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Film and Culture Series
Movie Journal: The Rise of a New American Cinema, 1959-1971
Whether he is discussing the holy terrorism of Andy Warhol, the changing language of cinema, or the neglected art of film journalism, Jonas Mekas' special "insanity"—his deep love for film art and artists—is constantly evident in this book. A collection of Mekas' Village Voice pieces over the past decade, Movie Journal provides a chronicle of the birth and infancy of the new genre he baptised as the New American Cinema.
Here are perceptive discussions of Markopoulos, Brakhage, Jack Smith, Antonioni, Anger, and Breer; lacerating comments on Hollywood film; exhortations to young film-makers, unabashedly ecstatic reviews. Unlike most film criticism, Movie Journal sees its subject not as a seperate, extracultural phenomenon, but as the lens of a kaleidoscopic new culture. Consistently rejecting the false for the true, the ugly for the beautiful, the trite for the meaningful, Mekas' passionately honest and human vision provides a unique and total trip through the sensual world of a new art.
Here are perceptive discussions of Markopoulos, Brakhage, Jack Smith, Antonioni, Anger, and Breer; lacerating comments on Hollywood film; exhortations to young film-makers, unabashedly ecstatic reviews. Unlike most film criticism, Movie Journal sees its subject not as a seperate, extracultural phenomenon, but as the lens of a kaleidoscopic new culture. Consistently rejecting the false for the true, the ugly for the beautiful, the trite for the meaningful, Mekas' passionately honest and human vision provides a unique and total trip through the sensual world of a new art.
- GenresFilmNonfiction
434 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1972
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422 people want to read
About the author
Jonas Mekas
114 books196 followersJonas Mekas is a Lithuanian-American filmmaker, poet and artist who has often been called "the godfather of American avant-garde cinema." His work has been exhibited in museums and festivals world-wide.
In 1944, Mekas left Lithuania because of war. En route, his train was stopped in Germany and he and his brother, Adolfas Mekas (1925–2011), were imprisoned in a labor camp in Elmshorn, a suburb of Hamburg, for eight months. The brothers escaped and were detained near the Danish border where they hid on a farm for two months until the end of the war. After the war, Mekas lived in displaced person camps in Wiesbaden and Kassel. From 1946 to 1948, he studied philosophy at the University of Mainz and at the end of 1949, he emigrated with his brother to the U.S., settling in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York. Two weeks after his arrival, he borrowed the money to buy his first Bolex 16mm camera and began to record moments of his life. He discovered avant-garde film at venues such as Amos Vogel’s pioneering Cinema 16, and he began curating avant-garde film screenings at Gallery East on Avenue A and Houston Street, and a Film Forum series at Carl Fisher Auditorium on 57th Street.
In 1954, together with his brother Adolfas Mekas, he founded Film Culture, and in 1958, began writing his “Movie Journal” column for The Village Voice. In 1962, he co-founded Film-Makers' Cooperative and the Filmmakers' Cinematheque in 1964, which eventually grew into Anthology Film Archives, one of the world’s largest and most important repositories of avant-garde film. He was part of the New American Cinema, with, in particular, fellow film-maker Lionel Rogosin. He was a close collaborator with artists such as Andy Warhol, Nico, Allen Ginsberg, Yoko Ono, John Lennon, Salvador Dalí, and fellow Lithuanian George Maciunas.
In 1964, Mekas was arrested on obscenity charges for showing Flaming Creatures (1963) and Jean Genet’s Un Chant d’Amour (1950). He launched a campaign against the censorship board, and for the next few years continued to exhibit films at the Film-makers’ Cinemathèque, the Jewish Museum, and the Gallery of Modern Art. From 1964 to 1967, he organized the New American Cinema Expositions, which toured Europe and South America and in 1966 joined 80 Wooster Fluxhouse Coop.
In 1970, Anthology Film Archives opened on 425 Lafayette Street as a film museum, screening space, and a library, with Mekas as its director. Mekas, along with Stan Brakhage, Ken Kelman, Peter Kubelka, James Broughton, and P. Adams Sitney, began the ambitious Essential Cinema project at Anthology Film Archives to establish a canon of important cinematic works.
