CREATURE FEATURE:
Underground Cinema at Eyedrum
by Felicia Feaster
published in Creative Loafing
August 30, 2006
Jack Smith was a '60s underground legend. Before he was 30, this gay, Jewish,
cross-dressing filmmaker had made one of the most influential films of all time,
the 1963 avant-garde classic, Flaming Creatures.
Though eventually banned in the state of New York for its array of bare breasts
and flaccid penises, many bright lights of the New York underground hailed it as
a masterpiece.
Purportedly made for just $300, Flaming Creatures features exotically dressed
transvestites, a rape and enough bare-bones spectacle to make it the fringe
cinema's answer to the exotic adventures like Arabian Nights (1942) that so
enchanted Smith in his youth.
Avant-garde film enthusiast Andy Ditzler, who almost single-handedly has been
keeping film culture alive in Atlanta, will man his blessedly creaky film
projector to feature a 16mm print of Flaming Creatures in a one-night homage to
some of the pioneers of American underground cinema, Carnivals of Ecstasy, at
Eyedrum Gallery. The screening is part of the five-day Table of the Elements
Festival.
The event is hosted by another important '60s figure, Tony Conrad, the musical
director for Flaming Creatures. Conrad had a hand in some capacity in every film
appearing in Carnivals of Ecstasy, either contributing his musical talents or
appearing onscreen.
Viewers also can get a taste of Smith's unique onscreen charisma in 1964's
Chumlum, which was made by another Smith collaborator, Ron Rice. Rice shot Smith
and his dolled-up, spaced-out cast on breaks from Smith's never-completed
project, Normal Love.
Featuring a musical score by Velvet Underground original drummer Angus MacLise,
the film is a kaleidoscopic wonder of superimposed imagery in which Smith and a
coterie of fellow freaks vamp in campy ecstasy, exhibiting the kind of excess
and charisma that made Smith and his creatures legends.
Also appearing on the Carnivals of Ecstasy bill are Piero Heliczer's (who
appears in drag in Flaming Creatures) 1967 Joan of Arc, Ira Cohen's 1967
Invasion of Thunderbolt Pagoda and the world premiere of a new work, Brain
Damage.
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