184, 517-518 by Brakhage: An Anthology (Volumes One and Two)

[Noiretirc]

Volume 2 and Blu-ray set of both volumes announced.

Fantastic news re: Vol 2.

So.....um.....am I the only one here who questions what Blu will do (enhancementwise) for MOST Brakhage films? (Of course I am!)

[MichaelB]

So.....um.....am I the only one here who questions what Blu will do (enhancementwise) for MOST Brakhage films? (Of course I am!)

If the BFI's Jeff Keen set is any guide, the difference will be very noticeable indeed.

I've compared Marvo Movie on Blu-ray, DVD and YouTube, and frankly the Blu-ray is like watching a different film altogether. The DVD/YouTube resolution isn't high enough to resolve the original grain structure, but with the Blu-ray you're watching as near as dammit everything that's preserved on the original film (certainly the 8mm stuff, arguably the 16mms too, as Keen tends to use quite fast stocks), so it "feels" like film in a way that the lower-resolution media can't come near. Keen, like Brakhage, is also prone to physically interfering with the celluloid after shooting, and again the Blu-ray manages to convey the textures of the scratches, paint daubs and other additions.

With Brakhage, perhaps even more than Keen, the physical texture and grain structure are an integral part of the viewing experience, so the Blu-ray should be genuine revelation even for those who already have the first volume on DVD.

[Murdoch]

Fine blu-ray, you win.

[Zot!]

Though not abstract, Kenneth Anger BFI Blu-Ray is amazing, and all those are 16mm. The colors and film attributes should really come alive on this Brakhage stuff. Although somewhat irrelevant, being animation, the Ponyo DVD/Blu comparison on Beaver http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film2/DVDRevie ... lu-ray.htm shows what you are missing in a DVD, and for me is the last word. Rest assured you are missing the same amount of detail in film based materials, it's just easier to hide the artifacts with the complexity of the photographed image.

[Adam]

And I've been told by the person doing the Brakhage restorations that they have even considered and then rejected some films (or one or two films) for the set because they felt that even a high-def transfer didn't represent the important/true qualities of the film. Meaning some of his films will never make it to legitimate video, probably. They are being very conscientious. But some films simply work only as projected film.

[zedz]

So.....um.....am I the only one here who questions what Blu will do (enhancementwise) for MOST Brakhage films? (Of course I am!)

I think it's just you. The difference in resolution is going to be far more crucial for these films than just about anything else Criterion's done on Blu to date. You can read a novel just fine in paperback, but a Jackson Pollock postcard just isn't going to cut it.

[James]

So.....um.....am I the only one here who questions what Blu will do (enhancementwise) for MOST Brakhage films? (Of course I am!)

I think it's just you. The difference in resolution is going to be far more crucial for these films than just about anything else Criterion's done on Blu to date. You can read a novel just fine in paperback, but a Jackson Pollock postcard just isn't going to cut it.

Yeah, definitely. This is probably the most "important" Blu-ray Criterion will release as it (hopefully) will open a door to several other avant-garde filmmakers (like Phil Solomon) to allow their movies to be seen in our home theaters. I know when the by Brakhage Volume 1 DVD set was released, there was much trepidation from avant-garde cinema purists who didn't believe that the lightplay of Brakhage's movies would translate to DVD (in fact, most claimed "video" was the most viable option) but many were pleased with the results. I can't wait to see what the Blu-ray collection looks like, and now I know why I waited to see the Dog Star Man movies.

[Noiretirc]

So.....um.....am I the only one here who questions what Blu will do (enhancementwise) for MOST Brakhage films? (Of course I am!)

I think it's just you. The difference in resolution is going to be far more crucial for these films than just about anything else Criterion's done on Blu to date. You can read a novel just fine in paperback, but a Jackson Pollock postcard just isn't going to cut it.

So Blu can even make Pollock Pollock?

[zedz]

So Blu can even make Pollock Pollock?

I doubt it, but it'd be closer. So we might end up getting 50% Brakhage rather than 20% with the new release, and that's enough to get me very excited.

[jsteffe]

So Blu can even make Pollock Pollock?

I doubt it, but it'd be closer. So we might end up getting 50% Brakhage rather than 20% with the new release, and that's enough to get me very excited.

Based on what I've read about transferring 35mm to high definition video, I'd say that uncompressed 1080p video should provide a fairly close approximation to actual 16mm "resolution," keeping in mind that photographic grain and pixels aren't the same thing. However, Blu-ray necessarily uses compression so you have to factor that in as well.

Any experienced telecine folks want to chime in?

[domino harvey]

I think the problem with even the best Blu-ray release is that it can't adequately replicate the process of the projector light, which is certainly something Brakhage was very concerned with. I think the Blu-ray will obviously be the closest you can get to seeing the real thing projected, but experimental film like this will always be one step removed from the actual experience.

