I remember my film professor showing this and prefacing the screening with the remark, "People who see this tend to have one of three responses. Either they fall asleep, or they want to throw the projector out the window, or they have a transcendent experience." Fortunately I had a transcendent experience and this film remains a favorite. As others have said, this is only a snippet of the whole 45 minute film, and it's meant to be seen in a theater, not as a 3rd-generation-copy YouTube clip.
it is just about the experience, you know you're in a room, and while watching the video you are still in a room, and that it is moving slowly in. It's that feeling of just watching something and waiting for a moment to happen, and that moment is just moving slowly across the room.
I think this is a VERY good idea for an experimental arthouse film, how the sound increases in pitch as you move slowly towards the wall... like the space around you is becoming claustrophobic... but freakin 45 minutes? What?
According to snobs, forcing 6 year old children to watch this will inspire them to become artists. Those same people say attending Art Prize in Grand Rapids Michigan is actually bad for young children.
My god this video made my ears hurt...and as soon as it ended relief. Great sound work but I would have liked a different visual narative. But still a great film...thanks Video Vortex for showing me this.
I understand that some art isn't for everyone...but I mean come on...what is this?? sometimes I think artists/filmakers try too hard to appear deep, mysterious, and eccentric...
This proves that art is purely opinionated, I personally cant stand the phrase "Avant Garde" And I believe the actual full movie is 45 minutes long and i don't know how anyone can sit through that but some people love it and i can't argue with that
Man, looks like film classes are ruining a lot of people's lives.... XD I didn't know they showed THIS kind of stuff..... Forcing a bunch of people to watch the whole of a film like this is probably the best way to make them hate avant-garde cinema for the rest of their lives..... Shit like this should be discovered individually, and then shared with a bunch of like-minded people.... I think this is the spirit of it... Not academically taught in a school by people who don't really understand it
@Thrash0Jazz0Assassin If this was the only thing they showed it might be bad, but in my film school this was one of dozens of unique films I watched. I think they're just trying to open people up to the idea that a film can be a lot of different things.
I think some of the cinephiles here are confusing emotional depth with great film. Sterile it may be, but its purposeful reduction of film to a slow zoom implicates the nature of the camera to alter perception. Zooming is an essential filmic tool that is used as often as it is naturalized into neglect. By amplifying this single feature he negotiates a disorientation between what the camera sees and what a viewer thinks he sees in his mind's eye.
@Vigilantekram Any sort of narrative, theme, or any other extraneous filmic device like cutting would only dilute the purpose many here don't take time to meet half way. Users championing ignorance and lazy consumption is kinda dissapointing. This ain't even the whole film.
W({velength is structured primarily around a single kind of frame mobility-the zoom-in. Its pattern of progression and development is not a narra tive one, but one of exploration, through deliberately limited means, of how the zoom transforms the space of the loft.
In film school, we learned of film history, naturally. To my surprise the teacher thought this movie was a, "brilliant piece of artistic cinema." We were then shown a reel of this movie, and I almost shot myself. No matter how deep you dig, there is no deep ambition beneath this pile of bullocks.
Some commenter on Roger Ebert's blog compared this guy to Stan Brakhage... I'm telling you right now, stop this crap and go check out Brakhage's Lovesong. _There's_ one hell of an emotional piece of filmmaking, even though it's just a bunch of flashing paint scribbles on celluloid.
What do you think art is? Is art intended to entertain? It art expressive? Is art educating? Is art contemplative? Is art intended to evoke emotion? What emotion does this movie evoke? Boredom. What does this movie contemplate? Not very much. Was this deliberate? Is there anyone on earth who would feel their lives were helped in some way by the viewing of this movie?
what is the point of this, is this a movie? well technically it is. yes its a series of pictures moving but why should people even know about this? enough stuff pisses people off. The fact is that people will view this in any context and over analyze the movie and think its spectacular, and you know what happens when you over analyze something, you drift away from reality, and the reality is this is the worst.
Thanks for posting this! Tonight we were going to watch this film in my "cinema aesthetics" class but now that I saw 1 min of it + all your comments, i Just won't go to my class lol, screw this
I would not call this horrible. I would say it is frustrating, aggravating, challenging, like all art. We get locked in this idea that art has to be something specific, and when it does not conform, we rebel. It's like the sports fan whose team wins the game, yet he is too busy bitching about the opportunities to make more points.
ISN'T IT INTERESTING HOW ART CAN MAKE YOU ANGRY AND REPULSED FOR YOU NOT UNDERSTANDING THE MEANING? HOW IT CAN ENRAGE YOU FOR MAKING YOU FEEL STUPID? BUT WAIT, YOU'RE NOT STUPID, RIGHT? YOU'RE SMART, YOU SO BELIEVE YOU ARE SMART? AND IF YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND SOMETHING, THAT IS STUPID, NOT YOU. NEVER EVER YOU. RIGHT? WE DON'T EVER WANT TO LIVE LIFE THINKING WE CAN'T UNDERSTAND. WELL, WHAT IF YOU ACCEPT YOUR LACK OF UNDERSTANDING. Well, then that's a start. that's a fucking start. :))))))))))))
I went to see this at the OAG in 76'ish, walked out at the 20 minute mark. That's 20 mins of my life I will never get back. Michael Snow has snowed Canada into believing he is some great artist. This, and any other work I've seen of his is total crap.
It's about a covert project. They could alter wavelengths on a chair & send their subjects through different space and time. Apparently, consciousness also affects where you'd arrive at.
what an annoying piece of shit. no matter if it's art house or whatever it's boring AND annoying at the same time with this bitchy BEEEEP-sound in the background. can'T stand it.
