to see the images. Some of them are absolutely hypnotizing, especially in the context. But gosh this filmmaker makes so many bad choices. Although the story has no explicit sexual flavor, it is quite close to perverse. My own view is that the world and the girls as he imagined them were tokens of otherworldliness so abstract and pure that they need to be admired for the clean purity. Having Dakota Fanning narrate as one of the Viviane Girls, and with practiced childishness, tips the balance from abstract to absolutely dangerous. A big mistake. The fellow that narrates Darger's inner voice is profoundly wrong too. A narrator could work. Animating the drawings could work. But gosh, either you need to fully buy into the world and enter it as Darger would, or you have to set a platform in between him and us that has some solidity. We have to know who and where we are. This filmmaker does not do that, skipping from place to place with no anchor, no coherence. If the man is about anything, it is coherence. It would have been good to know that some of the "witnesses" here basically stole the man's legacy and became wealthy as a result. Their recall is colored by some pretty crass motives.

Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.