Earthblog

From Luis Gonzalez's film, "Human Flows"

From Mr. DeRaadt:

This evening is a showcase of people that are making film in their own unique ways.  There are two artists from Denver, Mario Zoots and Milton Melvin Crossaint (MMC3); two Fort Collins locals, Gretchen Blegen and Matthew Sage; and Luis Gonzalez from Portland, Oregon.  Stylistically, each individual's aesthetic efforts are in a world of their own.  At the same time, most of the artists work in a loose, abstract manner.

I've only gotten the chance to preview two films from Luis Gonzalez and Gretchen Blegen's, which isn't fair to the other artists, but oh well, here goes...

And with the disclosure of this artist being a personal friend, I would put him in the lineage of experimental film-makers such as Stan Brackhage, who plays with rapid-cut techniques in a rhythmic fashion while toying with the outer limits of the amount of technicolor beauty human eye's vision can withstand.  Gonzalez meshes together the chaos of street scenes in crowded Southeast Asia with the visual metaphor of fishes swimming on top of another in a river.  At different moments in "Human Flows", claustrophobia of the crowded global existence is juxtaposed with the serenity and calm of human-less nature.  This barrage of imagery is reinforced by an epic electro-acoustic soundtrack composed specifically for the film. Gonzalez writes of the film:

"Human Flows is a personal expression on the non-linear, material nature of the world and of human lives. Cites, vehicles, people, rivers, and mountains are abstracted into nauseating, hyper-real layers/flows. Perhaps, an attempt to put viewers into a deep trance of layered symbols, the everyday, and the sublime. Shot in Burma, China, Japan, Hong Kong, Cambodia, Indonesia, Thailand, Laos, and USA."

In a similar fashion, Blegen's film explores textures of light, liquid, and bodily functions in a slow, meditative fashion that draws the viewer into an internal world of subtle experience.  Viscous liquids flow and merge in harmony with one another, leaving the meaning open to each person's interpretation.

In addition to the film screenings, there will be a performance from Fort Collins' own Christina the Hunn, who is bringing out brand new spanking tunes that conjure up images of Dr. Seuss writing a book with Bratmobile in a wooden shed.

An Evening of Experimental Film will be held at The Bean Cycle/Matter Bookstore, 144 N. College in Fort Collins on Saturday, February 27 at 7pm. The event is free and open to the public.

Self Proclaimed Un-Romantics
left their corporate desks
for the plantations of Ecuador
to learn romance

from embroidered palms
of the plantations' villagers
and to reignite lust
in their plastic wives

instead they found the villagers
hands to rough
to touch smooth skin
between legs, too calloused
to feel infants' cheeks.

so the un-romantics stole
carnations, roses, baby's breath
But without
crops, pesticides, thorns

calluses peeled and healed
children picked wild flowers
and couples made love
in overgrown pastures

This poem was first published in Matter 10: Village.

The Old Town Writing Group

That’s the myth. In reality, most writers need people. In reality, most writers go soft with no deadline, no one waiting on the other edge of the computer screen. Some unchecked stories get loose and meandering, some unchecked egos balloon exponentially, only to deflate rapidly with the obnoxious farting sound of self-pity. Most writers need a balance, a grounding mechanism, a central command to report to.

Most writing is enhanced by nuts-and-bolts concepts: workshopping, feedback, and revisions. While these craft-centric ideas may not sound sexy, the finished product is. Smart, cogent writing peer-reviewed and trimmed of unnecessary fat? Sexy. Smart, cogent writing about sex peer-reviewed and trimmed of unnecessary fat? Extra-super-sexy. This is the M.O. behind “Savage Night,” a Valentines Day reading put on by The Old Town Writing Group, a six-woman band of established Fort Collins authors who aim to share their work and the benefits of self-starting a writing collective.

“The past is never dead.  It’s not even past”
-William Faulkner

Surrounded by a mass of spectators—or perhaps only one—reality could not be understood without its theatrical nature. To paraphrase Shakespeare, what we call life seems to be a movie that runs perpetually, and we actors and actresses memorize the plot, change its regularity, sometimes without knowledge of the story’s real meaning. Sometimes we have arguments about our roles. Sometimes we have no chance to go back and correct our mistakes. Our movie is full of tragedy and comedy—“that foolish tale told by an idiot, full of sound of fury,” as Macbeth said.

Pedor Almodovar’s latest film, Broken Embraces (Los Abrazos Rotos), follows this theatrical nature but develops and stretches its boundaries.  In the beginning, we curiously see a blind director operating under a pseudonym, and, as the story unfolds, so do the reasons behind the name switch. Or so it seems. The beginning is emblematic and even trickery, but Almovodar manages the cliché and develops, by a mastery use of retrospective, its causes and consequences. He suggests that, if in reality the past is imposible to change, perhaps there is a way to fix it or change our impression of it. The answer lies within our imagination and, in this case, the will to forgive. He suggests that if our past holds tragedy, we have the power to change it for ourselves. Rather than viewing it as regret, a broken embrace, the film urges us to see it as a last kiss—an understanding and forgivable last kiss.