This is an experimental film. There is nothing to really understand except that the maker of this piece was trying to do something or learn something that he thought he could learn the answer to by creating this piece.
I'm going to admit that I don't get it. I don't understand but I'm not repulsed, rather intrigued. Can someone help me to understand this better? I know this is only a segment of it and from the looks of it it's someone playing with the concept of perception and depth and time and space but that's really all I understand. Is it that the film defies all conventions of cinema norms and does what it wants without a narrative or purpose to experiment? Can someone help me to understand this more?
Uhhh..... Can't really explain it myself. No problem with that at all. However,most art snobs would probably see people who don't understand it as ignorant which is actually pathetic of them to assume. The art world(in my opinion) goes like this:Either pretend you know what you're talking about or just admit you don't. = / I've met some people like that and they're.....pretty much assholes. Ha ha ha.
If you watch the whole thing it is brilliant. It's about the way we see things. It questions our perception of depth versus flatness by ending with the zoom on the photograph, flat picture that is really no different than the flat movie, tv or computer screen we watch.
I understand it isn't a narrative piece so some people won't like it but why the hostility? This is a certain kind of film and it is easy to avoid. If you hate "art" don't watch it.
Ive done my Homework. Ive watched a lot of arthouse films and I'm what some might concider to be an artist,but honestly 45 min or so of this just had no profound effect on me or gave me the feeling something was achieved...if I had done the same now People would laugh. I understand the time period , but I cant beleive this was acclaimed. In my opinion this was just not worth anything. People can insult me, but thats my opinion.
You make something stupid like this, and act pertinacious enough, and have the right friends in the art world, then no one will want to admit hey "don't get it" so everyone will say it's great.
Even the ideas people say are profound about it depth vs flat and all that, are just really stupid an painfully obvious, Yes, TV's are flat, what genius!
Also the sound is just annoying. If i wanted to hear a tea kettle go off i'd put one on the stove. At least then I'd get some tea out of the deal.
hey i agree with you i mean during that time the counterculture was just so strong that anything straying from the norm would be considered a masterpiece but i just think its taking it to far by making it 45 minuts long and i dont see how people can stand that high pitch wail my god its like having your brain pulled out of your ears! La region central is kinda cool too.
The reason everyone says, "Art is something I cannot do," is because they are not artists.
I am an artist and therefore I say, "Art is something I *can* do," which includes zooming into a photograph, eating lunch, having sex, or anything I choose.
FAIL - this is conceptual art. if you take it out of the philosophical conversational context and only dwell on a superficial level. then yes you could make this film. can you move an "art" forward cognitively? then good for you.
So I'm curious, is there conceptual justification for this? Because I don't see much value in structuralism that has no revelation of narrative, linguistic, aesthetic, performance or technical ideas.
I could watch Salad Fingers and be more artistically inclined and inspired by it more so than this peice of no budget garbage!
This so reminds me of Ed Wood. You know, instead of giving Ed Wood the title of being the worst "Director of all time", they should have given it to Michael Snow, that would have been far more approperiate.
This isn't the full film. If I recall correctly it's actually close to a half hour long. Art films like this aren't meant to be enjoyed or even understood by people who aren't in the know. This one in particular is a big fuck you to every convention used by popular narrative cinema. If you say it sucks you betray your own ingorance.
Ive seen worse films than this, this actually if you give it time pretty cool. Ive seen a movie where its just static in a grey box for 45 min, its called untitled film and it was at sundance
realmente es impactante... pero debe sentirse la experiencia durante todos los minutos que dura esta pieza y en pantalla cinematográfica para alcanzar a percibir las sensaciones y notar la evolución de la misma. Algo increíble y muy nutritivo!!!! gracias por subirlo
I first read about this movie in the book 'Science Fiction Films' by Films & Filming writer Philip Strick. I thought it was rather odd he referred to it as 'science fiction'.
Yes because aiming the camera at a picture with incessant pitching effects for half an hour is art.
You know why this had so much acclaim? Because they fucked with the camera. They somehow made the camera sensitive to light and the more often it's exposed to it the higher the pitch.
It's so beautifull.... Isn't it?
NO, this is the most fugly and irratating nuesance I've ever heard.
Last thrusday i was in a film presentation from this man in berlin. I couldn't stand up in front of the screen more than 5 minuts. My surprise was that in the room there were almost 100 people looking at that and trying to convince themselves that a fucking man doing strange noises with a microphone and another one playing really horrible the saxofon worhts the word art.what's happening with modern art? are we crazy? rollerthrower!
I could poop in my hands, smear it all over my face, then headbutt my grandmothers dead body for twenty minutes while singing every third word from Camptown Races and somebody would call it art.
No they wouldn't. The difference is that this is firmly rooted in the history of art and film art and your suggestion is firmly rooted in immature vulgur behavior.
I agree with co907.. This clip doesn't show the film in the way it is supposed to be experienced. I don't know if anyone has talked about this yet, but the sound in the film is linked to the different filters or "wavelengths" of light seen on camera. My class was lucky enough to watch the original film and although I got a massive headache from it, I found it to be an enlightening experience. In part due to the structuralist concept of the film the other was the group phenomenological experience
This just annoys me of how a group of comideans who went totaly against the norms of current comedy are now endlessly quoted out of context and at times when its really not appropriate.
Please someone explain to me why this is good. I don't want to criticise it without understanding it. Please tell me why it's so good as I can't see it. I mean I've watched the whole thing in another video and at best it's very slightly vaugely interesting but how is it a work of art? Is it just my ignorance? please someone tell me.
