In the Shadow of Hollywood and Vine

I attended the Throbbing Gristle event last night at the Montalban Theater on Vine Street as promised, and it was actually pretty fascinating. They appeared live and played the score to Derek Jarman’s 1972 arthouse film In the Shadow of the Sun. It’s funny how times have changed – Apple laptops have taken the place of synthesizers but you could tell some of the audience had been TG devotees since their inception in 1976; there was a lot of silver hair in the crowd, and a lot of black clothing. This score was actually added to the film in 1980 as a collaboration between TG and Jarman, and its ambient grind fits the images perfectly. The style of the film is painterly and surreal, with scenes that reminded me of Bunuel and Dali, and some that I think were in direct homage to Maya Deren’s experimental Meshes of the Afternoon. Jarman holds some shots for so long that even with slight movement they take on the character of pictures in a gallery rather than film, a device he used later to great effect in Caravaggio. The alchemical content was subtle, an occult undercurrent told in symbols rather than words (there is no dialogue and no linear plot): a young man lies in a flaming square, a large key is pulled from a drawer, pyramids loom behind archaic statuary and men in animal masks silently impart a shamanic presence. Soundless interactions are staged like live theater, such as the pairing of a seated young man and a figure dressed in a Seurat top hat who simply stands and stares at him from the opposite side of the frame. The film clocks in at just under an hour, and the band closed their appearance with the live performance of one song, Persuasion.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_the_Shadow_of_the_Sun_(Throbbing_Gristle_album)

http://www.elizabethdeegallery.com/files/press/DJ_2009-02-10_Artforum.com.pdf

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080920/

http://greg.org/archive/2008/03/04/derek_jarmans_in_the_shadow_of_the_sun.html

Re: Caravaggio, mentioned above and filmed in 1986, it’s a beautiful film and stars Tilda Swinton (in her first film role).

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0090798/

Swinton also appeared in Jarman's segment “Depuis Le Jour” in Aria in 1987, and it’s stunning.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZqEImF2SfL8

I’ve always meant to see Jarman’s punk-era film Jubilee, but have never gotten around to it. I’ll have to look it up – it sounds fascinating.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jubilee_(1977_film)

And apparently there is a new documentary about Jarman. I really do find him compelling. There is nothing like a real artist.

http://www.derekthemovie.com/