From: Adam Hyman (email suppressed)
Date: Mon Nov 07 2005 - 16:05:45 PST
Hi Freya,
Your description makes it sound like an anti-whaling film. :-)
But another meaning. Prior to the discovery and large scale drilling for
oil of the late 19th century, sperm whale oil (from melted down blubber) was
the highest quality oil available, especially for lighting. It burned
cleanly and brightly. Whale oil in particular was used for all sorts of
additional things, as was the baleen. Finally, sperm whales have that
particular substance, ambergris, that was used as the binding element for
perfumes.
I think it's a pretty good link between Vaseline, aka "petroleum jelly," and
the substances drawn from whale hunting. Plus, of course, there is the
personal significance for Barney of Vaseline, with its use in various
sculptural & performance works. The use of oil today causes the destruction
of the environment, as did the use of whale oil.
And so on.
Best regards,
Adam
On 11/7/05 3:53 PM, "Jack Sargeant" <email suppressed> wrote:
> Thanks for this description, I am intrigued. While I am not into
> whaling or wearing fur I'm not sure you can negatively judge a film
> because the director appears to endorse these things, appearances can
> be deceptive. Moby Dick (the book and film) is great and that is set on
> a whaling boat. Also, remember Bjork is from Iceland and whaling is
> part of their traditional way of living, this isn't to justify it, but
> it may explain an interest in it as a theme and source of mise-en-scene.
>
> Jack
>
>
> On Monday, November 7, 2005, at 10:43 pm, Freya wrote:
>
>>> i am more interested in his new work on whales and
>>> whaling that he has
>>> made with bjork, anybody heard anything about this?
>>
>> Yes it's set on a whaling ship (that's a kind of boat
>> dedicated to the senseless murder of our beautiful
>> water based mammals despite the fact they have done
>> nothing to us except make beautiful under water
>> music), so that's kind of a bad start for Freya, but
>> anyway, it's like set on a whaling ship and it's
>> called "drawing restraint 9". Apparently whenever
>> barney isn't sure what to do, he makes a "drawing
>> restraint" film, and this is no9.
>>
>> Basically there is a sculpture of liquid vaseline, and
>> like bjork and barney transform into whales and swim
>> in the liquid vaseline. I don't think you should put
>> whales in liquid vaseline but that is my own personal
>> opinion.
>>
>> It starts off with bjork and Barney dressed in
>> traditional fur costumes (I'm not sure what kind of
>> poor defenseless furry animal was murdered to make
>> them) and then they have a tea ceremony, because it is
>> a japanese whaling ship, and you know, the japenese
>> market is important and all.
>>
>> There is a big storm and then the ship starts to fill
>> with liquid vaseline, and we sense, or perhaps we just
>> use logic to deduce, that all this liquid vaseline is
>> coming from the sculpture known as "The Field" which
>> is of course made of liquid vaseline as I said at the
>> beginning. I mean it's not like liquid vaseline is
>> usually around in huge quantities. At least not in
>> this universe. Maybe there is another dimension where
>> Whales swim in liquid vaseline all the time and it is
>> like everywhere, but in this universe it probably came
>> from that sculpture. Anyway, we basically sense that
>> it came from the field. Ooops sorry, that it eminated
>> from the field.
>>
>> Thankfully (?!!?) barney and bjork have blowholes in
>> their necks, to blow out the liquid vaseline, and they
>> lock in an embrace and pull out knives and gouge out
>> all the flesh from the lower half of their bodies till
>> only vestigial whale tail like things are left.
>>
>> Then the boat emerges from the storm and sails between
>> icebergs and stuff and I think there is supposed to be
>> a happy ending or something.
>>
>> This all takes 2 hours and 15 minutes.
>>
>> Now I've only heard about all this but I HAVE heard
>> the Bjork soundtrack.
>>
>> Bjork has created a soundtrack which is kind of
>> slightly random vocalisations and that thing she does
>> with the music box setting on her synth. I don't want
>> to be hard on Bjork however because she never took
>> away half an hour of my life or whatever it was, with
>> dancing playboy sheep etc.
>>
>> However, my favourite bit is where an oriental
>> sounding fellow makes noises like eeeeeeeeeryp, and
>> occadionally hits something to make a dull thud at
>> seemingly random intervals. For some reason this did
>> kind of work for me and I'm curious what the visuals
>> that accompany this bit are like. Probably people
>> drinking tea I expect.
>>
>> Sorry I rushed and knocked this out slightly but this
>> is my independant, apolitical and completely unbiased
>> opinion about this film I have never seen.
>>
>> love
>>
>> Freya
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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>>
>> __________________________________________________________________
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>>
>
>
> __________________________________________________________________
> For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.
__________________________________________________________________
For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.