“The Sacred Art of Tibet”
music (unidentified) gives way to street sounds. (A description of this film at Canyon Cinema iden- tifies the composer as William Moraldo.) Finally, we close on one objective shot of direct “reality,” but everything heretofore has already been ob- jective reality—reminding us of the essential surrealism of vision possible out in the streets. “Adagio” (1981, 8m) uses Albinoni’s music to intercut images of a fountain’s spout with shots of a naked woman standing and posing (even in slow- motion and freeze-frame) and rapidly cut flurries of a naked man frantically running around. You need to freeze him to realize he’s blowing a horn. “In a Summer Garden” (1982, 15m) shows incred- ibly beautiful close-ups of flowers to the strains of a pastoral rhapsody by Delius. “Winter Light” (1983, 9m) uses Vivaldi to give us sweeping pans of a misty, dawny scene of lakes, hills and sheep. The notes say that Jordan brackets these three films together as a film concert.
He also brackets the next three under the col- lective title “Odyssey.” “Waterlight” (1957, 8m) is footage from a merchant marine ship. “Tapestry” (1988, 12m) begins by contrasting rapid, blurry closeups of flowers with stable shots of the sleep- ing naked artist. Is he dreaming of the flowers as the sap rises in himself? And those shots of old
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engravings might also be flitting through his mind. Perhaps the idyllic garden scene outdoors, com- plete with bobtailed black cat and birds bathing and hummingbirds feeding, is dreaming Jordan. The music seems to be a Renaissance piece with voice, drums and hautboys (oboes). The last of the “Odyssey” triptych, “Postcard from San Miguel” (1996, 10m), shows the artist writing lines from Lorca on postcards, interwoven with touristy shots of the colonial-era Mexican town and some enig- matic behavior by his friends, plus music by Fauré. Jordan’s own remarks on this trilogy: “Curi- ously, they are like bookends to my 45-year ca- reer in film. ‘Waterlight’ is one of the first I ever made, when I was a young romantic. ‘Postcard’ is my last film—product of an old romantic; while ‘Tap- estry’ represents the middle of my (domestic) life, a life which I have sometimes documented on film.” Minor complaints: A handful of title cards in French on the first disc don’t offer English subs, and these title cards as well as some marginal in- formation occasionally clue us in that the sides of the image are sometimes overscanned, not as re- duced as they should be. Also, this set doesn’t include all Jordan’s films. This means there’s plenty left for a follow-up collection, which we earnestly hope will happen.
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