Images and themes in Meshes of the Afternoon!

Transcription

1 Images and themes in Meshes of the Afternoon Jaime Costas Nicolás

2 Since the beginning of the avant-garde movements, many artists have found in cinema a new way of artistic expression. They were astonished with the possibilities that cinema offered in order to play with time and space, or as Breton said it is in cinema where the only modern mystery is celebrated 1. It is the modernity that Breton names, the one that will fascinate the surrealist artists, among which we find Man Ray, Jean Cocteau, René Clair or Luis Buñuel. Moreover, through this medium, they could offer more easily the base of the surrealist image theory, the analogy between two elements completely opposed. While in Europe the surrealist cinema was developed in the 20s, in the United States it will not arrive until the 40s, mostly thanks to the shooting of Maya Deren s Meshes of the Afternoon. This film is going to produce a late initiation of the surrealist cinematography in the United States and it will make Maya Deren the mother of the North American independent cinema. This essay will try to make an analysis of the complex images and ideas behind the cinematographic debut of Maya Deren, but before, it is necessary to know the main characteristics of Deren s art, her theories about cinema and the context in which Meshes of the Afternoon is going to be filmed: -Despite of being part of the surrealism, there are big differences between the Maya Deren s cinema and the cinema form the classic surrealist authors. Deren does not believe in the automatic writing nor chance as creation formulas, she will declare to be a classic and methodological artist. The second difference between Maya and the surrealists is the treatment of the dream state. While surrealist artists pervert reality thanks to the introduction of new forms and the transformation of objects and persons, Maya will recreate her fantasy with bizarre relations between objects and between the objects and their context, but never transforming them. However, she shares some elements with surrealist and dadaist artists: the representation of the dreams and the subconscious, and the interest for psychology. There is even an unfinished film made by Maya Deren together with Marcel Duchamp. -Maya Deren understands cinema as a total art. She is going to use techniques from photography, dance or poetry. In fact, she started her artistic career as a poet: Before I was a filmmaker, I was a very poor poet, because I thought in 1 Kyrou, Ado. Le Surréalisme au Cinéma. Paris. Le Terrain Vague, Page 22.

3 terms of images; what existed as essentially a visual experience in my mind, poetry was an effort to put it into verbal terms. When I got a camera, it was like coming home. It was like doing what I always wanted to do. 2 She is going to use her poetic narrativity (poetry cinema) and her passion for the dance to create a temporal and spatial art, and she will produce new experiences and space-time relations. She considers herself an amateur director, meaning she does it for love to the art, instead that for money or necessity. -Finally, we need to talk about the historic context in which Deren had made her films. During the 40s, United States was at war against Europe and Japan. This situation will make the american society completely alienated and this state will be reflected in Deren s work. Moreover, the cinema at that time was mainly made by men and also it had also a tremendously fixed structure to which Maya was opposed. There, she is going to introduce in her cinema feminist and antihollywood elements. These characteristics are going to be present in the debut film of Maya, Meshes of the Afternoon, and it is thanks to them that it will become in one of the most important oeuvres of the american surrealism, Deren is credited with making the first narrative film in the history of the American avant-garde. 3 Meshes of the Afternoon was filmed in Los Angeles in The film is a collaboration between Maya Deren and her first husband Alexander Hammid, a Czechoslovakian photographer and director. It is believed that Hammid was in charge of the camerawork and the cinematography while Maya worked in the narrativity of the story. However, Tino Hammid, son of Alexander, talks about a total collaboration between the two parts, There is not a clear distinction between the themes in Meshes and its shooting and editing. My father worked almost his entire career without film scripts (...) (he) treated the creative process in a very open and collaborative manner. 4 It has no script nor sound. The non- diegetic music was added a posteriori by Maya s third husband, Teiji Ito. 2 Deren, Maya. Essential Deren: Complete Film Writings McPherson, Geller, Theresa. The Personal Cinema of Maya Deren: Meshes of the Afternoon and Its Critical Reception in the History of the Avant-Garde. University of Hawaii Press. Biography, Volume 29, Number 1, Winter 2006, pp (Article). Page 2. 4 Hammid, Tino. (2012, Décembre 10). interview.

4 Meshes of the Afternoon is going to propose the inner world and the dreams of a woman through the juxtaposition of objects, concepts and opposed situations: dream-world and reality, life and death, women and men, the house and the sea, and other mechanisms more subtle that we will later see. The experimental film director Érik Bullot has written about its structure, Meshes brings the narrative causality through a logic of non-contradiction 5. It is a poetic film, it will get its meaning through its images. Now, I would like to state that the next interpretations regarding the film are personal insights, helped, of course, by the texts written by Maya Deren and other scholars included at the bibliography. My personal point of view about the film is the next: the female protagonist lives under her husband s submission. It is this submission that will be reflected in her dreams as suicidal feeling but, at the same time, she will have doubts due to her sexual desires. We start our analysis of Meshes of the Afternoon by its credits. In them, rather Deren or Hammid writes Hollywood when it is obvious that this film it has not been shot in these cinematographic studios. Deren, but mainly Hammid, attack with this title sequence conventional cinema. In their film, they are going to question each of the conventions of classic Hollywood films: a chronological timeline, continuity editing and romance as the main theme. The reason for this critic is very simple: when Hammid arrived to the United States, he could not work in the cinematographic industry since he was not part of the american union. 6 Therefore, they are going to play with space and time, reject the patriarchy and representing it as a threat, and they will use experimental cinematographic techniques to destroy continuity. We are going to split the film in six parts: 1. Reality 5 Bullot, Érik. Éloge du camouflage. Les Cahiers dy Mnam 112/113 été/automne Page My father had recently come from Czechoslovakia to Hollywood as a well known and respected European filmmaker. When he tried to get work he hit a brick wall because he was not a part of the unionized industry. They wouldn't even let him pick up a camera, so to speak. Hammid, Tino. (2012, Décembre 10). interview.

5 The narration starts in the real world. Reality is going to be the base for the dream-world of the female protagonist or how Maya herself describes it This film is concerned with the interior of an individual. It does not record an event which could be witnessed by other persons. Rather, it reproduces the way which the subconscious of an individual will develop, interpret, and elaborate an apparently simple and casual incident into a critical emotional experience 7. The first image is a mannequin s arm leaving a paper flower on the road. Here, it is necessary to talk about three different features. First, the two objects represent a contradiction itself. Both represent something alive but are completely inert. Regarding their symbolism, the arm makes us think about women s objectivization who are regarded as man s toy, not only in society, but also, in cinema at that time. Moreover, the flower is the feminine symbol more recognizable in poetry and, in fact, we are going to associate it with the woman s silhouette through the film. We have to also highlight the use of a recurrent film technique in Meshes of the Afternoon, the magic edition inherited from George Méliès at the beginning of film history, through which Deren makes disappear or Fragmentation Life and death move objects, in this case the arm, in order to disturb reality. The woman is a shadow, we do not see her in this sequence of the film, only fragmented parts. This technique foreshadow, as we will see, the end of the story. Later, she takes the flower and both seems to move in a similar way, which produces a visual and symbolist match between these two elements. She sees a man at the end of the road (maybe her husband), she grabs the key to open the door but it falls through the stairs. The key seem to escape as it was alive. If we look for the meaning of the key in the 7 Film Culture. 39. Winter, Page 1.

6 psychoanalytic theory, in which surrealist images are based, there are two possibilities, a liberation or repression factor depending if the key is given or taken aways, and also as a symbol of couples, marriage and the domestic life. Therefore, the key fleeing could represent the female repression at home or her submission in the marriage life. It is also important to state that objects are going to be the protagonists of the film together with the woman. This idea makes us think again in women thought as objects. She opens the door and we see the objects that we have just talked about, a knife, that represents masculinity due to its phallic form and it is opposed to the flower, the record-player which a a reference to the circular structure of the film and the dreams itself and, finally, the telephone off the hook that symbolizes a link between the two states, reality and dream-world. She goes up the stairs. She sits, with the flower on her lap and she The eyes of the surrealism touches her body sensually. Now, we see a extreme close-up of her eye which reminds us to other pieces of art from the surrealist movement like the photographies by Man Ray or the bloody scene in Un Chien Andalou. The eye is the window and entry into the inner world of the protagonist as we see in the transition reality-dream when the camera moves backwards through a tunnel forming the shape of an eye on the screen. 2. The first cycle of the dream In the dream, the elements presented in reality are going to become important. In the reality part, the woman sees a man on the road. In the dream, there is a black dressed figure with a mirror as face in the road, who is going to escape from her at all time. The woman is never going to be reflected on its mirror-face, in face, she is only going to be reflected on surface that are going to disturb her image (the knife and the window). This emphasize the problems we have talked about, the lost of the female identity in the marriage due to the masculine oppression. Nevertheless, the figure represents also the death itself and its presence in the dreams indicates the desire of dying. Moreover, it carries the flower establishing a

7 connection between the figure and the woman. In this case, we can also interpret the lack of a sharp reflection as her doubts to kill herself since the face of the death can be her own. It is also in the dream, that we see for the first time the complete face and body of the woman which establishes the dream-world as a liberating place, Lost of identity opposed to reality. Inside the house, we find the knife on the stairs, threatening. She tries to go to the first floor but stairs now seem endless. We need to think about the stairs as the path to the bedroom, the place where the woman is subdue to the man and so the never ending stairs reflects how she may feel when she walks them. In the room, the telephone is now on the bed sleeping, as we have said it is a symbol for the dream state. This way of presenting the objects out of the normal context personifies them, exactly the opposite of what happens to woman through the film. Later, she sees her distorted reflection on the knife as we already advanced before, denoting a lack of identity. Afraid by this idea, she hangs up the telephone trying to escape from the dream. Now, due to her fear, the stairs look like a cliff in which she seems to fall in and Hammid s movements with the camera achieve to transmit that same feeling to the viewer. Then, she approaches the window and she sees another version of herself (three with the Penetration one sleeping on the armchair). This image of having several alter ego is related again with her identity issues, the female protagonist is alienated from herself. Finally, before moving on to the third version, she picks up the key from her mouth. From my point of view, on one side, it is a liberating movement, her provocative face confirms it. She gets rid of the institution of marriage and she passes it her new version who enters the house. On the other side, this is the great contradiction within the woman, she wants to die but her sexual desires prevent her from doing it. It is when she is penetrated (the image of the key in

8 her mouth) that she stops her actions and passes the baton to the next version of herself. At the same time, the key also means the beginning or aperture of the new cycle within the dream. 3. The second cycle of the dream This cycle is a repetition of the topics already seen. The woman follows the dark figure who has in its hands the woman s fate, the flower. In this second cycle, death seems to be closer Death in the room to the woman since the figure is now inside the house and inside the bedroom. Now, the stairs are harder to walk on because the death is closer and her doubts, bigger. Moreover, if we pay attention to how the woman moves through the stairs, from one side to the other, she reminds us of the key falling at the beginning of the film, another comparison between the woman and the objects. The death leaves the flower on the bed, in the same place the knife was before. It is on the bed where many of the themes and symbols of the film converge. The bed is where the knife and the flower are, meaning, where masculinity and femininity meet and, at the same time, where the woman is dominated by the man as we will see at the end of the dream. The bed is an object of oppression for her but also of her sexuality and desires. Therefore, it is the main symbol for her role in the patriarchal society of that time. The next sequence is very revealing. She sees the death disappear and next she transforms in a kind of inanimate object, like a statue, that is what is left of her if she does not embrace death. She stares at the knife, doubtful. It is the masculine presence which makes her an object. Before beginning the third repetition, we have again the scene where she takes the key from her mouth but, this time, the key becomes the knife, the phallus. Her sexual doubts are still present and now, more clearly represented. 4. The third cycle of the dream This first scene is mainly a summary of the three cycles of the dream. All the woman s versions are reunited around the table. They leave the key/knife on the

9 table and they seem to decide their destiny. The first two versions take the key but their signs of sexuality or their sexual desires, which we have been describing during the film, prevents them from taking action. As historian Adams Sitney suggests Objects, vision, and the erotic are important to the film s construction of a repressed and resistant female sexuality and subjectivity (...) provide insight into the film s psyco-sexual tensions 8 It is the third one who, without any trace of sexuality, finally takes the key which transforms immediately into the knife. Her hand is black, she seems to have fused with the black figure, her deadly desire. Then, the protagonist take the knife and we see she is wearing a pair of glasses that does not let her see, she has made a decision. She gets up and we have a traveling scene that Deren described as, What I meant when I planned that four stride sequence was that you have to come a long way from the very beginning of time to kill yourself, like the first life emerging from the primeval waters. Those four strides, in my intention, span all time. 9 This last murderous version gets close to her sleeping self but she wakes up, opens her eyes, and it is her husband who is approaching her. The husband is clearly identified as a threat. 5.The fake reality I name this part fake reality because the Finally, the reflection on the mirror The two first versions waiting for the third one audience is supposed to think that we are back to reality, but, as we will see, we are still inside her subconscious. We see the husband has the flower in his hand, he is dominating. He takes her to the bedroom, while she checks that all the objects are back to their normal places, they are not alive anymore. The man leaves the flower on the bed, as an invitation, like the death in the dream. The strongest 8 Sitney, P. Adams. Visionary Film: The American Avant-Garde, Oxford University Press, October 3, Deren, Maya. Letter of April 19, Film Culture. 39. Winter, Page 30

10 image that the man is who troubles the woman is on his reflection on the mirror. We have said that the absence of reflection meant an absence or deformation on the female identity. Now, we see that the place where her identity should reside is occupied by the husband and so, we can deduce that it is his presence that disturbs the woman. She lays on the bed and the man starts to touch her body sexually. The masculine Freedom desires are superposed to the feminine s when the flower transforms into the knife. We have again a close-up of her eyes maybe pointing out the end of the dream. Finally, she breaks the mirror, his face, and the influence of the husband disappears. The woman is liberated. The house, the woman s prison, is opened to the sea, a symbol of limitlessness and infinity, without walls. Another possible meaning, bringing back the idea of the attack against Hollywood cinema, is the breaking of the frame as the breaking of conventional cinema against Deren and Hammid s more experimental films. This image could appear as the end of the movie but, as in Un Chien Andalou, Meshes of the Afternoon offers a double ending, a mechanism to play and destabilize the viewer. 6. Return to reality The man enters the house and we find out what she has done to liberate herself, she died. She is cut with mirror pieces which resembles to the fragmentation of the body we witnessed at the beginning of the film. We see how her imagination, her inner world, achieved to conquer reality: she is covered with seaweeds and sand, her will was too strong to be repressed. To sum up, Meshes of the Afternoon is about a woman oppressed and objectified to a point she can identify herself anymore. She wishes her death but her sexual passions make her doubt. However, at the end, her mortal idea prevails and she commits suicide. The next year (1944), Maya Deren shoots At Land, a film that many critics named Meshes of the Afternoon s sequence. The raisons are that they share many themes and also images. For example, the film starts with a woman carried by the sea waves, an image that directly recalls to the same sea of freedom in Meshes.

11 After these two films, Deren s filmography was focused in other aspects. She shot Ritual in Transfigured Time and Meditation on Violence where she mixed cinema and choreography and played with the spatial-time possibilities that this mean offers. However, Maya Deren finished her career with a documentary about the Haitian culture Divine Horesemen: The Living Gods of Haity, totally different from her debut s style. In conclusion, Meshes of the Afternoon is a film that offers many interpretation possibilities depending on which literary or cinematographic theory we focus on. If we focus, for example, on feminism, Meshes tells the story of a female subdued to the patriarchal society, and if we focus in film history, it is a film that tries to break with all the Hollywood conventions. Tino Hammid said that his father told him that the films had not any particular meaning but only interesting expressions. He also stated that he thinks that they are many personal and aesthetic reasons that Maya and Alexander wanted to express but, against what many believe, they are not as premeditated as we think. 10 We can say about this work the same that Jean Cocteau said about his film La Sang d un Poète, if each of you find your own personal meaning in this film, then I will have achieved my ambition I finally asked my father what all the imagery in Meshes meant. He answered that it had no particular meaning but rather it just was some interesting expressions created through film. I am one who believes that almost nothing we do is devoid of meaning. I'm sure there are plenty of personal and esthetic reasons my father and Maya had that they expressed in the film. I just don't think they were nearly as conscious, organized, or premeditated as some believe today. Hammid, Tino. (2012, Décembre 10). interview. 11 Cocteau, Jean. Two Screenplays Baltimore: Pelican Books, 1969.

12 Bibliographie Béhar, Henri et Michel Carassou. Le Surréalisme. LGF, LDP Biblio Essais. May, Bullot, Érik. Éloge du camouflage. Les Cahiers dy Mnam 112/113 été/ automne Cocteau, Jean. Two Screenplays Baltimore: Pelican Books, Deren, Maya. Essential Deren: Complete Film Writings McPherson, Deren, Maya. Letter of April 19, Film Culture. 39. Winter, 1965 Deren, Maya. "Program Notes." Film Culture. 39. Winter, Dor, Simon. La forme créatrice du temps comme expression chez Maya Deren. Université de Montreal. Décembre 15, Durozi, Gerard et Bernanrd Lecherbonner. Lu Surréalisme: théories, thèmes, techniques. Larousse, Geller, Theresa. The Personal Cinema of Maya Deren: Meshes of the Afternoon and Its Critical Reception in the History of the Avant-Garde. University of Hawaii Press. Biography, Volume 29, Number 1, Winter 2006, pages Article. Haslem, Wendy. Maya Deren, The High Priestess of Experimental Cinema. Senses of Cinema. December 12, great-directors/deren-2/ Kyrou, Ado. Le Surréalisme au Cinéma. Paris. Le Terrain Vague, Hammid, Tino. (2012, Décembre 10). interview. Pagán, Alberte. Introducción aos clásicos do cinema experimental CGAI/CGAC, Xunta de Galicia, Sitney, P. Adams. Visionary Film: The American Avant-Garde, Oxford University Press, October 3, 2002.