Invocation of My Demon Brother

This is from the second DVD of a set called "The Films of Kenneth Anger"--a collection of avant garde films by this odd film maker. I found the first disk to be more satisfying--the second has a lot about Aleister Crowley and Satanism that I found a bit dreary.

This film is purely for someone who loves art films and has a very, very high tolerance for this sort of thing. While my tolerance is higher than the average viewer, I found this entire short filled with self-indulgence and silly imagery. I am sure that the folks who made this film loved it, as did their friends, but I seriously doubt that more than 1 or 2 in 100 who might otherwise see it actually enjoying the film. It's just NOT a film for the average viewer.

It consists of lots of bizarre imagery, an albino, references to Satanism and various ancient religions, rituals, pot use, dead cats, dead cat heads, a visit from Anton LaVey (founder of The First Church of Satan) in Satanic regalia (looking a lot like 'Hot Stuff' the cartoon character, actually) and lots of crotch shots of naked men. To each his own...

By the way, for a great practical joke, show this to your mother or some of your friends and insist with a straight face that it's the greatest film ever made. Then wait to see their reactions! Be sure to get it all on video or digital film.

I disagree with the comment that angers film is amateurish and boring. what you have to keep in mind is that is was made in 1969 on a shoestring budget. also that the whole MTV aesthetic was not even thought of then, and it would take 30 years until the way Anger does film would be incorporated into the mainstream music videos of acts like Nine inch nails,Marilyn Manson, etc.

The use of juxtaposing sound and film, editing them in a way that creates maximum contrast and dynamic is something every video director - directly or indirectly - has gotten from Anger. he was the first to fuse rock music and experimental films, thereby by accident creating the seed of the rock video.

Angers short films -and especially this one - has probably been more important in shaping pop and art culture than any other single short film. for that he deserves credit and recognition.

A very worthwhile freak-deaky experience. In this film's short lifespan it takes you on a wild ride using techniques that have become common place in modern cinema. The music by Mick Jagger that is oh so memorable. The jump cuts, the shot-layering, the changing of frame rate is so definitively anger that you would be daft to confuse it with anyone's else work. The way that Anger tries to shove you head first into the occult is just breathtaking. You go into some kind of trance state with this film. To view Satan as he appears in this film is truly changing. Any film student interested in making an impact on film today has to see this picture. Anger made his first film at 15, he was young when he made this one too. This is a film that pushes the envelope. We don't need anymore formulaic boring action movies, we need people like this willing to push the limits of the medium and mess with your mind.

There is a difference between "trippy" and "psychedelic." "Trippy" is what people who mostly have never had psychedelic experiences ascribe to weirdness in art, and "psychedelic" is art - be it music or film or whatever - that simulates or outright induces a state of altered consciousness as a proxy or alternative to psychedelic drugs, dream states, meditation, etc.

People really like to pat themselves on the back a lot in their neurotic quest to dismiss all 60s or occult techniques, imagery, sounds, tropes, whatever. I can understand this to some degree. A lot of the 60s was just goofy. The case I'd make for this and Lucifer Rising is that this is about as good as this kind of thing can be done.

It is not for everyone.

Here Anger turns everything up to 11 in a relentless torrent of Thelemic, Satanic, and Nazi imagery, nudity, drug use, and blasphemy.

This is a psychedelic film or, I guess, if you're just too hip or grounded or intellectual or contemporary or whatever for Kenneth Anger, an attempt at one. The purpose here is to get on top of you, by which I mean, tap a nerve. This is a torrent of input - visual and aural - pumped mercilessly into the viewer's senses.

The disturbing soundtrack, varying film speeds, interlaced light effects and occult imagery (flashing unicursal hexagrams, etc.) are clearly meant to unsettle and induce a state of altered consciousness of some sort, but in my case it just kind of made me uncomfortable. In a good way. This is not to say a pleasant way. An effective way. (Is this film itself, a magickal working of sorts?)

I can't help it. I like this, even if I don't *enjoy* it exactly. This is not an exploitation film. This is the real deal: the Age of Horus spontaneously exploding through (and nearly obliterating) the Age of Aquarius.

Evil hippies, man.

I found this nightmarish, frantic, and disconcerting. I suppose if you can simply dismiss the whole of the 1960s and the whole of the occult of the time, you can dismiss this, too. I'm just not that cool I guess.

Worth a watch as art and as film-making with a different purpose than usual (while this is entertaining, I don't think this was conceived of as primarily "entertainment").

There's no plot here. If you need one, don't bother. Watch with an open mind.

Then go to Church after.

I watched this last night for the first time, on the "Films of Kenneth Anger Vol. 2" DVD, and to me this was probably the most intense of the set. Between the droning, obnoxious score (by Mick Jagger, of all things), and the changing film speeds, this film really did invoke feelings of, if not really a nightmare, then definitely an altered state, and not a real fun one at that.

But the capper for me was the use of Bobby Beausoleil (sp?), who was one of Manson's killers. This footage was apparently shot only a couple of years before Bobby (sorry, not trying to imply too much familiarity, but I'm really sick of typing his last name, it hurts my brain) murdered Gary Hinman. The footage of Bobby, combined with the knowledge of what he's gonna do in a couple of years, just creeped the f**k right out of me.

So, I did like this, and I'd recommend it to folks interested in Anger, or in weird sixties head trips & the dark side of psychedelia, but I'm really glad I didn't watch it under the influence. It probably would have wound up occupying a "special" place in my brain, and I don't mean a good happy place.