As a film-maker, Mekas' own output ranges from his early narrative film (Guns of the Trees, 1961) to “diary films” such as Walden (1969); Lost, Lost, Lost (1975); Reminiscences of a Journey to Lithuania (1972), Zefiro Torna (1992), and As I Was Moving Ahead Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty, which have been screened extensively at festivals and museums around the world.
Mekas expanded the scope of his practice with his later works of multi-monitor installations, sound immersion pieces and "frozen-film" prints. Together they offer a new experience of his classic films and a novel presentation of his more recent video work. His work has been exhibited at the 51st Venice Biennial, PS1 Contemporary Art Center, the Ludwig Museum, the Serpentine Gallery, and the Jonas Mekas Visual Arts Center.
In the year 2007, Mekas released one film every day on his website, a project he entitled "The 365 Day Project."[2] Since the 1970s, he has taught film courses at the New School for Social Research, MIT, Cooper Union, and New York University.
Mekas is also a well-known Lithuanian language poet and has published his poems and prose in Lithuanian, French, German, and English. He has published many of his journals and diaries including "I Had Nowhere to Go: Diaries, 1944–1954," and "Letters from Nowhere,
In 1944, Mekas left Lithuania because of war. En route, his train was stopped in Germany and he and his brother, Adolfas Mekas (1925–2011), were imprisoned in a labor camp in Elmshorn, a suburb of Hamburg, for eight months. The brothers escaped and were detained near the Danish border where they hid on a farm for two months until the end of the war. After the war, Mekas lived in displaced person camps in Wiesbaden and Kassel. From 1946 to 1948, he studied philosophy at the University of Mainz and at the end of 1949, he emigrated with his brother to the U.S., settling in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York. Two weeks after his arrival, he borrowed the money to buy his first Bolex 16mm camera and began to record moments of his life. He discovered avant-garde film at venues such as Amos Vogel’s pioneering Cinema 16, and he began curating avant-garde film screenings at Gallery East on Avenue A and Houston Street, and a Film Forum series at Carl Fisher Auditorium on 57th Street.
In 1954, together with his brother Adolfas Mekas, he founded Film Culture, and in 1958, began writing his “Movie Journal” column for The Village Voice. In 1962, he co-founded Film-Makers' Cooperative and the Filmmakers' Cinematheque in 1964, which eventually grew into Anthology Film Archives, one of the world’s largest and most important repositories of avant-garde film. He was part of the New American Cinema, with, in particular, fellow film-maker Lionel Rogosin. He was a close collaborator with artists such as Andy Warhol, Nico, Allen Ginsberg, Yoko Ono, John Lennon, Salvador Dalí, and fellow Lithuanian George Maciunas.
In 1964, Mekas was arrested on obscenity charges for showing Flaming Creatures (1963) and Jean Genet’s Un Chant d’Amour (1950). He launched a campaign against the censorship board, and for the next few years continued to exhibit films at the Film-makers’ Cinemathèque, the Jewish Museum, and the Gallery of Modern Art. From 1964 to 1967, he organized the New American Cinema Expositions, which toured Europe and South America and in 1966 joined 80 Wooster Fluxhouse Coop.
In 1970, Anthology Film Archives opened on 425 Lafayette Street as a film museum, screening space, and a library, with Mekas as its director. Mekas, along with Stan Brakhage, Ken Kelman, Peter Kubelka, James Broughton, and P. Adams Sitney, began the ambitious Essential Cinema project at Anthology Film Archives to establish a canon of important cinematic works.
As a film-maker, Mekas' own output ranges from his early narrative film (Guns of the Trees, 1961) to “diary films” such as Walden (1969); Lost, Lost, Lost (1975); Reminiscences of a Journey to Lithuania (1972), Zefiro Torna (1992), and As I Was Moving Ahead Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty, which have been screened extensively at festivals and museums around the world.
Mekas expanded the scope of his practice with his later works of multi-monitor installations, sound immersion pieces and "frozen-film" prints. Together they offer a new experience of his classic films and a novel presentation of his more recent video work. His work has been exhibited at the 51st Venice Biennial, PS1 Contemporary Art Center, the Ludwig Museum, the Serpentine Gallery, and the Jonas Mekas Visual Arts Center.
In the year 2007, Mekas released one film every day on his website, a project he entitled "The 365 Day Project."[2] Since the 1970s, he has taught film courses at the New School for Social Research, MIT, Cooper Union, and New York University.
