Film and Reflexivity (fwd)

[Brian Siano]

Forwarded message:
> From: "Chris Stolz" <cstolz at acs.ucalgary.ca>
> Cc: pynchon-l at sfu.ca (Pynchon-L)

> 	American film, which is at its basic mythical level
> purely psychological (Lynch), sociological (the Western, marriage
> comedies) or religious (Scorsese, Coppola, Tarantino) does not
> lend itself to purely artistic, aesthetic reflexivity, i think.
> It would be the Europeans who would experiment with this kind of
> form, since their cinematic traditions do not have as their
> primary concern the Americans myths of societal foundation,
> Puritan redemption or psychological archetypes.  
> 
> 	By the way, to my mind, the two closest cinematic
> analogues to the work of Pynchon are 
> 
> 1)  Terry Gilliam's _Brazil_
> 
> 2) Antonioni's _Blow-Up_, maybe the masterpiece of '60s cinema.

	Not to be too contentious, but if there's a filmmaker who can
be said to be a cinematic Pynchon, it's Stanley Kubrick. There's the
fascination with technology (2001, Clockwork Orange, Dr. Strangelove),
the issues of control (Strangelove, Clockwork Orange), the uses and
failings of language (Strangelove, Full Metal jacket), and the dark
humor (you name it). In terms of technique, Kubrick is a genuine
innovator (_2001_, not _Blow-Up_, remains the single most original
film of the 1960s), and in terms of general outlook, Kubrick and
Pynchon strike me as being virtual soulmates.
	And let's not forget the reclusiveness, either. 
	This is not to knock Antonioni (I've only seen _Blow-Up_, and
was only mildly impressed) or Gilliam (who I think is a genuinely
original filmmaker). But if we're trying to find the "cinematic
Pynchon," it's got to be Kubrick.

Brian Siano - siano at cceb.med.upenn.edu