from: http://www.flashback.net/~cva/angerinteng.html Click Here: <A HREF="http://www.flashback.net/~cva/angerinteng.html">Kenneth Anger interview</A> ----- A conversation with Kenneth Anger. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The following interview was first published in the second issue of The Fenris Wolf (1991). It gives, in my opinion, an interesting insight into one of this century's most visionary artists. One factual error escaped me though. Jack Parsons, mentioned in the interview, died in 1952, but for some strange reason I had jotted down "1946" in my notes, and in my question. Anger kindly and elegantly let my mistake slip and we continued the conversation... ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The following interview took place in Kenneth Anger's legendary Hollywood home, in early 1990. The house was a splendidly beautiful gem, packed with rare objects from his collections of Hollywood memorabilia. An atmosphere of the golden days of glamour was present and strong, but evil sadly lurked outside... Anger had been harassed by the local hispanic gang for quite some time, which had forced him to hire a bodyguard. And a short time after my visit, they shot his dog on the pavement outside. This forced Anger to move, and I can see before me how the once so beautiful house is now a crack-den for that local low-life. Hollywood as such no longer exists, it's just a pile of memories swirling around in an atmosphere of Beirut-like clashes between the law enforcers and the criminal blacks and hispanics. A sad tale, indeed! Amidst these troubles, Mr. Anger was kind enough to spare me some of his time, and what follows here, is a more or less straight account of what was said at the time... ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Fenris Wolf: In what way, would you say, is Cinema a Magickal art? Kenneth Anger: Well, it's an art of vision. It's like a crystal ball, you can create visions. It also allows you to manipulate time and space and transcend realism. Obviously, the camera records what's in front of it, but it can also record the inside of a Magickian's mind. How many strings are pulled behind the scenes, or special effects, or things to make this happen, are the Magickian's secrets. I don't think it's necessarily... Like in Hollywood films, they explain how all the tricks are done. I don't think that's a good idea. T.F.W.: When, and how, did you realize what power Cinema can have? K.A.: Seeing certain films when I was young. When I was a very young child, I was taken to the Chinese Theatre here by my Grandmother, to see "Noah's Ark". It has a scene in a Pagan Temple, taking place before the flood, which of course gave the Hollywood set designers and costume designers an excuse to invent a completely imaginary world. Like Atlantis... Wonderful sets and costumes in a very barbaric Pagan style, and I always loved those. It's all washed away by the flood, and I remember being very upset about this. It was such a nice place. "Why do they have to wash it away...?" (laughs) My Grandmother tried to explain "That's because they were wicked", but I said "They looked pretty interesting to me!" Then I was myself in the film "A Midsummer Night's Dream", again through my Grandmother's influence. That was a thrilling thing to be associated with, and then, when I saw that... The scenes of the world of the fairies were so beautifully done in that film. It's never been done better. That's the part of the film that I loved, rather than the intrigue bertween the lovers and all that. It's that element of fantasy which is suggested in Shakespeare. But in stage productions they can't do it. In film suddenly, it's expanded to this "dance of the spirits of the moonbeam", and things like that. Later, when I went to France and saw the films of Georges Melies, his trickfilms, I realized that you can do wonderful things in film without having tremendous amounts of money. You just need imagination and the kind of deep wonder-vision of a child. Things appearing out of nowhere, and things like that. I've always loved film, but only a few times in my life have I had enough money to do what I wanted to do. Commercial films were never really an option for me, because I felt that to deal in the commercial marketplace... I'm more of a poet than a salesman, so I never tried to become a part of the commercial industry. T.F.W.: Were you ever approached by the film industry in the beginning? K.A.: No. I was always in my own little corner as an independent artist. I wasn't the only one. In the silent period you had experimental films, or, as they were called, avant-garde, being made by Man Ray, Leger, Rene Clair. I saw all of those films at an early age, and of course in France later, I saw Jean Cocteau's "The Blood of a Poet", which is one of my favourite films. But I began to make films before I saw it. And then, of course, Bunuel's "L'Age d'Or". So I saw the power of the medium. I've made about nine films which I consider are finished enough to show to the public. I have other films that are unfinished: either they lack a soundtrack, or some scenes are missing, and I prefer not to show them. Some films have been destroyed or lost, which is too bad, but that's one of the things that can happen. I had one film that was censored by Eastman Kodak because it had nudity in it. It was called "The Love that whirls", and it was based on a passage in "The Golden