Mekas is also a well-known Lithuanian language poet and has published his poems and prose in Lithuanian, French, German, and English. He has published many of his journals and diaries including "I Had Nowhere to Go: Diaries, 1944–1954," and "Letters from Nowhere,
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
November 29, 2008
The way Mekas writes about avant-garde films makes me want to either raid the Filmmakers' Co-op and watch everything within or live at Anthology Film Archives until I die. This is possibly the best book about film (of any kind) that I've ever read.
January 12, 2017
"I wouldn't bother you about this, except that I think the world is in peril and I'm trying to do something now other than the mere artistic thing."
May 24, 2020
I've been reading this on and off since 2019, which is okay as it's a series of columns, and reading them all in one go is too rich a meal for me. I went from being vaguely aware of Mekas' work as a filmmaker and then as one of the main people behind the underground cinema explosion of the 1960s...and now I want to adopt Mekas as my spiritual grandfather.
This book has been reprinted, but it really is crying out for an annotated version. One reason it too a long time for me to finish was every column sent me scurrying over to Wikipedia, YouTube, and Letterboxd to see if the movies he was mentioning were available online. In maybe the most interesting dive, I found that an eight year old Super8 filmmaker he lauded (in Mekas fashion--as better than most adult filmmakers) wound up being one of the founding animators of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
Mekas had a dream of putting cameras in the hands of regular people, that film should be a democratic art form just like writing and drawing. His utopian vision has come true (with dark undercurrents)--the kind of citizen journalism he talks about has its roots in the Rodney King footage all the way up to BLM and the need now to have iPhones on and recording when a cop pulls you over. There isn't much poetry though.
Mekas was a poet as well, and you can hear it in his celebrations of filmmakers, his railing against police raids and censorship, and his desire for transcendance. He often calls for institutions (like Lincoln Center) to be burned down (metaphoricallly, although it was the 60s). But his is an infectious and celebratory tone. An arts writer (as I have been) would be chastised for so unabashedly promoting his friends like Stan Brakhage. But he was friends with them because he loved their work.
There are a few Letterboxd lists devoted to the extant films he mentions in Movie Journal, over 300 of them. There are maybe more lost to time of damage (as another subject he often broaches is the endless search for funding so films can be shot/edited/distributed). In fact the last entry in the book is an interview with Harry Smith, looking to fund his film. A Letterboxd search found that film (Mahogany) too 10 more years to complete.
Mekas has a lot to say for those who write and review art, as well as those who make it. Technically "finished" reading, but this book will not be going anywhere...
This book has been reprinted, but it really is crying out for an annotated version. One reason it too a long time for me to finish was every column sent me scurrying over to Wikipedia, YouTube, and Letterboxd to see if the movies he was mentioning were available online. In maybe the most interesting dive, I found that an eight year old Super8 filmmaker he lauded (in Mekas fashion--as better than most adult filmmakers) wound up being one of the founding animators of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
Mekas had a dream of putting cameras in the hands of regular people, that film should be a democratic art form just like writing and drawing. His utopian vision has come true (with dark undercurrents)--the kind of citizen journalism he talks about has its roots in the Rodney King footage all the way up to BLM and the need now to have iPhones on and recording when a cop pulls you over. There isn't much poetry though.
Mekas was a poet as well, and you can hear it in his celebrations of filmmakers, his railing against police raids and censorship, and his desire for transcendance. He often calls for institutions (like Lincoln Center) to be burned down (metaphoricallly, although it was the 60s). But his is an infectious and celebratory tone. An arts writer (as I have been) would be chastised for so unabashedly promoting his friends like Stan Brakhage. But he was friends with them because he loved their work.
There are a few Letterboxd lists devoted to the extant films he mentions in Movie Journal, over 300 of them. There are maybe more lost to time of damage (as another subject he often broaches is the endless search for funding so films can be shot/edited/distributed). In fact the last entry in the book is an interview with Harry Smith, looking to fund his film. A Letterboxd search found that film (Mahogany) too 10 more years to complete.
Mekas has a lot to say for those who write and review art, as well as those who make it. Technically "finished" reading, but this book will not be going anywhere...
