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the village VOICE, December 31, 1970 movie JOURNAL [[image]] by Jonas Mekas How to write about the movies of Joseph Cornell? Where can I find such lightness and grace and unpretentiousness and directness? My typewriter is here in front of me, very real. The paper, the letters. I'm searching for words, letter by letter. To pay a tribute to a unique artist. One amazing part of Joseph Cornell's film work - and he is the first one to stress this and remind us of it - is that a number of other people have been involved in making of his films, either in photographing them or editing them. But when you see them (nine were shown at the Anthology Film Archives weekend before last) the same unmistakable Cornellian qualities mark them all. I spoke with Stan Brakhage, who did camera work on a few Cornell movies, and he said, yes, I held the camera, but I was only a medium who followed every indication, every movement, every suggestion that Cornell made: Cornell didn't touch the camera, but he made my every movement, he took every shot. Rudy Burckhardt, who photographed a good number of other Cornells, relates the same experience. Yes, this invisible spirit of a great artist hovers over everything he does; a certain movement, a certain quality that he imposes upon everything he touches. When in contact with people, this quality rises again from the work, like a sweet mist, and it touches us, through our eyes, through our mind. Cornell's mist (art is the opiate of the people . . . ), Cornell's fragrance is at once unique and at the same time very simple and unimposing. It's so unimposing that it's no wonder his movies have escaped, have slipped by unnoticed through the grosser sensibilities of the viewer, the sensibilities of men who need strong and loud bombardment of their senses to perceive anything. What Cornell's movies are is an essence of the Home Movie. They deal with things very close to us, every day and everywhere. Small things, not the big things. Not wars, not stormy emotions, dramatic clashes or situations. His images are much simpler. Old people in the parks. A tree full of birds. A girl in a blue dress, looking around in the street, with plenty of time on her hands. Water dripping into the fountain ring. An angel in the cemeteries, sweetest face under a tree. A cloud passes over the wing of the angel. What an image. "A cloud passes, touching lightly the wing of an angel." The final image of "Angel" is to me one of the most beautiful metaphors cinema has produced. Cornell's images are all very real. Even when they are taken from other movies, as in "Rose Hobart," they seem to gain the quality of reality. The Hollywood unreality is transported into Cornellian unreality which is very very real. Here is an evidence of the power of the artist to transform reality by choosing, by picking out only those details which correspond to some subtle inner movement or vision, or dream. No matter what he takes, be it a totally "artificial" reality, or bits of "actual" reality, he transforms them, bit by bit, into new unities, new things, boxes, collages, movies, with no other thing on earth resembling them. I have seen some of these movies during the years in process of assembling themselves in Cornell's studio, as they were put together, or maybe as they were putting themselves together from Andrew Sarris on Preston Sturgis in FILM COMMENT SCREENWRITERS ISSUE now on sale at newsstands and bookstores or send $1.50 to FILM COMMENT 100 Walnut Place Brookline MA 02146 USA (1 year subscription $6) ALEXANDRO JODOROWSKY'S EL TOPO WED. & THURS. DEC. 30 & 31 AT MIDNIGHT FRI. & SAT. JAN. 1 & 2 AT 1 A.M. SUN.-THURS. JAN. 3-7 AT MIDNIGHT Elgin Cinema Eight Avenue & 19th St. - Tel: 675-0935 M ARCHIVES ANTHOLOGY FILM ARCHIVES IS LOCATED WITHIN THE PUBLIC THEATRE, 425 LAFAYETTE ST., SOUTH OF ASTOR PL. ANTHOLOGY FILM ARCHIVES MAILS A MONTHLY PROGRAM FOR A SERVICE FEE OF $1.00 PER YEAR. ADMISSION: $1.00 PER SHOWING TELEPHONE: 677-3197 THU DEC 31 6 PM LAUREL & HARDY BIG BUSINESS, 1929 THE MUSIC BOX, 1932 TWO TARS, 1928 8 PM PETER KUBELKA MOSAIC IM VERTRAUEN, 1955 ADEBAR, 1957 SCHWECHATER, 1958 ARNULF RAINER, 1960 UNSERE AFRIKAREISE, 1966 10 PM GEORGE LANDOW FLEMING FALOON, 1964 BARDO FOLLIES, 1967 FILM IN WHICH THERE APPEAR EDGE LETTERING, SPROCKET HOLES, DIRT PARTICLES, ETC., 1966 FILM THAT RISES TO THE SURFACE OF CLARIFIED BUTTER, 1968 INSTITUTIONAL QUALITY, 1969
