11 April 2016

Dr. Schluss' Psychedlic Film Fest April 2016

I'm looking for those psychic, electricity-inducing icepicks into the brain.  Ephemeral and experimental films tend to do the trick.  I named my primary music project after one and we've gotten into the business of making them for ourselves.  For the past 15 or so years, I have tended to subject my newfound friends to screenings of this stuff, and now I will screen a few for you.  Will you be my friend on the cybernetic astral plane?



Weird, abstract analog imagery to tickle your brain.  There are no narratives, actors,or anything of that sort to distract you.  I have heard that this is the ground zero for special effects tricks that would later illuminate the lightsabers in the original Star Wars.  I think this is what you would see in the elongated split second between sticking your head into the lightsaber and disintegrating.  Holy crap, I tried to show the younglings The Force Awakens today but ended up with another run though Jurassic World instead.  Bloody hell, just watch "7362."



There was crappy video with the original soundtrack, and better video with someone else's music slathered all over the affair.  I went for option #1, but do keep in mind there are Kenneth Anger DVDs you can go for instead.  The subconscious and Egyptian imagery in this film will make you re-evaluate reality.  Some of the vocabulary for modern music videos and filmatic cultism is certainly created here  That said, while I'm not either, it's probably best to have an open mind towards the homo-erotic and the Satanic with this one.  The stranger realms of archetypes make themselves known here.  If you delve into the conspiracy theories, some suggest Anger is the true head of the Church of Satan, and an Illuminati herald of Aleister Crowley's demonic world-view.  At least it makes for an interesting subtext - sort of like assuming Sgt. Pepper's is a veiled acknowledgement of Paul is Dead.  Less conspiracy-laced is that Mick Jagger was deeply into this shiznatch - he even contributed an unlistenable electronic score to one of Anger's earlier films.  Not that this film gets off the hook.  The soundtrack is fantastic psychedelic weirdness, but you have to deal with the fact that it was created in prison by Bobby Beausoleil, a member of the Manson family.  This is meaty, if not comfortable, viewing.



If someone enters my home for the first time, I am likely going to make them watch this.  No, it's not psychedelic, and it's narrated and, uh, sung, by a substandard Johnny Cash wanna-be, but it is one of my favorite films.  Redundant or not, that theme song will implant itself into the core of your skull for the remainder of our lifetime.  It's a film intended to teach safety to construction site workers.  Most of us do not need this training, but we will enjoy the fact that every horrible accident that we think will happen to our stock actors does.happen.  I can enjoy bright red, fake blood.  This film once backfired on me when I tried to show it to a lady friend many years ago only to find out that the film disturbed her because her dad was a construction worker.  Don't be an asshole like me.  I guess the disclaimer is that you may want to avoid this situation.

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