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So here it is, a long awaited review of my namesake, Dog Star Man. This is the film, more than any other film, which liberated my existence as film maker and film artist. The man behind this masterpiece of composition, Stan Brakhage. Oddly enough, this isn't my favorite work of his. I suppose my favorite work would have to be his latter, Black Ice, but something about Dog Star Man has jarred me from all my preconceptions of what "film" is. Its a film for film makers, and looking at it through any other lens would be rather preposterous.
Stan Brakhage had his roots in Maya Deren in the beginning of his cinematic career. Brakhage and many avant-garde artists of the time copied Deren and her poetic dreamlike productions, but come 1962 when Dog Star Man is created, something happens, something even as I write this I cannot explain. Dog Star Man takes the cinematic medium and propels it into a realm that has nothing to do with cinema at all. I don't consider Dog Star Man a film, frankly, I am at a loss of words to illustrate exactly with it truly is. It is art; its medium is celluloid; but somehow it transcends the very medium which it is printed on. Dog Star Man doesn't exist in the known dimensions of cinema, therefore, it is something almost completely incapable of being fully understood. Anyone can view the "film", but it exists in the realms of the mystics, transcending all logical practice in favor of something intangible.
This is a personal review for me, so instead of utilizing the "you" I will substitute with the "I".
As I watched Dog Star Man I not only saw the beginnings of the universe, but its inevitable death as well. The exploration of the concepts that were so important to Stan Brakhage, "Birth, sex, death, and the search for God," come forth not in single file, but rather all at once. It was difficult for me to grasp this concept at first, the very notion that the artist could beat out infinite concepts at once seemed impossible, but I stood boldly corrected. I soon felt I was in the presence of a divine magician, neither white nor dark, but someone who's very nature was neutral; both achromatic and shadeless. I was witnessing the beauty of birth, and the horror of death. I was witnessing something that had no definition except that of "God". It was a spiritual experience for me. Something unlike I have ever encountered before or since. It was visual Zen:
It is said that once you experience a "Zen" moment, things become clearer, and that certainly became the case after I viewed all of Dog Star Man in its five parts; from Prelude to Part IV. Soon, I became liberated from the tangible world of cinema. I soon realized that there was a God, that the heavens existed, and one didn't have to experience death to find it. I realized that kind celestial beauty was all around me, and at any moment I could meditate and find it. Dog Star Man, therefore, became the film that pushed me ever closer into Eastern concepts of religion and spirituality, a belief that I could truly find and be with that kind of omnipotant beauty and place of powerful calm anytime I wished to be. The fear of death has left me.
The films impact on me wasn't just in its spirituality, but it was also in its aesthetics and practice. Everything about that film that was so mystical and foreign became a fascination to me. I loved the techniques utilized within the film of intercutting, superimpostions, zooms, hand painted celluloid strips, time exposures, etc. Everything I witnessed seemed limitless in creation. However, the thing that has influenced me the most within the film itself, as a film maker, is the very fact that Stan Brakhage had virtually nothing to create this film. He created a masterpiece, and I say that without any restraint, of extremely powerful spiritual, personal, and visually radiant work all by himself. This was one man's vision. In Dog Star Man, Stan Brakhage didn't have lighting equipment, (he used all natural lighting); a crew, (he was alone in the mountains with only his family); a high-end camera, (shooting on 16mm); or sound equipment, (he felt it would subtract the viewer away from its visual magnificence). Stan Brakhage illustrated to me, more than any other film maker, that you don't need these things to make your work, all it takes is the individual, the vision, with the determination to do it. Since my initial viewing of Dog Star Man, in this regard, I have tried to emulate him as much as possible. I've gone out many days and nights filming and experimenting with my own camera. I am therefore free from the confines of narrative structure. The need for crew, equipment outside of camera, high-end cameras, sound, etc. I don't give it the time of day anymore. I just do.
This is why Dog Star Man has become the most important film to me in my individual experience. I don't expect anyone to share this experience, but this is the experience that I have that must be told. If you read this review and become interested, all the better, by all means, view the film for yourself and come to your own conclusions. Its a film which expands my vision and propels me to create and live.