[zedz]

I have no firm ideas about the science of resolution, but I can always fall back on Kluge's idea that the genius of film isn't that it's projecting images 24 times a second, but that it's projecting darkness 24 times a second. Or more to the point, that Brakhage was working with the entirety of the technology, which is only approximated by the BD (or DVD) format.

Hey, domino beat me to it!

[antnield]

When Lux released their Shoot Shoot Shoot DVD compilation of 1960s and 1970s British avant-garde, containing works by Stephen Dwoskin, William Raban, Guy Sherwin and Malcolm LeGrice amogst others, they put the following disclaimer on the inner sleeve. Directly below where the disc sits, in fact, so that you couldn't miss it...

Think about what you’re holding in your hand. […] It contains all the sound and images from these films, and the sound and images are all in the correct order, but something is different… and the difference is in the material. These works are originally films, and the medium of film is exactly what dictated the way they are. Some of these elements are inevitably and irretrievably lost in the translation to video and the encoding to DVD. If you look at this disc, you will be seeing a representation of the films but not the films themselves. Your television screen or video projector cannot hope to recreate the quality of light of projected film or the experience of sitting in a darkened room with other spectators. Think of it as a splendid art book with excellent reproductions. Looking at this book we can absorb some of the information contained in the original. We can see the shape and form, sometimes even get a sense of the brushwork, the surface and its depth, but the photographic representations can never replace the experience of standing in front of the original paintings. This DVD is a reference tool, not a replacement for seeing and understanding the films as they are intended to be seen: illuminated by the light of a projector and reflected from a light white screen.

[Zot!]

Well that's the projector shutter, not the light, but I would say that the new monitors that can display native 24fps are pretty much have that issue covered, there is some decay present even in LCD/Plasma crystals, so I don't see any point in trying to "ruin" a technology, just to further approximate film. If you can actually see a projectors shutter opening and closing, you are superhuman. The issue for most of the purists was the framerate and the digital artifacting. The artifacting is still imperfect in blu, but pretty darn near imperceptable for most viewers. My argument with the purists is that while video is not a perfect delivery method, neither is film, which is full of dirt, grime, damaged/faded prints, reedited prints, focus problems, noisy patrons, sticky floors, etc...etc...which all serve to compromise the original intent of the creator.

[Peacock]

Am I being silly by thinking that playing these two Brakhage volumes in Blu, through an hd projector, won't be similar to seeing the real thing in a theatre?

[jsteffe]

The other thing to consider is that these new Brakhage transfers reflect an extraordinary amount of care to represent the films well on HD video. The results won't be like "average" DVD or VHS transfers. Most experimental filmmakers have neither the budget nor the access to technical facilities and expertise that Criterion has at their disposal when they are transferring such inherently challenging materials to video. Much as I love their titles, you simply cannot compare what a company like Re:Voir has done on their VHS tapes to what we got with "By Brakhage" 1 and what we'll get with the Blu-ray set.

The unfortunate reality is that 16mm is a dying format, at least for projection. There are fewer venues these days that can even show 16mm outside of museums. At universities, fewer departments have the money to rent 16mm prints and it can be difficult to line up good equipment and trained staff. Given the dismal economic state of higher education, this will only get worse. 16mm and super 16mm are still used for some TV and film production, though. Over the long term, if films are not available on video they're not going to be seen except by the lucky few.

That said, I love seeing films like this on 16mm when I can. A couple years ago when they showed some George Kuchar films here in Atlanta, I was stunned by the vivid color on some of the newly struck 16mm prints. On those rare occasions when all the stars are aligned, projected film is pure magic.

[Zot!]

The experience should be very closely approximated, to a point where the difference is truly negligable. I actually think the blu will be closer to an ideal presentation than a film. The purists will cry murder, but like I said earlier, a film projected on film projector is also is compromised by the environment and equipment. As you say, the stars need to align.

[Jun-Dai]

The experience should be very closely approximated, to a point where the difference is truly negligable. I actually think the blu will be closer to an ideal presentation than a film. The purists will cry murder, but like I said earlier, a film projected on film projector is also is compromised by the environment and equipment. As you say, the stars need to align.

The experience will not be very closely approximated, but at the point of Blu-ray it becomes less a matter of following the diminishing returns of higher resolution and increasing quality and more a matter of a fundamental difference between watching a film on a projector, with all of the flaws of the print, the mechanical oddities of a physical projector, and then for me the atmosphere of a small student movie theater, a handful of pretentious college students around me, and the knowledge that I'm going to have to sit through a boring lecture on the film the next morning. I always liked the essays and notes that accompanied the films, though.

