Mauricio Kagel (b. 1931)
Films 1965-1983
Whether in the classical music hall, the theatrical stage or film/video, Kagel’s neo-dada performances and wickedly original techniques always opens one’s eyes and ears to the pure possibilities of sounds and their production. Although this aspect of his varied productions is little known in the US, Kagel’s output as a filmmaker is tremendous. He just about made a film or video each year in the 60s and 70s, and has only begun to slow down in recent times. Films include “Antithese” (1965), “Match” (1966), “Solo” (1967), “Duo” (1967-68), “Hallelujah” (1969), “Ludwig Van” (1969), “Blue’s Blue” (1981) and “MM51/Nosferatu” (1983). You can also listen to Kagel’s music here.
Direct Download from UbuWeb
(right-click and save as on the film-title)
Antithese
234.8 mb (avi)
1965, 19 minutes
16mm
ANTITHESE is an awe inspiring bit of comic paranoia concerning the duties of a studio engineer and his psychic meltdown.
Match
177.6 mb (avi)
1966, 27 minutes
16mm
MATCH stars new music stars Siegfried Palm and Christoph Caskel as instrumentalists at odds with one another.
Solo
334.5 mb (avi)
1967, 26 minutes
video
Duo
502.6 mb (avi)
1967-68, 41 minutes
video
DUO and SOLO are psycho-dramas of musicians, and audiences worst nightmares, a series of absurd scenarios, electric guitar solos on the subway, mannequins hogging bathroom stalls and conductors lost in a melting environment of absolute resistance.
Hallelujah
528.1 mb (avi)
1969, 47 minutes
16mm
HALLELUJAH is one of Kagel’s major works, a surreal story about the mouth and it’s many permutations. Hands, eyes, lips, tongues, etc are in quite a quandary without means of escape.
Ludwig Van (incomplete)
457.4 mb (avi)
1969, 36 minutes (full version is 100 minutes)
16mm
Kagel’s major film work. An epic meditation on deafness, loudness, musical wallpaper, costumes, and of course Beethoven. With a cast of hundreds including Joeph Beuys, Dieter Roth, Rober Filliou and many, many permutations of the titular star.
Blue’s Blue
129.5 mb (avi)
1981, 32 minutes
video
BLUE’S BLUE stars Kagel as a couch potato living in a small dark room with three other musicians who attempt to channel the muse of the titular bluesman, in a desperate attempt to rouse themselves from their malaise.
MM51/Nosferatu
349 mb (avi)
1983, 10′ 00″
video
MM51 does more than mark time, it mics it. Film within film as Murnau’s silent “Nosferatu” leads an accompanist by the hand, and whose feet are quite literally tied to time. A tug of war between the vertical and the horizontal.
——-
Mauricio Kagel is wonderfully hard to pigeonhole. An Argentinian resident of Germany, one might say Kagel’s dramatic and often humorous music is both rooted in and rooting against the European classical tradition. His wildly inventive scores call for a high degree of theatricality and physical interaction, continuously making us aware of the codes of performing. Whether in the classical music hall, the theatrical stage or film/video, Kagel’s neo-dada performances and wickedly original techniques always opens one’s eyes and ears to the pure possibilities of sounds and their production. Although this aspect of his varied productions is little known in the US, Kagel’s output as a filmmaker is tremendous. He just about made a film or video each year in the 60s and 70s, and has only begun to slow down in recent times. A lot of these movies were originally produced for the small screen, but this has in no way dulled the expansiveness and surreal qualities of his vision. Kagel’s films are rarely, if ever, screened outside of Europe, so series may well be the largest sampling of his films in North America to date.
– Film Anthology Archive
Rare films by the Austrian-based experimental composer. Kagel’s early films (1965-68) are influenced by the French and German avant garde of the 1920s: from Rene Clair’s “Entr’acte,” Bunuel’s “Un Chien Andalou” and “L’Age d’or,” Hans Richter’s “Vormittagsspuk” and abstract films, as well as from E.S. Porter’s “The Great Train Robbery” (1903). Kagel’s films are rebelliously “educated” happenings. Like Eric Satie, their director believes he must deny education although he cannot live and work without it…
– Astrid Suparak
Thanks!! to fitz and Cinemagrotesque for making these available.
Astrid! We have more in common than I realized! I’m perusing an online source for movies from one of my favorite composers & moviemakers when Lo & Behold! it’s YOU who’ve written the notes! I’ll be KLANGed! Farbenmelodied! I was trying to convince the Warhol Museum to do a retrospective of Kagel’s films while Kagel was still alive. Alas, my suggestion fell on deaf ears, as usual - that’s what I get for talking to a bldg!
Comment by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE — put November 11, 2009 @ 9:57 pm