Dog Star Man(1962-1964)
So here it is, a long awaited review of my namesake, Dog Star Man. This is the film, more than any other film, which liberated my existence as film maker and film artist. The man behind this masterpiece of composition, Stan Brakhage. Oddly enough, this isn't my favorite work of his. I suppose my favorite work would have to be his latter, Black Ice, but something about Dog Star Man has jarred me from all my preconceptions of what "film" is. Its a film for film makers, and looking at it through any other lens would be rather preposterous.
Stan Brakhage had his roots in Maya Deren in the beginning of his cinematic career. Brakhage and many avant-garde artists of the time copied Deren and her poetic dreamlike productions, but come 1962 when Dog Star Man is created, something happens, something even as I write this I cannot explain. Dog Star Man takes the cinematic medium and propels it into a realm that has nothing to do with cinema at all. I don't consider Dog Star Man a film, frankly, I am at a loss of words to illustrate exactly with it truly is. It is art; its medium is celluloid; but somehow it transcends the very medium which it is printed on. Dog Star Man doesn't exist in the known dimensions of cinema, therefore, it is something almost completely incapable of being fully understood. Anyone can view the "film", but it exists in the realms of the mystics, transcending all logical practice in favor of something intangible.
This is a personal review for me, so instead of utilizing the "you" I will substitute with the "I".
As I watched Dog Star Man I not only saw the beginnings of the universe, but its inevitable death as well. The exploration of the concepts that were so important to Stan Brakhage, "Birth, sex, death, and the search for God," come forth not in single file, but rather all at once. It was difficult for me to grasp this concept at first, the very notion that the artist could beat out infinite concepts at once seemed impossible, but I stood boldly corrected. I soon felt I was in the presence of a divine magician, neither white nor dark, but someone who's very nature was neutral; both achromatic and shadeless. I was witnessing the beauty of birth, and the horror of death. I was witnessing something that had no definition except that of "God". It was a spiritual experience for me. Something unlike I have ever encountered before or since. It was visual Zen:
The bamboo-shadows move over the stone steps as if to sweep them,
but no dust is stirred;
The moon is reflected deep in the pool,
but the water shows no trace of penetration.
but no dust is stirred;
The moon is reflected deep in the pool,
but the water shows no trace of penetration.
It is said that once you experience a "Zen" moment, things become clearer, and that certainly became the case after I viewed all of Dog Star Man in its five parts; from Prelude to Part IV. Soon, I became liberated from the tangible world of cinema. I soon realized that there was a God, that the heavens existed, and one didn't have to experience death to find it. I realized that kind celestial beauty was all around me, and at any moment I could meditate and find it. Dog Star Man, therefore, became the film that pushed me ever closer into Eastern concepts of religion and spirituality, a belief that I could truly find and be with that kind of omnipotant beauty and place of powerful calm anytime I wished to be. The fear of death has left me.
The films impact on me wasn't just in its spirituality, but it was also in its aesthetics and practice. Everything about that film that was so mystical and foreign became a fascination to me. I loved the techniques utilized within the film of intercutting, superimpostions, zooms, hand painted celluloid strips, time exposures, etc. Everything I witnessed seemed limitless in creation. However, the thing that has influenced me the most within the film itself, as a film maker, is the very fact that Stan Brakhage had virtually nothing to create this film. He created a masterpiece, and I say that without any restraint, of extremely powerful spiritual, personal, and visually radiant work all by himself. This was one man's vision. In Dog Star Man, Stan Brakhage didn't have lighting equipment, (he used all natural lighting); a crew, (he was alone in the mountains with only his family); a high-end camera, (shooting on 16mm); or sound equipment, (he felt it would subtract the viewer away from its visual magnificence). Stan Brakhage illustrated to me, more than any other film maker, that you don't need these things to make your work, all it takes is the individual, the vision, with the determination to do it. Since my initial viewing of Dog Star Man, in this regard, I have tried to emulate him as much as possible. I've gone out many days and nights filming and experimenting with my own camera. I am therefore free from the confines of narrative structure. The need for crew, equipment outside of camera, high-end cameras, sound, etc. I don't give it the time of day anymore. I just do.
This is why Dog Star Man has become the most important film to me in my individual experience. I don't expect anyone to share this experience, but this is the experience that I have that must be told. If you read this review and become interested, all the better, by all means, view the film for yourself and come to your own conclusions. Its a film which expands my vision and propels me to create and live.
My Rating:
5 Stars of 5
5 Stars of 5