Fireworks

'Fireworks' is a violent and disturbing manifesto, a short experimental dream-movie that throws in a couple of images that are real eye-openers, and enough homoerotic weirdness to keep those eyes open. What it 'means' of course is anyone's guess. Anger 'awakes' from troubled sleep, and wanders out to get a light for his cigarette, finding instead only torture at the hands of a bunch of muscle-bound sailors. The title refers, at least superficially, to a particularly jaw-dropping episode of sexual imagery, though as with much of what goes on in the film, there are probably any number of magical and sexual allusions that are tied in with it. Beyond a handful of frames that are burned into my memory, quite possibly until the end of time, I'm not sure what there is to take away from the film when you leave- possibly it has something to say about the all-consuming power of violence, but really that's just a shot in the dark. But of course one could argue that a handful of jaw-dropping frames is enough to justify any film. The fingers- in- nostrils scene is a real wow...

This film is one of the seminal works of underground cinema and hugely influential on what was to follow - including Jean Genet's 'Un Chant d'Amour' - hallucinatory, surreal. Sheer unalloyed genius. Beautifully luminous black-and-white photography and razor-sharp editing. Made when Anger was a mere twenty years old (he claimed seventeen ... those three years make all the difference), and shot for a few dollars on the family 16mm camera, it remains one of the founding texts of the underground, looking back to Eisenstein's montage theories and forward to the explosion in avant-garde film-making in the '50s and '60s. The greatest living film-maker.

Anger's first film was made over the course of a weekend at his family home. His parents were away. He was Seventeen.

The film is a short and immensely effective exploration of sexuality. That the fantasies are of homosexual leaning bears no relevance; it is merely the chosen vehicle for the subject.

The film is fascinated with the violence of sexual submission as well as the fear of it. The narrative seems to take the form of a dream sequence and is laced with astonishingly mature sarcasm and gentle wit. It is by far Anger's greatest film and a landmark of the American avant-garde.

A young man with a restless libido steps out of a fantasy world into real-life encounters that are both mercilessly brutal and profoundly liberating. Not for film school students to pick apart in class; they'll never understand it that way. This is a shudderingly intimate film that can only be grasped on an instinctual, visceral level. It is essential to be more than a mere voyeur, to empathize with the film's protagonist (a young Anger himself), and enter with him into his very personal homosexual twilight-world of fantasy. An unflinching and daringly honest examination of Anger's own take on the homoerotic myth associated with sailors, which is both surrealistic a la Luis Bunuel & Salvador Dali's Un Chien Andalou, and exquisitely ethereal, evoking one of Anger's early cinematic heroes, Jean Cocteau (compare this film to the far more subliminal Blood of a Poet for fascinating parallels). It also owes more than a passing nod in the direction of the great Jean Genet. YES it poetically glorifies homosexual violence; it does this in a way which is far less graphic than contemporary films, and if anyone is offended by this "violence" I might venture to suggest that their reaction has more to do with their discomfort with their own darker sexual fantasies, as this film has the power to touch, even open, this very private, very special place in the viewer's soul. It also surprises me, how frequently the humorous elements of the film seem to escape many reviewers.

As the film is now over 50 years old, it does help to recall its historical context: when it was made, almost all gays and lesbians led fiercely closeted lives, and cowered in terror of "entrapment" (a common device employed by police to bust human beings for the "crime" of same-sex acts). For such a film to explode out of this repressive social context makes it "fireworks" indeed! And it is easy to see why the intelligentsia of the day rightly wanted to lionize the young Anger for this astonishing manifesto that comprises his official cinematic debut. Apparently a powerful scene was later edited out, depicting Anger being humiliated by his tormentors on the floor of the urinal. I wish this scene was still intact; nonetheless, even as it stands, this is one of the most powerful, beautiful, knowing films ever made about fantasy, violence, and eroticism. Amazingly, virtually every film subsequently made by Anger sustains this unique power. Kenneth Anger is truly one of the greatest American artists and filmmakers. Sadly the public focus on his Hollywood Babylon books, his controversial beliefs and life have dwarfed appreciation of his monolithic power as a filmmaker. He has influenced scores of successors and it's time to give this great artist his due.

Fireworks (1947)

*** (out of 4)

Kenneth Anger's earliest surviving film was apparently influenced by him trying to pick up a sailor only to be beaten by the man and his friends. Trying to explain what this film is about would be pointless as I'm sure each viewing could watch it and come away with something different. The basic set-up has a man walking into a "Gents" room where he watches a man flex his muscles and then he tries to pick him up. FIREWORKS is certainly a very weird film as is its history, which included Anger being arrested on obscenity charges. Seeing the film today it's hard to believe that anyone would make too much fuss about it and I'd argue that the homosexuality isn't nearly as on display as the reputation of the film would lead you to believe. For the most part Anger has done a pretty good job in regards to the style and images seen in the film. The surrealist nature is really impressive and I thought several of the images were very nightmarish and they really came across as someone a lot more experienced behind the camera. I'm sure this film isn't going to appeal to everyone but fans of the weird should at least give it a shot.