Maya Deren At Land Pt.1

Deren's second experimental film, At Land (1944), reinforces her interest in the juxtaposition of anachronistic spaces and introduces a critique of social rituals. This film begins by reversing the natural rhythm with images of waves breaking and descending back into the sea. Starring again, Deren is seen climbing up a dead tree trunk on the beach, magically emerging onto a table where a formal dinner party is in progress. This 'civilized' world ignores Deren as she crawls along their dinner table. By depicting herself as invisible to the diners, Deren highlights the myopia of the guests. The dinner sequence in At Land ends with an enchanted chess game. A pawn falls from the table and descends back into the dead wood on the beach, it falls over rocks, into the water and is washed away over the waterfalls. Chasing the pawn, Deren is restored to her original landscape. - Wendy Haslem

Category:

Film & Animation

Tags:

• Experimental
• Deren
• Hammid
• Surreal

[diegosemerene]

I love it how cats flushing the toilets get 5,00000 views on YouTube, but Maya Deren's masterpieces get 578 views!

[splattproductions]

That's true ... we have the attention span of a tennis ball, now.

[Aceticacidplease]

@aairtrafficc I can respect the film editing techniques she pioneered. Absolutely no problem with any of that. I guess I could credit my film class and the readings I was given with trying to force some sort of "story" into it if there isn't one. I don't like forced interpretations because they are subjective and it makes things like this seem... perhaps more pretentious than they were meant to be.

[aairtrafficc]

@Aceticacidplease the key to viewing avant garde films is to not focus on what it "means" or to try to make sense of it - because you will get incredibly frustrated by doing so. You just have to take it all in with a completely open mind without the intention of drawing some sort of conclusion. Also - Maya Deren was completely ahead of her time in regards to film editing - watch it again and pick up on her great editing techniques - it's really amazing!

[cmatthews926]

wow, just watched this with Colin Stetson's "Clothed in the skin of the dead" playing. Pure coincidence, but it worked magically. Gotta love beautiful mistakes.

[taliayu]

Lasiren Labalen, chapeau m tombe dan la mer

[MsThirdphase]

OMG, I haven't seen a Maya Deren film since my film classes 30 years ago. This is what inspired me to want to make movies. Stunning! Does anyone make film as good as this now? Where do I find it?

[lamp5matt]

@Aceticacidplease, just start with the wikipedia article and go as deep as you want. One assumption avate-garde films *don't* make is that there has to be a "conclusive" meaning in (from?) a work of art.

[Pouroushair]

@James1954May Before you talkn about what is a masterpiece or what is not. Look at how many restrictions there are imposed upon films have in Hollywood to the point that Individualism is erased.

[alphonse639]

Check out Lucid Who in the video response. Made it years ago but recently recut it. Was strongly influenced by this film and meshes of the afternoon. Enjoy!