Bough" by Frazer. It's about when they choose someone to play God for a year. The boy is treated as a God, like a King, and then, after the year, he's sacrificed. That's something that occurred in different ancient cultures, including the Aztecs. It goes back in Europe much further. I had some nude figures in that, and this was in the early forties. It wasn't even remotely sexual. They were artistic nudes, but it was a no-no. They confiscated the film and I never got it back. At that time you couldn't get colour film developed except through Eastman Kodak. There weren't any independent labs. So, I've had a battle in the past with censorship... "Scorpio Rising" was first running in California in 1964. It was seized by the police, and now the amount of controversy in the film is so little. The few flashes of nudity are so brief. It's hard to see what all the fuzz was about! T.F.W.: Did they actually go to the theatre and take the prints? K.A.: They took the print from the theatre, and they arrested the manager. I wasn't there at that time, so I don't know whether they would've arrested me or not, but the reason why they did it was that the American Nazi Party didn't like the film. They denounced it to the cops. They didn't say "We're the American Nazi Party", but they were the ones who did it. If the vice squad in America, although I don't know if they're still that way, have a citizen's complaint from anybody, they will act on it. If they say "This shop is selling a dirty book", they check it out. This was back then... I think now there's been such an avalanche of obscenity, that I doubt they're still that vigilant. They used to be... There was that Swedish film, "I'm curious yellow". I haven't seen it for years, but now it would seem so innocuous. But at a time it was very controversial. People went to see it, hoping to see a little bit of tits or something. That's how the situation has evolved. The pendulum now seems to be swinging back... Dr. Kinsey was a friend of mine, and he said that "Censorship and permissiveness towards sexuality in the cultures of the world, it goes like a pendulum..." T.F.W.: It's also quite symbolical in general, how sexuality is regarded... K.A.: Yes. These are tough times. The worst thing is that there are so many diseases. It does have an effect on the freedom of sexuality. And that is used by the moralists as an excuse to condemn all sexual expressions. T.F.W.: Do you agree with the theory that it's an imposed disease? K.A.: Well, that sounds too paranoid. Too much like paranoia. I have no proof of that. It would be convenient to think that, but, on the other hand, if it could be ... H.G. Wells wrote a story called "The Island of Dr. Moreau", which is a wonderful story. In it, he predicted that the world would be infected with unknown diseases that would shape the things to come. He invented one, "the wandering sickness", which was like a kind of incurable fever... People would break out in sweats and they would have the desire to sleepwalk and wander. And then they'd have to shoot them. It was convenient for H.G. Wells, because he thought that even in 1935, the world was much too overpopulated. He wanted to cut the population on earth by one third. As an artist, you can invent a plague with a sweep of the pen that will wipe out two thirds just like that... Then, from that, a new elite develops. He calls them the "air men". This is of course a fantasy, but I wish we could have an elite. But it seems to me in many different ways that progress is an illusion, and that for every advance, there's a step backwards. T.F.W.: And we were speaking yesterday of the moral decline and the changes in society... Do you think that the Aeon of Horus will ever be established? K.A.: Well, I believe in it. But we're in the chaos-stage of birth that will be very rough. At least it seems that the nuclear threat between the super-powers is perhaps diminishing. Next year Gorby could be overthrown, and you could have a new reactionary regime in Moscow. It's amazing how he's kept them at bay. He's almost like in a cage of tigers. A wild animal trainer who just with his eyes says "Stay down, stay back!" Anyway, it's fascinating to watch, but on the other hand there's such an element of... I think that the human species has in it the seeds of the Destroyers, whether they're thugs in India or whatever, Kali-worshippers... The terrorists, like the Red Brigade who killed the head banker in Germany, are like in a time warp. What reds are they working for? It's beside the point of history, and history's passed them by. There they are - still blowing up people like the anarchists in 1900, or killing the equivalent of a king. A banker is like the king of Yugoslavia or something, the one that set off World War One. It's possible that terrorism will continue, because there will always be people who have grudges if they get a hold of poison gas or biological weapons, which would be quite easy to manufacture, like viruses. I think harmony is far away. If it ever happens! And in the meantime the climate is being ruined. And very fast! To me, the destruction of the Brazilian rainforests requires international pressure. All the governments, from Mexico down, Central America, South America, they're all charicatures of corruption. And the chief villain is an American billionaire, who's cutting it down because he's raising cheap cattle to sell to McDonald's for McDonald's hamburgers. It's so revolting, and very unhealthy food anyway. In five or ten years, the land will be depleted and no longer can they raise the cattle and the forests will be gone. A new desert will start, and this will be an ecological catastrophy for the whole world. To me the cause should be strong enough... You can't just say to this corrupt government: "Don't do it! Naughty, naughty, don't do that..." It's almost reason to declare war on them. This would be very messy and difficult, and it would have to be through the United Nations or something, not just one country. There's also a problem with the water supplies being contaminated, the oceans being contaminated... It's such a precious planet. When you realize that in our solar system, this is the only place suitable for life... All the rest are deserts or totally poisonous. Like Mars, it's very inhospitable, and that's the only one remotely possible, but it's terribly cold and you'd have to create sealed environments. The other planets are just impossible. Beyond our solar system, everything is so far away, we're talking about light-years, that it's a question of "this is all we have". I think the planet should be called Planet Earthquake, because the planet has one million earthquakes every year, big ones and little ones. A million earthquakes is a lot! Some regions are much worse than others, like Japan and the Pacific coast of America. The volcanic cracks go right down from Alaska all the way down to South America. The whole coast is volcanic, unstable. But it's better than living on Venus, where you have oceans of sulphuric acid!! (laughs) I love wildlife and animals, and to see the way they're being treated, the arrogance of the human species... The worst guardians of African wildlife are the Africans. They don't care. To them there's just one name for it - it's just meat. Or a nuisance... They try to grow their fields in an area that belongs to the elephants, so the elephants come to the fields and trample them, and they kill the elephants. They have no way of existing in harmony with animals, so it's tragic what's happening. The elephant population in Africa is half of what it was ten years ago! Ten years is such a short time... T.F.W.: It's the same thing with wolves in Sweden. There are about six of them left... K.A.: Terrible. So, I don't know whether people will be able to band together to do something, because obviously the individual can do nothing. I believe in the environment and Greenpeace and all those things that want to save the planet. But I think it needs to be like a war crisis. I'm fairly pessimistic about it. I'm personally very pessimistic about the human race, and I think that's something I share with Anton. You have wonderful geniuses, poets, and artists, but yet so many who are destroyers and don't care. The biggest problem is overpopulation. If I had my way, it'd probably be like they have in China or India, where they are only allowed so many children. It isn't working there either, but at least they try and limit it. You're only supposed to have one child, which is like an humiliation to traditional China, because you were supposed to have five or six, and as many sons as possible. The Hispanic people that live in this neighbourhood for instance, they come up from Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, all those countries, many illegally, and they bring with them the breeding habits of the third world. The women start having children at 16, and from then on until menopause, they have a baby every nine months! They end up with 15-20 children! Even if some of them are intelligent - which I question! - they'll never have jobs for all of these people, unless they want to pick in the fields or something like that... ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Our talks turned to the Prophet of the Aeon, Aleister Crowley, who's been such a great influence in Anger's films. His Magnum Opus, "Lucifer Rising", was influenced by Crowley's poem "Hymn to Lucifer", and he's planned to do a film version of the O.T.O. Gnostic Mass. And also, more biographically oriented material... ------------------------------------------------------------------------ K.A.: I had plans and did sketch out a realistical film based on Crowley's living at Cefalu, at the Abbey of Thelema. That's basically why I went there, to do research. I lived in it. But I don't know if it'll ever happen, because I'd have to find serious money... That's always been a great obstacle to me. When I've made films, either a relative has left me some money, like my mother left me some bonds and I cashed them in, or I had some help from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Ford Foundation. But not very much, only modest amounts. Not enough to do these projects. It's also become more difficult to get that kind of sponsorship. Something like the Gnostic Mass would be like half an hour long. It could be done for a modest amount of money, but I want the setting and the robes and everything to be beautiful. In some cases I might want to use actors instead of members, because they may be more impressive. That's perfectly alright. The thing where the people who belong to the Brotherhood will be helpful is in getting the accuracy of the ritual gestures and all that right. I've seen it done by several groups, including the group in Switzerland, and some did better than others. Some things are open to a bit of interpretation. So, that's something to think about, and I might be able to get some sponsorship for it from one of the art organizations. T.F.W.: Do you usually work with ready scripted material and storyboards, or do you work on a more spontaneous level? K.A.: I have it mostly inside my head, and I make notes of what I need. I usually do a technical breakdown of what I need. But it isn't like a written script for a play or a usual film, because I basically work in images, not in dialogue or narration. If I film a Crowley-ritual, it would be a different direction for me, because it would be the first time I use speaking. Up to now I've only worked in silent films. I'm closer to dance, the way ballet can tell a story without using speech, and in that sense I'm closer to that. But I'm willing, if I had the means, to use speech. T.F.W.: Do you have equipment of your own? K.A.: I have some, but I usually borrow or rent it from various people who have it. Particularly the editing equipment, there are places I can go and use that. I don't have to have my own. T.F.W.: Would you rather work in 35? K.A.: Yes, if the budget would permit it, and if I could get a loan of a 35 mm-camera. There's ways of getting 35 mm-film in a city like Hollywood, because there are places to buy film that is left over from other productions. If you're careful, you can get excellent film enough to shoot with for a fraction of what it would cost to buy it new. You may have to load the camera with a piece that's just enough for one scene and then load it again. It's not difficult to conquer those kinds of problems. Ingenuity! T.F.W.: What effects do you want your films to have on the audience? K.A.: Well, I would like for them to... The idea that you can see a film, or watch a play, or read a poem and be changed. I think it can effect you. Certainly Crowley, in his poetry, and the plays he wrote, and various literary works... It was to effect change, like through a Will. Whether this is directly or subliminally, indirectly or whatever, I do believe that change is possible. The ways this happens are mysterious. I've never made something to change day into night, though it would be a nice idea... T.F.W.: You have chosen the same means as Crowley, that is not sloganeering, but a rather more poetic and romantic approach... K.A.: Right. T.F.W.: How did you come in touch with Jack Parsons? K.A.: He was working here at the Jet Propulsion Laboratories. He actually invented the fuel that took the Apollo-rocket to the moon. He has a crater on the moon named after him, which is rather thrilling. I'm convinced that he was murdered by Howard Hughes. Howard Hughes wanted him to work for him, and he simply didn't want to. When you work for Howard Hughes, you lose your freedom. In other words, he tells you what to do. He was very much like L. Ron Hubbard. Jack Parsons was kidnapped by Howard Hughes. They followed him in a limousine, and two big, strong bodyguard-types hopped out and physically picked up Jack Parsons and put him in the limo and drove him around. That's physically kidnapping! It's a crime! To physically interfere with someone and to do something with their body is a felony crime, whether you physically harm them or not. In the limo, there was a representative of Mr. Hughes. He said "Mr. Hughes admires your talent, and we're sorry to pick you up like this. We want to forcefully get the message across that Mr. Hughes wants you to quit JPL and work for him." They had spies out, and knew that he was doing some really interesting scientific work. Jack played it cool, and said "Well, I'll have to think about it. Please let me out by my home in Pasadena..." But they drove him around for about an hour, and it was definitely intimidation. Anyway, he then decided that the time had come for him and Marjorie Cameron to leave for Mexico, because his life was in danger. He was packing up to leave when his house exploded, and he was killed. He knew how to handle explosives and things like that, and also the explosion was so strong that the whole house was destroyed - a big house with two stories! His wife had gone around the corner to do some shopping for a picknick. They were going to drive without stopping from Pasadena to Mexico, and it was like they were escaping from this monster who was Howard Hughes. Instead of that, the house blew up, and she heard the explosion and went back. There was no house! She was like one block away... T.F.W.: This was in 1946. Do you know if Crowley reacted to the incident? Did he get the news? K.A.: Well, he must have got the news. I've never read a letter or anything about his reaction to the news. But he was dying practically, so these were his last months. But he had already quarelled with Jack, because Crowley was great at quarelling with people. T.F.W.: About the Moonchild-operation? K.A.: Yeah, and he thought they'd done something stupid. In a way, he was right, but Jack was so talented that it was a pity that they had to have a falling out. It would have been better if he'd said "You're going too slow, you're going too fast, or you've done something wrong..." It's unusual with that kind of talent. It's one man in a million with a true talent for Ritual Magick. Jack had that talent. But there were some technical mistakes in that ceremony, and in some of his rituals. I don't know if he got the wrong numbers or something, or if he paid for this with his life... I don't know. But the fact is that he was jumping the gun. He wanted to become a Magus before he was really qualified. In a sense, he was repeasting what Crowley did with Mathers... T.F.W.: And I guess squabblings like that have continued all along... K.A.: Unfortunately. That's why I never wanted to join. I prefer to be detached. T.F.W.: So you've always worked by yourself? K.A.: Yeah. I'm a member of the A.'.A.'., but not the O.T.O. T.F.W.: Did you become an A.'.A.'. Magus through the performance at the Haight Theatre in 1967? K.A.: Well, that was the public thing. My real rituals are private. It's also a psychic thing. I consider myself on the path, but I've never tried to belong to a group or to have a group around me. It's just my own choice. If you have to choose a Tarot Arcana of what is your thing, I'm a Hermit. T.F.W.: What originally made you interested in Thelema? Were you introduced to Parsons, and he told you about the books, or...? K.A.: As soon as I heard about it, something clicked and I said "This is mine!" My family is Scottish-Presbyterian from an ethnic background of German and Scottish. I never was attracted to their church. They tried to take me when I was twelve or something, and I told them "No!". I was the first child to do that, and my brother and sister were both very happy to go along in the footsteps. I refused to go to church on Sundays, and I got my allowance cut because I was rebelling in a way that embarrassed them. But then they left me alone. So I had rejected christianity at an early age, and I never believed in Santa Claus either! (laughs) I find christianity repellant. I don't like the story, I don't feel I need someone to get nailed to a cross to pay for my sins. It's ugly! I don't know how much longer it'll last... It's collapsing in ways that are pretty obvious, but it may yet take centuries. At the time of its collapse, it creates these monsters like the evangelists. Bigotism and censorship are coming back again. Most members of the human race don't deserve Thelema. I hate to say it, but they're rotten! Whether they're born rotten or they become rotten, they're sheep. They're unawakened. I don't waste energy on hatred, that's foolish. As a Magickian, I conserve my energy. Wherever I live, I try to create a sanctuary for myself. As much as I can, I have the things around me that I love. T.F.W.: What, would you say, are the advantages of the concept of a "total environment"? K.A.: It's control. You can do it in one room or even in a tent, I suppose. The idea is to create a sanctuary of harmony that is a reflection outwards of the best parts of yourself. So, I'm projecting outwards... Even if I have chaos in me, or confusion, I try to make a projection of the admirable things. I have a controlled chaos in the form of my storage areas and my closets where I hide all my things... I haven't mastered it completely! I always say I need more space, but maybe I need a computer to keep track of everything, so I don't lose things. More shelves, more storage... - - - I'm strongly opposed to nicotine smoking. It's like a vampire, sucking on the human race. Crowley, of course, was a smoker. He smoked like a volcano! It didn't do him any good, considering the fact that he had asthma and emphyzema. He was very short of breath. I don't like to sound like a puritan about things like that. I like to smoke pot occasionally, because it gives me a high. It does some good. Whereas the lift you get from nicotine is so ephemeral. It's addictive. It's diabolical. It takes away much more than it gives. And then I find it extremely offensive, the way people will smoke at you, or smoke in a restaurant or a public space where there's other people that don't want it! Their smoke is going in your face... And in your lungs! When Crowley lived, the medical science hadn't realized how extremely bad it was, with lungcancer and everything. Crowley might have changed his mind about it, but he believed in trying all the dangerous things, and wheteher that's the Thelemic way... I think it's but for an elite. The thing that bores me about drugs now, is that they've become so public. You have cocaine being sold in some form on the street corners in the city by little kids. I still like marijuana, and I think it should be made legal. If alcohol is legal, you might as well... It serves the same kind of purpose maybe better than alcohol. It doesn't destroy your liver the way alcohol does. T.F.W.: Also, it doesn't dull your mind... K.A.: No, it clarifies you. But apparently, it's not going to happen in this century. Two things that are imporatant to Thelema have become turned into demons by the cultures: Drugs and Sex. It's like "sex and drugs and rock'n'roll"! Because of the new diseases and the war on drugs, there's almost a war on sex too. People are afraid of experiments. I hope some kind of solution can be found to these problems before too many more years. It seems out of control right now. There's no medical thing on the horizon, like a vaccine. T.F.W.: The only thing would be more restrictions and thereby greater control... K.A.: Yes. And caution, and fidelity. It's not a good time for Don Juan! (laughs) T.F.W.: Have you never been tempted to pursue any other artistic expressions, like painting or writing? K.A.: Well, I write to earn money. My writing projects are mostly concerned with things like the Hollywood scandals. I'm generally interested in that field. Scandals and tragedies are an important part of the historical records of cultures. They reflect at any given time what is considered over-the-edge of behaviour, and it's also something that the public can be fascinated with, and afraid of... They're demonized and glamourized. The books I've written on Hollywood have been about that aspect. I'll probably do another one, because I need to earn some more money. A certain number of years elapse between the books, and suddenly I need the money. So that usually is the spirit... T.F.W.: Do you know how much the first two have sold? K.A.: They were on the bestseller-list in The New York Times, both books, and that meant five or six editions, and they're both still in print. So, it must be over half a million copies. The new one will also be Hollywood scandals and tragedies, but the trouble is, off the record between you and me, I feel I've used up all the good stories... And I don't like contemporary Hollywood. The characters aren't larger than life, they're usually smaller than life! (laughs) I can write about someone like Fatty Arbuckle or Jean Harlow or Garbo, but to write about someone like Barbra Streisand... T.F.W.: Do you think there are any stars left? K.A.: There's some good actors. Tom Cruise is an excellent actor. He's a better actor than James Dean ever was, as far as sheer acting. And maybe it's better if the stars get humanized and not made into false gods. Turning humans into gods has more reasons against it than for it. It places that person in a prison. I've talked to people like Mick Jagger and they say they can't even take a walk. People will bother them because their face is so famous. Strangers will come up and follow them. They don't have that cloak of invisibility that most of us have. When I knew Mick in London in the early 70's, he liked to go out in the streets at two o'clock in the morning, and by the river just run... For blocks and blocks, just to feel free. I used to run with him at times. It's like a bird out of the cage! T.F.W.: What is it with Rudolph Valentino that fascinates you so much? K.A.: He was the first male sex god. He was a male that had erotic appeal, and recognized frankly as that. "The Latin Lover"... He was the first one to do it, in a real sense, for a man. I also think he was a good actor, and he had that intangible thing called charisma. He was a Taurus. I collect him. T.F.W.: What will your book on him be like? K.A.: It'll be basically a picture book with little comments on my feelings about him. Many of the pictures have never been published before, and there's never been a book on Valentino that's had colour in it. I will have colour illustrations. I hope I can find a publisher who can agree to the amount of colour pages. I haven't chosen yet. Maybe one like Abrams... The costs of doing it in colour are so great, I almost need like three countries to agree on it. Some art books are published in Japanese, British, and Italian, or something like that. Some of the best colour printing is done in Japan. They've perfected the technique with laser printing the colours. T.F.W.: Can you tell me about your "Hollywood Babylon"-film project? Part archive, part fiction? K.A.: Yes, with some recreated scenes with actors. That's difficult, but I intend to do it in a stylized way. If you have an actor impersonate a star, it's very difficult, because they're too well-known. Like, how could you find someone to impersonate Garbo? It's just impossible... But I've found some wonderful archive material. The producer, Ed Pressman, and I cannot agree on the budget, so it may never happen. I'm quite resigned to the fact that it may never happen. I say I need fifteen million and he wants to do it for two million... T.F.W.: How do you think the film medium will develop in the future? K.A.: Well, film may be replaced by some magnetic tape and a way to project it that gives a great, clear and beautiful image. They're supposed to clear videoprojection up in ten years , so... I hate videoprojection now, because it's bad enough the way it is. To me, it's an abomination! It loses all quality in colour and definition. It's moving wallpaper, to have in a disco or something. There's some wonderful techniques coming up though... Something called IMAX, a huge image. It's like 70 mm filmed on its side, so that each frame is as big as a postcard. When this is projected, you get absolute clarity, and you can have a screen five stories high. It's a Canadian system. The have a theatre here, and one in New York. They're usually connected with some museum, but they make films especially for it. They've never made it like a commercial story. It's always like "The history of flight", but they're done in a very poetic way. They're actually quite good. There's one on time that's very interesting, and another one on "Save the Grand Canyon". Very beautiful. Mostly wildlife and things like that. Then there's another system called "Showscan", which uses film that goes through the camera and the projector at twice the speed, which completely eliminates flicker... So it's like looking at reality! Even though it's not three-dimensional, it's still so clear that it gives an illusion of three dimensions. It's developed by a man named Douglas Trumbull, and there's been a few presentations of it at the World's Fair in Seattle, and a few private showings here and there. But it's never been used commercially, because the drawback is it uses up so much film that the reels of film have to be giant, they have to be huge! Human ingenuity may come up with some wonderful techniques that we've never thought of. I thought that by this time in my life, there would be a practical method of three-dimensional, but there's not. If you have to wear glasses or something, it destroys the illusion right there. Holograms are not practical. The images look very fake. You can't use it in a narrative. To me, all of these things are beside the point. If you have a strong subject and the personal vision of a genius, someone like Eisenstein, the Russian genius, or Von Stroheim, or Von Sternberg, or John Ford, or Hitchcock, or someone like that... It's the personal vision that counts, not the technique! I'm fascinated with film, but the fact that it's so expensive almost makes it out of reach. Some filmmakers have been much more prolific than I, and I regret that I haven't been able to do more. But I'm glad I've made as many as I have, and I can always make more. It's possible the money will be available to me again in the future. T.F.W.: You've met quite a lot of interesting people. Who of these have influenced you the most? K.A.: I was fortunate enough to meet Jean Cocteau. He's had a great influence, because to me he was always a pure artist who yet could work in the modern world. He's not as much of a clown as someone like Salvador Dali who became like a charicature. Cocteau remained closer to his inner vision, and yet occasionally he could do things like design an ad for a perfume or something. It wouldn't matter, you know. He became a member of the Academie Francaise, and had his sword and all that. But he always kept a slightly ironic attitude towards it. He said "If you break a statue, you risk turning into one". He kept his distance, always. So Cocteau was an influence, and earlier I'd met D.W. Griffith here in Hollywood. Later I met Von Stroheim, another man I admire very much. Then the great director of the French Cinematheque - Henri Langois. I worked for him as his assistant for twelve years. That was a great thrill. And of course I never mer Crowley, because he died in 1947, and I never got to Europe before 1950. But I feel I know him very intimately as a man and as a creator, because I've studied his works all my life. And I've lived in his home in Cefalu. I have enough imagination that I could see what attracted him to it, to that place. He became too notorious, and attracted the attention of Mussolini. Even if it hadn't had anything to do with his Magickal Society, Mussolini was very anti-British. So just the fact that an eccentric Englishman lived in a part of Italy at that time... He got expelled. If he'd been a little more savvy, Crowley might have chosen Tunisia instead of Sicily. He went there afterwards, just took the boat across from Palermo. His life was a very adventurous life, always full of conflict. It was never like "This is the safest solution, or the one that will cause the least trouble..." It was quite on the contrary! To go to a city like Palermo, very catholic in the most primitive way, not enlightened at all, and with the peasants being very superstitious and afraid of strangers. They thought they were Devil-worshippers or something, running around in their robes and things like that. I talked to some peasants in Cefalu who'd actually seen Crowley perform rituals outside his house in the garden. Liber Resh to the Sun and everything. They didn't know what it was, but as little children of five or six, they watched this strange man. And they described it in movements... They remembered! Particularly the coloured robes. It was so fascinating to hear this, the way a child would remember Napoleon or Jesus doing something. After he was kicked out, some of the women remained. They were so poor, that they had to sell the furniture to the peasants, just in exchange for some eggs or meat or bread or something. I found Crowley's writing desk about a mile away, and they remembered it. "That came from the Englishman..." I'm sorry I didn't have the money to buy it, but they treasured it. It's still probably there... They don't use it as a table to eat on or anything. They turned it into their home altar, covered with catholic saints. I looked at it, and it had some ink stains, which were obviously from Crowley's ink well. And a few scratched doodles, like pentagrams and things like that. They couldn't really write, and I asked if they had anything else. "Yes, La Biblia..." - The Bible. They had a book wrapped in cloth behind their virgin Mary. They thought it was the Bible, but it wasn't the Bible at all... It was one of Crowley's books, not by Crowley though, bound in gold... It was by a Dean of Cambridge, called "Through the halls of history" or something like that. A history of Trinity College in Cambridge, where Crowley went to school for a while... ------------------------------------------------------------------------ All material is copyright � 1999 Carl Abrahamsson, if nothing else is stated. ----- Aloha, He'Ping, Om, Shalom, Salaam. Em Hotep, Peace Be, All My Relations. Omnia Bona Bonis, Adieu, Adios, Aloha. Amen. Roads End <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance�not soap-boxing�please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'�with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds�is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. 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