Mrs. Peel, We're Needed
Aug. 29th, 2003 03:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
malsperanzaAll these years I thought I was a high-culture whore; now I discover that I am really a pop-culture whore. Damn.
I have succumbed to temptation: I bought a DVD drive for my computer. I thought this was a good compromise because it maintains my home as a TV-free zone and also is not exactly the most comfortable way to watch movies. I thought, in my innocence, that this would prevent me from watching DVDs nonstop to the exclusion of all other human interaction for the rest of my life. Hah. The only thing preventing me from disappearing permanently into the Digital Maw is the fact that the drive seems not to like 1 out of 3 discs, and won't read them.
Started out fine. Started out with Ingmar Bergman, Joseph Losey's Don Giovanni, Berlin Alexanderplatz, other iconic works of high culture. Had every intention of watching lots of performance DVDs of Baroque operas--even got some Handel and Vivaldi discs. And yes, they were all splendid.
But then I had one tiny moment of weakness and bought (bought!) the boxed set of the entire run of "The Avengers (The Emma Peel Years)."
And that was that. Have spent the last two weeks painting in my studio (where the computer lives in the "office" half), while watching Diana Rigg in a leather catsuit with zippers, smacking people around and drinking Champagne. I may never emerge from Mod London again. I like it there. They drive amazing cars there, and wear astonishing clothes, and live in rooms that are painted strange candy colors.
As Rilke says, "A wave rolled toward you out of the distant past..."
Favorite moment so far, from 1967: Steed and Emma rescue a famous economist whose Utopian plan to unify the currencies of Europe "will bring a permanent end to poverty and debt." Aww, isn't that endearing?
The past is a very Futurist place.
I think we have nearly forgotten what pure style is. This show was too implausible to be action-adventure series; nor was it exactly a comedy; it was all about the style: the seamless, synchronized style of the sixties in the last days before all hell broke loose. It's about one relationship--never explicated, never resolved, the best extended example of UST I have ever seen on screen. It's about the rhythm and look of the world, not its substance. And it is wonderful.
We forget, sometimes, that good art (and I don't use the term lightly) can be a matter of favoring style over substance, rather than the other way round. High Style and Wit.
Style without substance always risks being shallow, but when it evades that pitfall, it is unbeatable. Yep
The One Spoon
Someone sent me to this website today:
Pretentious Blither
and I laughed and laughed when I got to the bit about Plato's Cave and the Spoon Itself.
Now there's a movie that relies on high style without substance and falls flat on its bloodysilly face.
Yay: long weekend ahead; much painting in store, also laundry; also, maybe, some work on the Opus Allegro (aiming for high style and wit, yes; poor X). That is, if I can bear to turn off the DVD long enough to open my wordperfect files. On the other hand, there is the boxed set of the complete run of "The Prisoner," which I also bought. My bad.
I have succumbed to temptation: I bought a DVD drive for my computer. I thought this was a good compromise because it maintains my home as a TV-free zone and also is not exactly the most comfortable way to watch movies. I thought, in my innocence, that this would prevent me from watching DVDs nonstop to the exclusion of all other human interaction for the rest of my life. Hah. The only thing preventing me from disappearing permanently into the Digital Maw is the fact that the drive seems not to like 1 out of 3 discs, and won't read them.
Started out fine. Started out with Ingmar Bergman, Joseph Losey's Don Giovanni, Berlin Alexanderplatz, other iconic works of high culture. Had every intention of watching lots of performance DVDs of Baroque operas--even got some Handel and Vivaldi discs. And yes, they were all splendid.
But then I had one tiny moment of weakness and bought (bought!) the boxed set of the entire run of "The Avengers (The Emma Peel Years)."
And that was that. Have spent the last two weeks painting in my studio (where the computer lives in the "office" half), while watching Diana Rigg in a leather catsuit with zippers, smacking people around and drinking Champagne. I may never emerge from Mod London again. I like it there. They drive amazing cars there, and wear astonishing clothes, and live in rooms that are painted strange candy colors.
As Rilke says, "A wave rolled toward you out of the distant past..."
Favorite moment so far, from 1967: Steed and Emma rescue a famous economist whose Utopian plan to unify the currencies of Europe "will bring a permanent end to poverty and debt." Aww, isn't that endearing?
The past is a very Futurist place.
I think we have nearly forgotten what pure style is. This show was too implausible to be action-adventure series; nor was it exactly a comedy; it was all about the style: the seamless, synchronized style of the sixties in the last days before all hell broke loose. It's about one relationship--never explicated, never resolved, the best extended example of UST I have ever seen on screen. It's about the rhythm and look of the world, not its substance. And it is wonderful.
We forget, sometimes, that good art (and I don't use the term lightly) can be a matter of favoring style over substance, rather than the other way round. High Style and Wit.
Style without substance always risks being shallow, but when it evades that pitfall, it is unbeatable. Yep
The One Spoon
Someone sent me to this website today:
Pretentious Blither
and I laughed and laughed when I got to the bit about Plato's Cave and the Spoon Itself.
Now there's a movie that relies on high style without substance and falls flat on its bloodysilly face.
Yay: long weekend ahead; much painting in store, also laundry; also, maybe, some work on the Opus Allegro (aiming for high style and wit, yes; poor X). That is, if I can bear to turn off the DVD long enough to open my wordperfect files. On the other hand, there is the boxed set of the complete run of "The Prisoner," which I also bought. My bad.
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no subject
Date: 2003-08-29 09:24 pm (UTC)I think in some cases style=substance because the style speaks for itself--The Avengers being a great example. It's like...I love David Lynch and I remember some people claimed Twin Peaks was all style. To me, though, it was always so obvious when DL himself was directing because his style was substance while with other directors it really did often feel like they were just doing weird things for no reason. Good David Lynch is like being inside somebody's dream and I think dreams are often more style than substance too. But the style is everything!
I've been thinking I need to watch The Prisoner ever since The Simpsons did that take-off on it. :-)