September 16, 2020
During the mid-seventies, when I was in art school and spent a year focusing on filmmaking and film history, aesthetics and appreciation (in lieu of a better word), this book was probably the most influential: my primary guide to films. My copy was well-worn and dog-eared. More than a book of film criticism, it’s about one man’s visual and visceral journey through the New York film landscape in the middle of the American Avant Garde’s most creative period. Mekas appeared to be (or maybe wanted to appear to be) an innocent on this journey, even at times calling himself a farmer (or a son of a farmer), though definitely way too proactive and engaged to be considered a mere bystander. Reading this again some 4O plus years later (I found a reasonably price used copy on E-Bay), though I’ve since seen more of the films he referenced in the book, I still have many left to see (at least those that don’t prove impossible to do so). And though he spends very little time on specific films he doesn’t like – a little more so early on, particularly when addressing the big commercial “art” films (which may have greatly influenced my own feelings about “Last Year at Marienbad”, which I finally watched a couple of times in the last couple of decades and found I really didn’t care for it all that much, which means either: my film viewing habits and abilities leave a lot to be desired, I’ve been brainwashed early on, or it really isn’t “all that” [of course, “personal preference” is still something that’s allowed]) – for the most part he focuses on those films he finds worth putting words to paper about: “I write only about the movies I like. I have tried to write about movies I don’t like, but I always fail at it. I totally fail at my dislikes. What is the use of talking about something you don’t like? Forget it, let it disappear.” Of course, bad and mediocre films don’t really disappear all that quickly, probably less so in our day and age, but the sentiment is still appreciated.
May 27, 2019
"Sabíamos que acabábamos de presenciar una de las noches de teatro más puras y maravillosas de nuestra vida, y sabíamos que Jack Smith seguía allí, solo en su estudio, el guardián de la tumba del fin de la civilización (...) De algún modo, todo se conservaba claramente en nosotros, como norma para nuestra vida, nuestro arte fue reestablecido por un momento, aquella noche, en el estudio de Jack Smith, allí, en la parte baja de la ciudad, en esa hora tardía en que la ciudad dormía. Había, en cierta manera, una nueva esperanza, una nueva vida en la calle oscura, mientras caminábamos en silencio."
December 28, 2016
On the average, I disagreed with about 20-30% of everything Mekas says in this book. I still give it five stars, because the man is such a persuasive, passionate, and devoted lover of film (not "movies") that the fact I didn't agree with much of what he had to say was irrelevant. The other 70% is a better 70% than other peoples' 100%. I may need to read it twice more to get everything I want to out of it.
Be warned that this edition is absolutely festering with typographical errors. Appalling lack of quality control for something from a university press. But go get it anyway. I would sooner have even a single other Mekas than a hundred other folks, even if a good third of the time I want to twist his nose.
Be warned that this edition is absolutely festering with typographical errors. Appalling lack of quality control for something from a university press. But go get it anyway. I would sooner have even a single other Mekas than a hundred other folks, even if a good third of the time I want to twist his nose.
November 24, 2007
The great and legendary iconic Jonas Mekas' collection of writings from the old Village Voice, when he covered 'Underground Cinema." The intense love he has for film is addicting - and to this day with the great Film Anthology (on East 2nd and 2nd in Manhattan) is a fantastic place to see films.
What makes this book so essential is not only the subject matter, but also Mekas' writing style which is hyper, informative, and passionate. He wrote these reviews or essays during the golden era of Underground film making - mostly from New York City (the 60's). Someone needs to reprint this book so we can feel the love for cinema once more.
What makes this book so essential is not only the subject matter, but also Mekas' writing style which is hyper, informative, and passionate. He wrote these reviews or essays during the golden era of Underground film making - mostly from New York City (the 60's). Someone needs to reprint this book so we can feel the love for cinema once more.
February 26, 2008
I think I read this when I was more than a little jaded to the revolutionary promise of experimental & underground filmmaking. As such, I think I found it a little naive. But, what the fuck, I'll take Mekas' passion anyday over a hopeless world. Mekas loves & champions work that's made its mark but how many people actually care I don't know. I mean, the multiplexes are still full of tits & guns right? I mean, the tits are fine by me but let's lose the guns, alright? &, for that matter, let's make people think about something OTHER THAN TITS too while we're at it.
March 28, 2010
It's insane that this isn't in print. Why?
April 8, 2013
Essential reading for indie film lovers. The rise of the underground film movement of the 1960s is captured in great detail by one of its chief architects.
December 13, 2016
Jonas' enthusiasm simply doesn't translate into interesting criticism.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews