Cat's Cradle | |
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Directed by | Stan Brakhage |
Starring | Stan Brakhage Jane Brakhage James Tenney Carolee Schneemann |
Release date |
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Running time | 6 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Cat's Cradle is an experimental short film by Stan Brakhage, produced in 1959. The film was described by Brakhage as "sexual witchcraft involving two couples and a 'medium' cat." [1] [2]
Cat's Cradle was filmed in Princeton, New Jersey. [3] The film features Stan Brakhage and his wife Jane, as well as composer James Tenney and visual artist Carolee Schneemann. [4] Schneemann, who appeared in several Brakhage films, wore an apron at Brakhage's insistence. [5] Despite her friendship with Brakhage, she later described the experience as "frightening," remarking that "whenever I collaborated, went into a male friend's film, I always thought I would be able to hold my presence, maintain an authenticity. It was soon gone, lost in their celluloid dominance--a terrifying experience--experiences of true dissolution." [5]
The entirely silent film was described by Brakhage as "sexual witchcraft involving two couples and a 'medium' cat." [1] [2] The film features shots of the naked bodies that are, according to writer Walter Metz, "edited in such a way that very little narrative sense can be immediately gleaned from them. As the film wears on, however, it becomes clear that the viewer is witnessing some form of domestic conflict and the intimacy that follows (or perhaps precedes) it." [6] The editing style includes very brief "flash-frames" that interrupt longer shots, a technique that Brakhage would continue to use in such films as Tortured Dust (1984). [7]
Paul Arthur, in his essay for The Criterion Collection, wrote that Cat's Cradle "does not entirely suppress our recourse to naming but rather floods our typical eye-brain loop with stimuli for which attached language cues are either less than automatic or, in cases of purely sensory appeal, non-existent." [8] Fred Camper, in another essay for The Criterion Collection, remarked upon the mysteriousness of the four characters' interactions, but was nevertheless "kept on edge by the very rapid intercutting... the viewer is at once encouraged to come up with his own interpretations and prevented from settling on any one idea." [9]
The Academy Film Archive preserved Cat's Cradle in 2006. [10]
Dog Star Man is a series of short experimental films, all directed by Stan Brakhage, featuring Jane Wodening. It was released in installments between 1961 and 1964 and comprises a prelude and four parts. In 1992, Dog Star Man was included in its entirety in the annual selection of 25 motion pictures added to the National Film Registry of the Library of Congress. being deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" and recommended for preservation.
James Stanley Brakhage was an American experimental filmmaker. He is considered to be one of the most important figures in 20th-century experimental film.
An underground film is a film that is out of the mainstream either in its style, genre or financing.
Experimental film or avant-garde cinema is a mode of filmmaking that rigorously re-evaluates cinematic conventions and explores non-narrative forms or alternatives to traditional narratives or methods of working. Many experimental films, particularly early ones, relate to arts in other disciplines: painting, dance, literature and poetry, or arise from research and development of new technical resources.
Carolee Schneemann was an American visual experimental artist, known for her multi-media works on the body, narrative, sexuality and gender. She received a B.A. in poetry and philosophy from Bard College and a Master of Fine Arts from the University of Illinois. Originally a painter in the Abstract Expressionist tradition, Schneeman was uninterested in the masculine heroism of New York painters of the time and turned to performance-based work, primarily characterized by research into visual traditions, taboos, and the body of the individual in relation to social bodies. Although renowned for her work in performance and other media, Schneemann began her career as a painter, saying: "I'm a painter. I'm still a painter and I will die a painter. Everything that I have developed has to do with extending visual principles off the canvas." Her works have been shown at the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the London National Film Theatre, and many other venues.
Anthology Film Archives is an international center for the preservation, study, and exhibition of film and video, with a particular focus on independent, experimental, and avant-garde cinema. The film archive and theater is located at 32 Second Avenue on the southeast corner of East 2nd Street, in a New York City historic district in the East Village neighborhood of Manhattan.
Structural film was an avant-garde experimental film movement prominent in the United States in the 1960s. A related movement developed in the United Kingdom in the 1970s.
George Landow, also known as Owen Land, was a painter, writer, photographer and experimental filmmaker. He also worked under the pen names Orphan Morphan and Apollo Jize.
Window Water Baby Moving is an experimental short film by Stan Brakhage, filmed in November 1958 and released in 1959. The film documents the birth of the director's first child, his daughter Myrrena, by his then-wife Jane Brakhage, now Jane Wodening.
Mothlight is an experimental short film by Stan Brakhage, released in 1963. The film was created without the use of a camera.
Philip Stewart Solomon was an American experimental filmmaker noted for his work with both film and video. In recent years, Solomon had earned acclaim for a series of films that incorporate machinima made using games from the Grand Theft Auto series. His films are often described as haunting and lyrical.
The Act of Seeing with One's Own Eyes is a 1971 American film by Stan Brakhage. Its title is based on the literal translation of the term autopsy. The film documented the highly graphic autopsy procedures used by forensic pathologists, such as the removal of organs and the embalming process.
Thigh Line Lyre Triangular is an experimental short film by Stan Brakhage, released in 1961, which depicts the birth of the director's third child, a daughter named Neowyn. The film, which involves painting and hand-scratching over photographic images, is more abstract than the director's earlier Window Water Baby Moving, which documented the birth of Brakhage's first-born, a daughter named Myrrenna.
The Film-Makers' Cooperative is an artist-run, non-profit organization founded in 1961 in New York City by Jonas Mekas, Andy Warhol, Shirley Clarke, Stan Brakhage, Jack Smith, Lionel Rogosin, Gregory Markopoulos, Lloyd Michael Williams, and other filmmakers, for the distribution, education, and exhibition of avant-garde films and alternative media.
The Garden of Earthly Delights is an experimental short film by Stan Brakhage, released in 1981. The film was partly inspired by Hieronymus Bosch’s painting of the same name.
I... Dreaming is an experimental short film by Stan Brakhage, released in 1988. The film features a soundtrack of Stephen Foster songs, composed by Joel Haertling.
Jennifer Todd Reeves is a New York–based independent filmmaker. She has also taught as a part time professor of film at Bard College, The Cooper Union, Millennium Film Workshop and the School of Visual Arts.
The End is a 1953 American short film directed by Christopher Maclaine. It tells the stories of six people on the last day of their lives. It premiered at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art as part of Frank Stauffacher's Art in Cinema series. Though the film met audience disapproval at its premiere, it was praised by critics as a "masterpiece" and "a great work of art".