Basically (and I don't necessarily think it's good, as in enjoyable, more "good" as in a great concept), the reason why it's so important is because it's a very interesting critique of conventional narrative cinema. It plays with the materiality of film (as in, the aperture, the mood created by the room, the different effects you can create with filters) and does a lot more with this space than could ever be done by a conventional film
so the full potential of film is explored. Also the film doesn't have a meaning, it's purely about the range of responses it can create in an audience, from boredom, to interest in the visuals, to anger, to tension (esp. during this last part with the buttock-clenching sounds), and it sets up what we expect to be narrative to then completely ignore it and focus on the space of the room
Thanks that actually helps. Although I thought it was pretty boring to watch it was very atmospheric and does do a lot with pretty much nothing happening at the same time. So I do have a certain level of respect for it.
That was absolutely horrible, I got a grasp on film history I took some classes in school and this is like the worst piece of shit ever made. I feel confused and sad after watching that. Whoever says this is art is full of shit.
oh give me a break!Any idiot can make something like this.Everyone just wants to act like they know something about how movies are made so they call this "movie" a work of art.There is not one thing good about this movie and its a shame people love it......Look the grass in the back yard is growing.Let me go and film this work of "art".
Wavelength is often listed as one of the greatest underground films and art house films ever made. It was named #85 in the 2001 Village Voice critics' list of the 100 Greatest Films of All Time. The film has been designated and preserved as a "masterwork" by the Audio-Visual Preservation Trust of Canada. In 2004, the film was named one of Canada's all time greatest film by the Toronto International Film Festival. The film won the Grand Prix at the 1967 Knokke Experimental Film Festival.
you draw anime. that's no more art than this. at least michael snow didn't imitate anyone. just because you don't like it doensn't mean it's "a piece of shit movie."
Please, recreate this. I would love to see your efforts. Use film and editing equipment and recreate this. Make music and recreate this. Mind you, this is only a fraction of the film. But please, try to recreate this; people would like to see it.
This production its so rear, i don´t liked much, but is this great idea. But, no disliked. El Cine estructural o Cine experimental this present in every world. o wherever thas say. XD
A pleasure keyfimation although I see the point of the attackers as the marority of video "art" is excreble.There are a few great examples this one and another called "Between" by David Hall and a collaborator whose name I've forgotten also had a profound effect/
You canse my paintings by typing in Ian Charles Scott also in Henry Boxer gallery under Ian Scott and Kilmorack gallery and Ian C Scott online gallery
Unlike many contemporary video "arts" this one was beautifully existential.The soundtrach is a "Wavelength" The camera zoom's into a Wave (photograph) and the length is the length of the film footage to arrive. I dislike most idiotic video art but this film had a transformational impact on me when I saw it aged 17.\
Thanks very much for posting this. This is an important moment in video/cinema/moving pictures history. Experimental art never gets old. It is still modern.
I second that. I hate it how people think this is such a sophisticated piece of art just because it's conceptual or experimental. This film probably doesn't mean shit other than what people say or BS about it. HELL! I think the artist himself is the ONLY person who truly understands what this shit is about (DUH! He made this film!).
I would recommend that fabulous film, The Rebel starring Tony Hancock and one of his half-hour radio programmes, the one called the Poetry Society.....the antidote to this sort of thing..
No - the photo, of the sea, can be found on the cover of Steve Reich's stunning 1970 LP Four Organs, and a euphoric letter from Reich to Snow regarding Wavelength is included in 'Digital Snow' an interactive DVD collection of 50 years of work by Snow - who is a 72 year old Canadian film-maker, musician, writer, photographer, painter, sculptor and sound poet.
OHMYGOD!!!! Ive seen the whole thing and the annoying sound is the exact same it doesnt make a difference being that this is a crappy copy. I wanted my 45 min back. the only reason i sat through the whole thing was because it was for a lecture and technically i was paying for it.
This is from the era of hypnogogic films. YOu really need to be in a quiet theater, with the whole thing playing. Way better than drugs. It turns your mind into itself. At least it did mine
Personally I'm a big movie fan and a fan of art in general but I believe that all the copys of Wavelength should be shiped directly to the Sun's core.
Michael Snow on Wavelength - "I wanted to make a summation of my nervous system, religious inklings and aesthetic ideas. I was thinking of planning for a time monument in which beauty and sadness of equivalence would be celebrated, thinking of trying to make a definitive statement of pure Film space and time, a balance of 'Unison' and 'Fact', all about seeing. " - From 'Film Is: The International Free Cinema' by Stephen Dwoskin)
This is only a portion of the 45 minute film. I won't rate it or criticize it, for it's easy to take a portion out of it's over all context. I've been waiting to see it for a long time and I still would like to, in it's entirety.
I remember my film professor showing this and prefacing the screening with the remark, "People who see this tend to have one of three responses. Either they fall asleep, or they want to throw the projector out the window, or they have a transcendent experience." Fortunately I had a transcendent experience and this film remains a favorite. As others have said, this is only a snippet of the whole 45 minute film, and it's meant to be seen in a theater, not as a 3rd-generation-copy YouTube clip.
cinemasailor 1 week ago
My brain just got fucked.
kimoxxx 1 month ago
Comment removed
countingmx 2 months ago
Comment removed
FNsMadman 2 months ago
Comment removed
countingmx 2 months ago
Comment removed
FNsMadman 2 months ago
it is just about the experience, you know you're in a room, and while watching the video you are still in a room, and that it is moving slowly in. It's that feeling of just watching something and waiting for a moment to happen, and that moment is just moving slowly across the room.
michelle410 3 months ago
I think this is a VERY good idea for an experimental arthouse film, how the sound increases in pitch as you move slowly towards the wall... like the space around you is becoming claustrophobic... but freakin 45 minutes? What?
fubsie2 3 months ago
tinnitus as fuck
PinkFloydrulez 4 months ago
45 MINUTES OF SHIT
Sonofkong0 4 months ago
In desperate need of a remake.
MrRazorblade999 4 months ago
this video actually goes on for 45 min. LOL. Anyways.. its supposed to constitute viewer and object.
ashton1988 4 months ago
I don't get it.
Satituite 5 months ago
Michael Snow is Michael Bay's clinically depressed cousin
Kveli100 5 months ago
I played Hot Cross Buns by hitting 654 654 44445555 654
brandon91616 6 months ago 2
Remember, this is considered art.
According to snobs, forcing 6 year old children to watch this will inspire them to become artists. Those same people say attending Art Prize in Grand Rapids Michigan is actually bad for young children.
garrickgreathouse 7 months ago
The illusion of deep space? No. Its a wall and bad sound.
der00b 7 months ago
you can play a song with pressing 1 - 9
blabliblublablo 8 months ago 3
My god this video made my ears hurt...and as soon as it ended relief. Great sound work but I would have liked a different visual narative. But still a great film...thanks Video Vortex for showing me this.
SABRENOSE 8 months ago
oh really such a joy ! I don´t know why...
36TransMohn 9 months ago
I feel like I've been Rick Roll'd
iroddable 10 months ago
@iroddable I would WELCOME a Rick Roll in place of this.
vondizmo 5 months ago
I can't wait for the Micheal Bay remake!
breenfantwo 10 months ago 7
I understand that some art isn't for everyone...but I mean come on...what is this?? sometimes I think artists/filmakers try too hard to appear deep, mysterious, and eccentric...
Pualdanger 11 months ago 2
this is the best experimental film that ever made all over the world.. this is the BESTEST film forever..
MrPoliteknikPerlis 11 months ago
This proves that art is purely opinionated, I personally cant stand the phrase "Avant Garde" And I believe the actual full movie is 45 minutes long and i don't know how anyone can sit through that but some people love it and i can't argue with that
NrthEastOHsk8 1 year ago
I don't get it?
How is this even a good underground movie?
power2go3 1 year ago
FUCKING EPIC
brakaki 1 year ago 4
I was turned onto the power of art when I saw this aged 17 in Film school
SIEBEGORMEN 1 year ago
@SIEBEGORMEN may i ask HOW this turned u on to art????? im so confused!!!
apple0zebra 1 year ago
watched this on 16 mm or 11mm film it was much better there was no sound and a lot more time was on more on the wave photo / photos
or is this just me
photographic quality is impt as it disappoints somewhat here
i was looking for the window frame measurement film tho - us 60's avante garde / possibly uk
and the watering the garden one - uk avante garde
i'd forgotten about this one totally
darrenevanscanada 1 year ago
I can't wait for the game to come out on the Wii
WimGrundy 1 year ago 4
Man, looks like film classes are ruining a lot of people's lives.... XD I didn't know they showed THIS kind of stuff..... Forcing a bunch of people to watch the whole of a film like this is probably the best way to make them hate avant-garde cinema for the rest of their lives..... Shit like this should be discovered individually, and then shared with a bunch of like-minded people.... I think this is the spirit of it... Not academically taught in a school by people who don't really understand it
Thrash0Jazz0Assassin 1 year ago
@Thrash0Jazz0Assassin If this was the only thing they showed it might be bad, but in my film school this was one of dozens of unique films I watched. I think they're just trying to open people up to the idea that a film can be a lot of different things.
Bucklechow 1 year ago
will that kettle ever boil!!!
tailendcharlie 1 year ago 3
Watching this in film class was the worst 45 mins of my life...........
phoenixnell 1 year ago
@phoenixnell amen brotha
apple0zebra 1 year ago
what a weird piece of shit
jmmadridondo 1 year ago
Spoiler Warning:Nothing Happens.
bealtespip123 1 year ago
I think some of the cinephiles here are confusing emotional depth with great film. Sterile it may be, but its purposeful reduction of film to a slow zoom implicates the nature of the camera to alter perception. Zooming is an essential filmic tool that is used as often as it is naturalized into neglect. By amplifying this single feature he negotiates a disorientation between what the camera sees and what a viewer thinks he sees in his mind's eye.
Vigilantekram 1 year ago 2
@Vigilantekram Any sort of narrative, theme, or any other extraneous filmic device like cutting would only dilute the purpose many here don't take time to meet half way. Users championing ignorance and lazy consumption is kinda dissapointing. This ain't even the whole film.
Vigilantekram 1 year ago
Comment removed
Vigilantekram 1 year ago
W({velength is structured primarily around a single kind of frame mobility-the zoom-in. Its pattern of progression and development is not a narra tive one, but one of exploration, through deliberately limited means, of how the zoom transforms the space of the loft.
chchmiles 1 year ago 3
In film school, we learned of film history, naturally. To my surprise the teacher thought this movie was a, "brilliant piece of artistic cinema." We were then shown a reel of this movie, and I almost shot myself. No matter how deep you dig, there is no deep ambition beneath this pile of bullocks.
awwsadface 1 year ago
AHHH THAT RINGING!
TheCGIMaster 1 year ago
this makes after last season look like fucking schindlers list
boogster123321 1 year ago
I'm all for the art of cinema...but it has to have a point!
Bondoman31 1 year ago
I really like alternative art, and independent movies. but WHAT THE HELL IS THIS?
r3ini 1 year ago
If this film were a race, I'd support it's genocide.
KKSAR 1 year ago 12
@KKSAR sorry but it happens to be interesting for people who study film theory
pasheko152 9 months ago
OHHHH NNNOOOOOOOOO.......NOOOOOOTTTTTT WWWWWAAAAAAVVVVVEEEEEELLLLLLLEEEEENNNNNGGGGGTTTTTTHHHHHH!!!!!
bigfilmhat 1 year ago
Some commenter on Roger Ebert's blog compared this guy to Stan Brakhage... I'm telling you right now, stop this crap and go check out Brakhage's Lovesong. _There's_ one hell of an emotional piece of filmmaking, even though it's just a bunch of flashing paint scribbles on celluloid.
ixat00 1 year ago
It's a movie that barely moves and rapes your ears more as you waste more time on it. Nice.
looker999997 1 year ago 2
What do you think art is? Is art intended to entertain? It art expressive? Is art educating? Is art contemplative? Is art intended to evoke emotion? What emotion does this movie evoke? Boredom. What does this movie contemplate? Not very much. Was this deliberate? Is there anyone on earth who would feel their lives were helped in some way by the viewing of this movie?
Maybe.
LoveSpaceCraft 1 year ago
Anyone who calls this piece of shit a masterpiece is a fucking idiot! You might as well call '9 Songs' or 'After Last Season' a masterpiece.
squidlad 1 year ago
WTF?
ShadowPetal 1 year ago
what is the point of this, is this a movie? well technically it is. yes its a series of pictures moving but why should people even know about this? enough stuff pisses people off. The fact is that people will view this in any context and over analyze the movie and think its spectacular, and you know what happens when you over analyze something, you drift away from reality, and the reality is this is the worst.
Lemke68 1 year ago
9:55 is fine. it's a summary.
45 minutes is a waste of time.
Yes the original version is 45 minutes....
colinrac 1 year ago
Thanks for posting this! Tonight we were going to watch this film in my "cinema aesthetics" class but now that I saw 1 min of it + all your comments, i Just won't go to my class lol, screw this
kantil17 1 year ago
I would not call this horrible. I would say it is frustrating, aggravating, challenging, like all art. We get locked in this idea that art has to be something specific, and when it does not conform, we rebel. It's like the sports fan whose team wins the game, yet he is too busy bitching about the opportunities to make more points.
sobergaijin 1 year ago
ISN'T IT INTERESTING HOW ART CAN MAKE YOU ANGRY AND REPULSED FOR YOU NOT UNDERSTANDING THE MEANING? HOW IT CAN ENRAGE YOU FOR MAKING YOU FEEL STUPID? BUT WAIT, YOU'RE NOT STUPID, RIGHT? YOU'RE SMART, YOU SO BELIEVE YOU ARE SMART? AND IF YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND SOMETHING, THAT IS STUPID, NOT YOU. NEVER EVER YOU. RIGHT? WE DON'T EVER WANT TO LIVE LIFE THINKING WE CAN'T UNDERSTAND. WELL, WHAT IF YOU ACCEPT YOUR LACK OF UNDERSTANDING. Well, then that's a start. that's a fucking start. :))))))))))))
dhan000 1 year ago 3
nothing happens
DarthDoolan 2 years ago 6
I love Michael Snow! Check out the LUX Collection for more of Snow's work.
luxmovingimage 2 years ago
I went to see this at the OAG in 76'ish, walked out at the 20 minute mark. That's 20 mins of my life I will never get back. Michael Snow has snowed Canada into believing he is some great artist. This, and any other work I've seen of his is total crap.
RollEmProductions 2 years ago 3
Absolute rubbish. I cannot believe this is seen as the best my country has to offer.
EverythingTobacco 2 years ago 4
Can you imagine sitting through the whole thing, drowsy and sleepy, and being rewarded with a loud-ass screamer?
looker999997 2 years ago 4
If you want the whole thing go to the wikipedia page and it will be at the bottom. Beware it's 45 minutes
thevgman 2 years ago
WOOw that was soo intense!!
wezkert 2 years ago
god that was horrible
fortylicks108 2 years ago
This has been flagged as spam show
Michael Snow is my great uncle, how cool is that?
anyways, this piece sucks... I guess I don't get art in genereal
jaguar8311 2 years ago
It's about a covert project. They could alter wavelengths on a chair & send their subjects through different space and time. Apparently, consciousness also affects where you'd arrive at.
sethchong 2 years ago
i can appreciate its new and different, but its annoying as shit, and it actually makes me angry just listening to it.
Rubberbandprods 2 years ago
I'm guessing the reason for the whistling is because it's been massively sped up?
RawPower 2 years ago
They're doing a reboot of this movie in 3D next year.
allnaturalhemp 2 years ago 32
@allnaturalhemp I heard that chuck norris its gona be the protagonist in the reboot as the wall.
Sedlan18 1 week ago
what an annoying piece of shit. no matter if it's art house or whatever it's boring AND annoying at the same time with this bitchy BEEEEP-sound in the background. can'T stand it.
jruwing87 2 years ago
This is a great film if you're stoned, as a lot of us were in '67.
traderjoe777 2 years ago
This is an experimental film. There is nothing to really understand except that the maker of this piece was trying to do something or learn something that he thought he could learn the answer to by creating this piece.
JohnPhoxx 2 years ago
I'm going to admit that I don't get it. I don't understand but I'm not repulsed, rather intrigued. Can someone help me to understand this better? I know this is only a segment of it and from the looks of it it's someone playing with the concept of perception and depth and time and space but that's really all I understand. Is it that the film defies all conventions of cinema norms and does what it wants without a narrative or purpose to experiment? Can someone help me to understand this more?
