Descriptions like “alternate film” and “experimental film” are relative terms — one man’s “alternate” being another man’s “practically mainstream” — but there are some filmmakers whose position on the continuum is beyond argument. One of them is the American Stan Brakhage, whose work I have been recently watching with equal parts trepidation and fascination. Brakhage, who made nearly 400 films — most of them under 10 minutes long — is routinely described as a non-narrative director, but that doesn’t begin to convey what he actually did — how he set out to overturn conventional ideas about how a film should be watched, and even what a film is.
To take just one example, his three-minute-long Mothlight was not made by recording things with a camera; it was created by manually sticking grass, stems, petals and dozens of moth wings (from insects that had burnt to death by flying towards candles) between two strips of clear film and then running it through an optical printer. That may seem a random, self-indulgent thing to do, but he put into the process all the care and thought of a painter adorning an immensely long canvas — he wanted a very specific effect on the screen when the film would be projected at 24 frames per second.
I settled down to watch Mothlight (and a few other Brakhage films) with only very basic background information, but I did read Fred Camper’s notes on how to ideally watch a Brakhage film. “Try to approximate the conditions of a cinema as much as possible,” Camper writes, pointing out that Brakhage made most of his films silent because “visual rhythms are crucial to his work”, and so, it’s important not to be interrupted by distracting sounds.
Feeling like a student going through pre-examination rituals, I darkened my room, sat on the ground at a distance of around three feet from my 36-inch plasma screen and reached for my notebook — before realising that it’s idiotic to try and take notes while watching a three-minute movie made up of subliminal images that only last a fraction of a second. As Mothlight began, it became obvious that this spooky, hypnotic film would lose much of its power if watched on (say) YouTube on a computer screen. Describing the experience is daunting. The first images are extreme close-ups of translucent brown objects: if you know the back-story, you can tell that these are moth wings, but even with no prior information it is soon possible to guess that the many dark shapes flickering on and off the screen represent insect forms and motifs. Shades of brown give way to splotches of green: for the odd second you can make out extreme close-ups of what look like leaves or stems. The rhythms of the images change constantly: at times they rush by (or appear to race at the camera) so fast you feel breathless and fearful; at other times you can make out distinct patterns that merge into each other.
What is the purpose of all this? Some viewers might say it’s visual gibberish. After a first viewing I felt that way too, but watching the film a further three or four times — having become more used to its weirdness of form — I found it strangely moving. Unfolding on the screen is an impression of relentless organic activity (and it is identifiably organic, even though there isn’t a single held shot of a whole insect or plant). The film may be constructed entirely of “dead” matter, but the projection and the speed give these elements an otherworldly life. Another of Brakhage’s best-known works, Window Water Baby Moving — a filming of the birth of his first child — is more explicitly about the creation and emergence of life, but Mothlight is equally poignant in its own way. The moths and the flora dance on the screen for those few minutes, and it is a testament to the regenerating power of film, even a reminder that all old movies — even mainstream ones — are made up of long-dead people brought achingly alive for our eyes.
Jai Arjun Singh is a Delhi-based writer jaiarjun@gmail.com
