{"id":1044,"date":"2007-03-31T18:10:07","date_gmt":"2007-03-31T17:10:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/markwebber.org.uk\/archive\/?p=1044"},"modified":"2018-01-25T14:55:22","modified_gmt":"2018-01-25T14:55:22","slug":"flaming-creatures-blonde-cobra","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/markwebber.org.uk\/archive\/2007\/03\/31\/flaming-creatures-blonde-cobra\/","title":{"rendered":"Flaming Creatures &#038; Blonde Cobra"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a name=\"top\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">ngg_shortcode_0_placeholder<\/p>\n<p><b>FLAMING CREATURES &amp; BLONDE COBRA<br \/>\nSaturday 31 March 2007, at 6.10pm<br \/>\nLondon Lesbian &amp; Gay Film Festival at BFI Southbank<\/b><\/p>\n<p><strong>Jack Smith, Flaming Creatures, USA, 1963, 16mm, black and white, sound, 42 min<\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> Ken Jacobs, Blonde Cobra, USA, 1959-63, 16mm, black and white &amp; colour, sound, 33 min<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Two gloriously primitive flicks which define and transcend the idea of \u201cunderground\u201d film. <i>Flaming Creatures<\/i>, Smith\u2019s impoverished, epic fantasy of Babylonian proportions, is a decadent celebration of the joy and torment of existence.<i> <\/i>This bleached-out orgiastic rite, all limp penises and shaking breasts, is populated by a blonde vampire, exotic Spanish dancers and androgynous bohemian poseurs.<i> <\/i><i>Blonde Cobra<\/i>, as close to an authentic portrait of Smith that we have, is propelled by a delirious monologue (witness the scurrilous tale of Madame Nescience and Mother Superior) and<i> <\/i>was shot amongst the rubble of his apartment. The two films were premiered together in April 1963, and remain fresh, provocative and startlingly original over 40 years later. (Mark Webber)<\/p>\n<a onclick=\"wpex_toggle(480357054, 'PROGRAMME NOTES', 'Read less'); return false;\" class=\"wpex-link\" id=\"wpexlink480357054\" href=\"#\">PROGRAMME NOTES<\/a><div class=\"wpex_div\" id=\"wpex480357054\" style=\"display: none;\"><\/p>\n<p><b>FLAMING CREATURES &amp; BLONDE COBRA<br \/>\n<\/b>Saturday 31 March 2007, at 6.10pm<br \/>\nLondon Lesbian &amp; Gay Film Festival at BFI Southbank<\/p>\n<p>Jack Smith\u2019s <i>Flaming Creatures<\/i> and Ken Jacobs\u2019 <i>Blonde Cobra<\/i> (in which Smith stars) are two gloriously primitive flicks which define and transcend the idea of \u201cunderground\u201d film. We can only begin to imagine the extraordinary reactions they might have caused in audiences of the early 1960s.<i> <\/i><\/p>\n<p><strong>FLAMING CREATURES<i><br \/>\n<\/i>Jack Smith, USA, 1963, 16mm, b\/w, sound, 42 min<\/strong><br \/>\n<i>Flaming Creatures<\/i>, an impoverished, epic fantasy of Babylonian proportions, supposedly caused riots at early screenings. Viewers were incensed not so much by what they saw, but for the lack of graphic pornography, which they expected from such an international <i>cause c\u00e9l\u00e8bre<\/i>. Smith\u2019s polymorphous vision, all limp penises and shaking breasts, is something decidedly other: A bleached-out orgiastic rite populated by androgynous creatures (exotic Spanish dancers, bohemian poseurs and a blonde vampire), and a decadent celebration of the joy and torment of existence.<\/p>\n<p><strong>BLONDE COBRA <\/strong><br \/>\n<strong> Ken Jacobs, USA, 1959-63, 16mm, b\/w &amp; colour, sound, 33 min<br \/>\n<\/strong><i>Blonde Cobra<\/i>, made by Ken Jacobs from footage abandoned by Bob Fleischner, is as close to an authentic portrait of Smith that we have. Shot mostly amongst the rubble of his apartment and propelled by a delirious monologue (witness the scurrilous tale of Madame Nescience and Mother Superior), its freewheeling anti-form mixes image with black leader, recorded sound with live radio. Both films were premiered together in April 1963, and remain fresh, provocative and startlingly original over 40 years later. \u201cLife swarms with innocent monsters.\u201d (Charles Baudelaire)<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#top\">Back to top<\/a><\/p>\n<p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Alina Rudnitskaya\u2019s humanistic approach to documentary filmmaking often brings out the humour in her chosen subjects. As an introduction to her work, this programme depicts three diverse groups of contemporary Russian women.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[41],"tags":[39,16],"class_list":["post-1044","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-london-lesbian-gay-film-festival-2007","tag-ken-jacobs","tag-london-lesbian-gay-film-festival"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/markwebber.org.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1044","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/markwebber.org.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/markwebber.org.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markwebber.org.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markwebber.org.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1044"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/markwebber.org.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1044\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/markwebber.org.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1044"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markwebber.org.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1044"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markwebber.org.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1044"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}