Dankore 2 years ago
Uhhh..... Can't really explain it myself. No problem with that at all. However,most art snobs would probably see people who don't understand it as ignorant which is actually pathetic of them to assume. The art world(in my opinion) goes like this:Either pretend you know what you're talking about or just admit you don't. = / I've met some people like that and they're.....pretty much assholes. Ha ha ha.
bealtespip123 2 years ago
Michael snow is a Great idiot!
limokontore 2 years ago
You people are IDIOTS. This film has a deep meaning! Ha ha. I'm just kidding. This is pointless.
bealtespip123 2 years ago 4
this freaks me out for some reason
TheCGIMaster 2 years ago
i actually found myself clicking randomly in the timeline to make little songs out of that whistling noise. Awesome film.
BinaryReader 2 years ago 2
It's tripe, but they get credit for trying I guess
3investigators 2 years ago
the most fun i had with this vid is playing with the time slider to make a song
tyedietundra 2 years ago
I got "mary had a little lamb" pretty easily
meltingpenguin 2 years ago 4
LOL as did i.
hueythebutt 2 years ago
If you watch the whole thing it is brilliant. It's about the way we see things. It questions our perception of depth versus flatness by ending with the zoom on the photograph, flat picture that is really no different than the flat movie, tv or computer screen we watch.
I understand it isn't a narrative piece so some people won't like it but why the hostility? This is a certain kind of film and it is easy to avoid. If you hate "art" don't watch it.
michaelspence3 2 years ago
Ive done my Homework. Ive watched a lot of arthouse films and I'm what some might concider to be an artist,but honestly 45 min or so of this just had no profound effect on me or gave me the feeling something was achieved...if I had done the same now People would laugh. I understand the time period , but I cant beleive this was acclaimed. In my opinion this was just not worth anything. People can insult me, but thats my opinion.
darthneji1992 2 years ago 5
You make something stupid like this, and act pertinacious enough, and have the right friends in the art world, then no one will want to admit hey "don't get it" so everyone will say it's great.
Even the ideas people say are profound about it depth vs flat and all that, are just really stupid an painfully obvious, Yes, TV's are flat, what genius!
Also the sound is just annoying. If i wanted to hear a tea kettle go off i'd put one on the stove. At least then I'd get some tea out of the deal.
meltingpenguin 2 years ago
i think you are free to your opinion :)
BinaryReader 2 years ago
hey i agree with you i mean during that time the counterculture was just so strong that anything straying from the norm would be considered a masterpiece but i just think its taking it to far by making it 45 minuts long and i dont see how people can stand that high pitch wail my god its like having your brain pulled out of your ears! La region central is kinda cool too.
BATTLEDROID678 2 years ago 3
Oh God,I know what you mean,man. Just slap some penis' on a canvas and BOOM! You got yourself a masterpiece.
bealtespip123 2 years ago
well in layman's terms yes.
BATTLEDROID678 2 years ago
I can't stand the whistle though. Feels like it's fucking my ears.
bealtespip123 2 years ago
so your saying you would rather watch 45 minutes of a zoom in shot on a picture of the sea then hear this high pitch wail.
BATTLEDROID678 2 years ago 3
Mhmhm..... Yeah,the sea sounds pretty pleasant right about now. = ]
bealtespip123 2 years ago
The reason everyone says, "Art is something I cannot do," is because they are not artists.
I am an artist and therefore I say, "Art is something I *can* do," which includes zooming into a photograph, eating lunch, having sex, or anything I choose.
zgold 2 years ago
FAIL - this is conceptual art. if you take it out of the philosophical conversational context and only dwell on a superficial level. then yes you could make this film. can you move an "art" forward cognitively? then good for you.
ginsushark 2 years ago
My first rule for defining art:
Art should be something that I can't do.
Fail.
wrdshmn 2 years ago
So I'm curious, is there conceptual justification for this? Because I don't see much value in structuralism that has no revelation of narrative, linguistic, aesthetic, performance or technical ideas.
TedGoranson69 2 years ago
This isn't art. This is crap.
I could watch Salad Fingers and be more artistically inclined and inspired by it more so than this peice of no budget garbage!
This so reminds me of Ed Wood. You know, instead of giving Ed Wood the title of being the worst "Director of all time", they should have given it to Michael Snow, that would have been far more approperiate.
Wavelength, art to the mentally impared.
PsychopathUltimate 2 years ago
There's a ad at the top right "Anime on youtube!"
WTF does Wavelength have to do with anime?
PsychopathUltimate 2 years ago
..its just an add...
darthneji1992 2 years ago
I'm curious. What is this?
TheArachnoid 2 years ago 2
The girl in the beggining looks like an alien! LOL
DanielTheWalrus 2 years ago
This isn't the full film. If I recall correctly it's actually close to a half hour long. Art films like this aren't meant to be enjoyed or even understood by people who aren't in the know. This one in particular is a big fuck you to every convention used by popular narrative cinema. If you say it sucks you betray your own ingorance.
allanmacauley 2 years ago
The film is actually over 40 minutes long.
effzehn 2 years ago
Ive seen worse films than this, this actually if you give it time pretty cool. Ive seen a movie where its just static in a grey box for 45 min, its called untitled film and it was at sundance
austin9687 2 years ago
realmente es impactante... pero debe sentirse la experiencia durante todos los minutos que dura esta pieza y en pantalla cinematográfica para alcanzar a percibir las sensaciones y notar la evolución de la misma. Algo increíble y muy nutritivo!!!! gracias por subirlo
CineVeracruzano 2 years ago
I first read about this movie in the book 'Science Fiction Films' by Films & Filming writer Philip Strick. I thought it was rather odd he referred to it as 'science fiction'.
Bizarronumber4 2 years ago
This comment has received too many negative votes show
How was this considered an art film? Hell even I've done better than this!
And that's saying alot.
