This is a 6 minutes long, silent, film by the legendary avant-garde, non-narrative film maker Stan Brakhage.
Called ‘Cat’s Cradle’, the film follows the uncertainty of montage patterns, that one has come to identify with solely Brakhage. The vivid and graphic use of the color red, and the inter-cutting between shots of man, woman, and cat, come together to create a jarringly beautiful spectacle by questioning the conventional understanding of conventional beauty itself. Brackage always followed a non-narrative style…in fact, even all his works put together fail to form a pattern of motifs or symbols. Each film is distinctly unique, eye-piercingly beautiful. It seems almost as if he is playing with ‘light’ itself!
Fred Camper, writer and lecturer on film and art who lives in Chicago and wrote regularly for the Chicago Reader, once quipped:
“Brakhage’s films serve as eye-training, both for seeing other films and as an opening onto more imaginative ways of seeing the world. If I had a friend who wanted me to teach him how to look at films, and unlimited access to an archive of world cinema, I’d begin with a couple of months worth of Brakhage.”
This piece serves as one of the finest examples of the above statement.
This film is most definitely one of my favorites.
Hope you enjoyed the film!