RFI - Maya Deren

Deren was also freaky-deep into the culture of Haiti and voudoun.

I also have a copy of her bk 'The Voodoo Gods' (originally called 'Divine Horsemen' and written in the early fifties) which was published as a paperback in the UK by Paladin in 1975. Her husband Teiji Ito composed the scores to 'Meshes Of The Afternoon' and another Deran film called 'The Very Eye of Night'; Tzadik have released a superb CD of the music that Ito wrote for a stage version of Alfred Jarry's 'Ubu Roi' - the CD is called 'King Ubu'. Deren died in 1961; Ito in 1982, at the age of 47.

I've seen Meshes at least once a year for the past six years and I never really figured out why. It's not particularly interesting in and of itself, but one can see the horror that came from it -- that is to say, every art school stereotype stems from it. The closeups, the pretensions, narciscisim disgused as melancholy and the idea that, in order to be considered a serious artist, one must avoid any sort of accessability. You want good female directors? Ida Lupino and Lina Wertmuller. Deren is garbage.

meditation on violence and a study for choreography for camera are pretty badass. googling maya deren turns up the myspaces of the most annoying people in the whole world.

especially cause i was trying to think of a paper topic incorporating deren and proust etc etc so "maya deren proust" led to really the most infuriating people. made me want to quit the humanities and get an MBA or something

I was thinking of getting a DVD of this lady's works minus the VOODOO, which is separate, but it is quite expensive, like 17 nicker, man.

Shitty transfers of a bunch of her films here

she's great - complaints above about her imitators should be aimed at her imitators, not at her. Meshes and the one with the dancers floating through space and the choreographed dinner party one plus the voodoo ritual stuff are all amazing.

choreographed dinner party one = ritual in transfigured time (my fave)

http://people.smu.edu/aosburn/sandoverjacket.jpg

i think part of the problem is that she wrote so much about her own stuff that her own insane capital-A artsy pretensions pervert the other, better things about her films

all I've read was Divine Horsemen (in which she doesn't reference her own film work at all) so what do I know

I finally saw "Meshes of the Afternoon" a while ago, I just watched it again on google video. I really liked it, esp the contrast between the weird, dreamlike imagery and the somewhat flat, matter-of-fact filming. who else was producing such surreal imagery in films as early as this (Apart from Bunuel & Berkeley, huh)

Old, old thread!

love love love her

Hello Pashmina,

You might seek the early films of Curtis Harrington or James Broughton (or Christopher Maclaine's "The Man Who Invented Gold) as they have some similarities, though they are a little later (mid-1940s to late 1950s). Of course you could also go all the way back to Man Ray and Jean Cocteau too. If the "Avant Garde" DVD sets by Kino Video are available in the UK, you should seek them out for some similar stuff.

If you like "Meshes" you should really watch "At Land"!

http://www.redfin.com/CA/Los-Angeles/1466-N-Kings-Rd-90069/home/7119196

http://media.cdn-redfin.com/photo/40/bigphoto/647/12-613647_7_0.jpg

What's the best, and especially, (most) complete dvd-set of Deren's work out there? Can't see the forest for the trees on Amazon tbh, and I really want to get a collection of her work as complete as possible.

a friend of mine used to own this it has the good stuff ("Meshes" is here but also my favorite "At Land")

http://www.undergroundfilmjournal.com/dvd-underground-index/maya-deren-experimental-films/

sadly, like most experimental film releases, it is out of print.

Heartbreaking last sentence there, Adam, after getting me all excited.

So it is in fact v difficult to get her whole oeuvre on dvd? Such a shame.

a quick search turned up the graveyard that is Ubuweb. that site ruled for so long but i haven't thought about it in years. RIP Ubuweb. they hosted some of her films but it seems like they were hit w a copyright claim around 2007 and had to remove her stuff. there is a backup of Divine Horsemen but im sure its low quality:

https://web.archive.org/web/20070105143937/http://www.ubu.com/film/deren.html

i know this is a long shot, but you could try Netflix DVDs if you have a disc account. they had all kinds of avant garde stuff years ago, it's worth a shot! also maybe library search engine like Galileo.

she only made 6 films so if u get that DVD you will have all her film work. she also collaborated w many people on dance work performance and music too so there are discs of those around. i think Mystic Fire put out 3 discs total and it is everything available. no idea if anything new has surfaced in the past 10 years.

i'm not willing to click the buy button, but maybe it's available here?

http://re-voir.com/shop/en/maya-deren-dvd/27-experimental-films-maya-deren-3493551100010.html

and it looks like they have others here: http://re-voir.com/shop/en/27-maya-deren-dvd

(hopefully this is obvious but i know nothing about maya deren or where to get the best, highest quality version of her work. intrigued, though!)

is there a file hosting service anyone can recommend?

nvm if yall on slsk i am mrkite1967