This has a lot less to do with purism (unless one is in the camp that home video / Blu-ray is a fundamentally unworkable approach to appreciating the films), and a lot more to do with the fact that watching a digital, projected replica of a great film is a less extreme version of looking at a very high-quality poster print of a great painting. I say less extreme because at the end of the day you're still dealing with a projected 2D image, whereas with a poster of a painting you've lost the physical texture of the paint, and that can only be replicated by some still-uninvented technology that can convincingly replicate that aspect of the work. This is more relevant with Brakhage than with most narrative-driven films, because for a narrative film (generally speaking), film is more of a format than a distinct medium from digital projection, whereas with Brakhage, his work is very much in the medium of film and digital projection is really an adaptation of that work, one that approximates the original medium closely enough that the matter is debatable.

To say that watching a Brakhage film on Blu-ray at home is to capture the experience exactly as Brakhage would have wanted you to see it, or as it was experienced by those who first saw his films is as ridiculous as saying that a Blu-ray version of a Brakhage film cannot capture *anything* of that experience.

[Tribe]

From the Andrei Rublev thread:

I hear the first Brakhage set sold much better than expected. People like to think of the American 'avant-garde' as, well, avant-garde, but something like Brakhage's oeuvre is actually pretty undemanding in terms of intellectual engagement and patience. Indeed, he fits right in in the You Tube era.

Kids say the darndest things.

[MichaelB]

Will this Brakhage collection on Blu-Ray be REGION FREE? I noticed my 1st Brakhage DVD is region free, so hopefully the Blu-Ray is. If 'YES' this will signify my first Criterion Blu-Ray purchase.

I'm pessimistic - the original By Brakhage was released in 2003, when Criterion's policy was to produce region-free discs unless compelled to do otherwise by the rightsholder. But at some point since then, they've started region-coding absolutely everything, and every single Blu-ray they've ever released has been Region A.

So I'm assuming the Brakhage Blu-ray is Region A until someone proves otherwise.

[skuhn8]

I believe Peter Becker stated that all CC blu-rays will be Region A in an interview, totally missing the cool marketing potential to be found in whimsical arrangements such as:
A, B, CC
CC = A + B
etc.

[What A Disgrace]

Criterion responded to me on Facebook, and list the following films for their second Brakhage volume:

DVD DISC ONE
The Wonder Ring 1955 · 5 minutes, 34 seconds · 16 mm · silent
The Dead 1960 · 10 minutes, 21 seconds · 16 mm · silent
Two: Creeley/McClure 1965 · 3 minutes, 12 seconds · 16 mm · silent
23rd Psalm Branch 1966 · 66 minutes · 8 mm · silent
Scenes From Under Childhood, Section One 1967 · 23 minutes, 43 seconds
· 16 mm · silent with optional soundtrack
The Machine of Eden 1970 · 10 minutes, 45 seconds · 16 mm · silent
Star Garden 1974 · 20 minutes, 58 seconds · 16 mm · silent
Desert 1976 · 10 minutes, 7 seconds · Super8 mm · silent

DVD DISC TWO
The Process 1972 · 7 minutes, 21 seconds · 16 mm · silent
Burial Path 1978 · 8 minutes, 2 seconds · 16 mm · silent
Duplicity III 1980 · 22 minutes, 18 seconds · 16 mm · silent
The Domain of the Moment 1977 · 14 minutes, 33 seconds · 16 mm · silent
Murder Psalm 1980 · 16 minutes, 31 seconds · 16 mm · silent
Arabic 12 1982 · 17 minutes, 1 second · 16 mm · silent
Visions in Meditation #1 1989 · 16 minutes, 19 seconds · 16 mm · silent
Visions in Meditation #2 (Mesa Verde) 1989 · 16 minutes, 9 seconds ·
16 mm · silent
Visions in Meditation #3 (Plato's Cave) 1990 · 16 minutes, 36 seconds
· 16 mm · monaural
Visions in Meditation #4 (D.H. Lawrence) 1990 · 17 minutes, 41 seconds
· 16 mm · silent

DVD DISC THREE
Unconscious London Strata 1982 · 22 minutes, 15 seconds · 16 mm · silent
Boulder Blues and Pearls And… 1992 · 22 minutes, 23 seconds · monaural
The Mammals of Victoria 1994 · 34 minutes, 9 seconds · 16 mm · silent
From: First Hymn to the Night -Novalis 1994 · 2 minutes, 52 seconds ·
16 mm · silent
I Take These Truths 1995 · 17 minutes, 44 seconds · 16 mm · silent
The Cat of the Worm's Green Realm 1997 · 14 minutes, 10 seconds · 16 mm · silent
Yggdrasill: Whose Roots Are Stars in the Human Mind 1997 · 16
minutes, 59 seconds · 16 mm · silent
“…” Reel 5 1998 · 14 minutes, 6 seconds · 16 mm · monaural
Persian Series #1-3 1999 · 5 minutes, 54 seconds · 16 mm · silent
Chinese Series 2003 · 2 minutes, 18 seconds · 35 mm · silent"

[yoshimori]

No "Passage Through" (1990)? Tragedy.

[Nothing]

So, the question is, does this really add anything to the first set (which gets pretty samey by the end)?