PsychopathUltimate 3 years ago
this was no random assembly of footage/sound. there is a thought behind it, its just hard to grasp.
atomicsoda 3 years ago
Yes because aiming the camera at a picture with incessant pitching effects for half an hour is art.
You know why this had so much acclaim? Because they fucked with the camera. They somehow made the camera sensitive to light and the more often it's exposed to it the higher the pitch.
It's so beautifull.... Isn't it?
NO, this is the most fugly and irratating nuesance I've ever heard.
PsychopathUltimate 2 years ago
It´s really, this fucking idiot sucks.
Last thrusday i was in a film presentation from this man in berlin. I couldn't stand up in front of the screen more than 5 minuts. My surprise was that in the room there were almost 100 people looking at that and trying to convince themselves that a fucking man doing strange noises with a microphone and another one playing really horrible the saxofon worhts the word art.what's happening with modern art? are we crazy? rollerthrower!
terejudit 3 years ago
*Poop*
*Smear*
Ladies song de track long day!
*Smash*
Down my in I home pocket,
tin day run Gwine!!
*Smash* *Smash*
All to day my de nag!
*Smash*
Medianightmare 3 years ago
I could poop in my hands, smear it all over my face, then headbutt my grandmothers dead body for twenty minutes while singing every third word from Camptown Races and somebody would call it art.
Medianightmare 3 years ago
No they wouldn't. The difference is that this is firmly rooted in the history of art and film art and your suggestion is firmly rooted in immature vulgur behavior.
alaire1 2 years ago
Yes they would. Have you heard of the Dadaists?
chimpiki 2 years ago 3
I agree with co907.. This clip doesn't show the film in the way it is supposed to be experienced. I don't know if anyone has talked about this yet, but the sound in the film is linked to the different filters or "wavelengths" of light seen on camera. My class was lucky enough to watch the original film and although I got a massive headache from it, I found it to be an enlightening experience. In part due to the structuralist concept of the film the other was the group phenomenological experience
Missdameanor 3 years ago 4
you have not seen this film unless you have seen it on print. it's really fantastic.
co907 3 years ago
He's not the Messiah, he's a very naughty boy.
halidefox 3 years ago 2
This just annoys me of how a group of comideans who went totaly against the norms of current comedy are now endlessly quoted out of context and at times when its really not appropriate.
jpeg1991 3 years ago
high frecuency = disturbing mind
deepriko 3 years ago
Please someone explain to me why this is good. I don't want to criticise it without understanding it. Please tell me why it's so good as I can't see it. I mean I've watched the whole thing in another video and at best it's very slightly vaugely interesting but how is it a work of art? Is it just my ignorance? please someone tell me.
JamieBarnes11 3 years ago
Basically (and I don't necessarily think it's good, as in enjoyable, more "good" as in a great concept), the reason why it's so important is because it's a very interesting critique of conventional narrative cinema. It plays with the materiality of film (as in, the aperture, the mood created by the room, the different effects you can create with filters) and does a lot more with this space than could ever be done by a conventional film
aideenj 3 years ago
so the full potential of film is explored. Also the film doesn't have a meaning, it's purely about the range of responses it can create in an audience, from boredom, to interest in the visuals, to anger, to tension (esp. during this last part with the buttock-clenching sounds), and it sets up what we expect to be narrative to then completely ignore it and focus on the space of the room
aideenj 3 years ago
Thanks that actually helps. Although I thought it was pretty boring to watch it was very atmospheric and does do a lot with pretty much nothing happening at the same time. So I do have a certain level of respect for it.
JamieBarnes11 3 years ago
That was absolutely horrible, I got a grasp on film history I took some classes in school and this is like the worst piece of shit ever made. I feel confused and sad after watching that. Whoever says this is art is full of shit.
Derek0000001 3 years ago
how can people say this is good.ANYONE can make a movie like this.
S0l0Assassin 3 years ago
This is one of the great "structural films" of experimental cinema. Learn your film history or go home
Synthetrix 3 years ago
oh give me a break!Any idiot can make something like this.Everyone just wants to act like they know something about how movies are made so they call this "movie" a work of art.There is not one thing good about this movie and its a shame people love it......Look the grass in the back yard is growing.Let me go and film this work of "art".
S0l0Assassin 3 years ago
Wavelength is often listed as one of the greatest underground films and art house films ever made. It was named #85 in the 2001 Village Voice critics' list of the 100 Greatest Films of All Time. The film has been designated and preserved as a "masterwork" by the Audio-Visual Preservation Trust of Canada. In 2004, the film was named one of Canada's all time greatest film by the Toronto International Film Festival. The film won the Grand Prix at the 1967 Knokke Experimental Film Festival.
Synthetrix 3 years ago
NOBODY CARES!!!!
PsychopathUltimate 2 years ago
yea, as an artist, i can officially say this is a piece of shit movie.
BatOtaku13 3 years ago
you draw anime. that's no more art than this. at least michael snow didn't imitate anyone. just because you don't like it doensn't mean it's "a piece of shit movie."
slavagrigoryan 3 years ago
yea, you have a point. i just fail to see the point at all, its just a room with a barely tollerable noise the entire time. oh well.
BatOtaku13 3 years ago
Thank you for comparing somthing that actually require's skill and talent to that of simply zooming in on a picture.
Remember kiddies, it's not art, if anyone can do it.
PsychopathUltimate 2 years ago
Please, recreate this. I would love to see your efforts. Use film and editing equipment and recreate this. Make music and recreate this. Mind you, this is only a fraction of the film. But please, try to recreate this; people would like to see it.
freddyquench 2 years ago
Bad copy. And I wish it were the full movie. Seems pointless to only post a segment.
CptnHowdy2 3 years ago
are you puposely going be yond human hearing DONT HURT TRYING To PROVE POINT
michaellovesthecat 3 years ago
This has been flagged as spam show
THIS FUCKING SUCKS BALLS
dandragonfuzel 3 years ago
masterpiece!
magnetmus 3 years ago
This production its so rear, i don´t liked much, but is this great idea. But, no disliked. El Cine estructural o Cine experimental this present in every world. o wherever thas say. XD
LoboVinotinto 3 years ago
simply push "time & space" to an ultimate
exploring level
23891050 3 years ago
A pleasure keyfimation although I see the point of the attackers as the marority of video "art" is excreble.There are a few great examples this one and another called "Between" by David Hall and a collaborator whose name I've forgotten also had a profound effect/
You canse my paintings by typing in Ian Charles Scott also in Henry Boxer gallery under Ian Scott and Kilmorack gallery and Ian C Scott online gallery
Yours Sincerely Ian
SIEBEGORMEN 3 years ago
Unlike many contemporary video "arts" this one was beautifully existential.The soundtrach is a "Wavelength" The camera zoom's into a Wave (photograph) and the length is the length of the film footage to arrive. I dislike most idiotic video art but this film had a transformational impact on me when I saw it aged 17.\
Ps I am a figurative artist!
SIEBEGORMEN 3 years ago
wow thanks for explaining it! i love this film!
KeyFilmation 3 years ago
Does anyone have access to the short "So Is This" by Michael Snow. It would be great if someone could post it.
jtblaker 3 years ago
I don't think one should label the entire film "shit," without seeing this small portion within the context of the whole.
TrentBrad 3 years ago 4
haha, come on now.
SirGrotius 3 years ago
Thanks very much for posting this. This is an important moment in video/cinema/moving pictures history. Experimental art never gets old. It is still modern.
doctorfrost 4 years ago
Where is the rest of it?! Please post it!
lemonbade 4 years ago
What a complete pile of horse shit.
austintowers75 4 years ago
I second that. I hate it how people think this is such a sophisticated piece of art just because it's conceptual or experimental. This film probably doesn't mean shit other than what people say or BS about it. HELL! I think the artist himself is the ONLY person who truly understands what this shit is about (DUH! He made this film!).
luckyme429 3 years ago
oh my goodness.
I am actually going to base a project on this.
Help me.
RobotsCanNotRead 4 years ago
Oh wow...good luck with that...I was sooooo thankful I didn't have to do a paper or a project when I watched this piece of crap...
luckyme429 3 years ago
I would recommend that fabulous film, The Rebel starring Tony Hancock and one of his half-hour radio programmes, the one called the Poetry Society.....the antidote to this sort of thing..
priapus56 4 years ago
is the picture on the wall a sunset?
boogiebuddy01 4 years ago
No - the photo, of the sea, can be found on the cover of Steve Reich's stunning 1970 LP Four Organs, and a euphoric letter from Reich to Snow regarding Wavelength is included in 'Digital Snow' an interactive DVD collection of 50 years of work by Snow - who is a 72 year old Canadian film-maker, musician, writer, photographer, painter, sculptor and sound poet.
helenorbridget 4 years ago
OHMYGOD!!!! Ive seen the whole thing and the annoying sound is the exact same it doesnt make a difference being that this is a crappy copy. I wanted my 45 min back. the only reason i sat through the whole thing was because it was for a lecture and technically i was paying for it.
omgthisisBS 4 years ago
very edgy. kind of like a psychedelic migraine lol.
desertshore 4 years ago
This is from the era of hypnogogic films. YOu really need to be in a quiet theater, with the whole thing playing. Way better than drugs. It turns your mind into itself. At least it did mine
the13thwarrior 4 years ago
Personally I'm a big movie fan and a fan of art in general but I believe that all the copys of Wavelength should be shiped directly to the Sun's core.
treykincade 4 years ago
I can't for the life of me understand what's going on here, but I find it absolutely hypnotic. . .
pezbuddha 4 years ago
Michael Snow is a great director. This film is a bit boring but very sensitive.
realistkarizma 4 years ago
Michael Snow on Wavelength - "I wanted to make a summation of my nervous system, religious inklings and aesthetic ideas. I was thinking of planning for a time monument in which beauty and sadness of equivalence would be celebrated, thinking of trying to make a definitive statement of pure Film space and time, a balance of 'Unison' and 'Fact', all about seeing. " - From 'Film Is: The International Free Cinema' by Stephen Dwoskin)
lemmingsalad 5 years ago
WOW!!! Michael Snow is soooo FULL OF SHIT!!!!
luckyme429 3 years ago
(high fives)
BatOtaku13 3 years ago
A "Thank you" from here. bad quality and only a part, so what? u can get some impressions of the film.
Do you also have "la region central"?
Rotanimret4ever 5 years ago
This is the end of the film, poor quality (the sound is less annoying when it's not garbled by bad VHS tape). Useless.
godard7 5 years ago
Bad VHS tape?? I think the VHS quality adds aesthetic. See my films "Detriment" and "8 9 10 123A" to see what I mean!
KeyFilmation 3 years ago
It's hard to judge such a low quality excerpt right enough, but honestly this sounded much more interesting than it looks.
LobsterHarmonica 5 years ago
This is only a portion of the 45 minute film. I won't rate it or criticize it, for it's easy to take a portion out of it's over all context. I've been waiting to see it for a long time and I still would like to, in it's entirety.
JonnyVelveTV 5 years ago
Terrible quality but a worty effort. Wavelength is a brilliant piece of film art. I wish it were more widely available.
dietzanator 5 years ago