Film

A Grand Experiment

Seattle Underground Film Festival Returns for a Second Year

by Jamie Hook

AN EXPERIMENT IS a stab at fixing a mystery. It begins with a vision of the impossible, and then labors to find an adequate expression for it. By definition, experiments frequently end in failure, but the energy released in the process of trying to find a path through the unknown is often justification enough for taking that stab in the first place.

The founders of the Seattle Underground Film Fest (SUFF), now in its second year, wear their experimental bent on their sleeves. Filmmakers Jon Behrens and Steve Creson founded the fest in 1999 "to try and provide some sort of home for smaller, more experimental, more rough-edged work." Their tremendous effort last year produced a festival that was ragged and somewhat confusing, but gloriously, giddily energetic--a refreshing and welcome combination of intents put upon the local film scene, which too often finds itself aimlessly, witlessly kissing its own ass in a doomed attempt to impress the mainstream.

The experimental nature of much of last year's SUFF program was, of course, elemental to its identity. In the last decade, experimental films have been egregiously damned to the underworld of American cinema. As the so-called "independent film" movement continues its death march across the landscape of cinema, the once-vital subgenre of experimental film has found itself positively unwelcome in the increasingly timid mainstream film-festival circuit.

The irony is that the loss is entirely mainstream cinema's. The stultifying demands of the commercial system--increasingly manipulated by the Hollywood fringe and its wannabes-in-waiting--all but guarantee that artistic integrity take a back seat to such non-entities as "Production Value," "Demographic Appeal," and "Primary Genre." Indeed, in such a filmmaking environment, the filmmaker who knowingly sets out to experiment is, at best, simply ignorant; at worst, a downright failure.

Which, if you haven't sensed my bent by now, is a great thing. I can guarantee that the second annual SUFF will have its fair share of failures. Perhaps some will even be spectacular failures; I hope few will be the flaccid, dull failures of the merely incompetent or lazy. But, by the very palpable possibility of admitted failure, I can also reasonably presume the festival will offer its share of fabulous successes--the important kind that emerge from within the specific body of a specific fest on their own terms, and clear the air. Such films are increasingly rare in the context of such large, hedging-our-bets festivals as Sundance or even our own SIFF.

A few samples presented to the press seem to affirm this possibility. The experimental narrative A Step Removed (Narrative Film Shorts III, 10/14 @ 9:30, Cinema 18) delicately examines the nature of memory and place in a wordless, 11-minute relay of still and live imagery. Restrained, yet confident, the film manages to suggest the vastness of the disconnection our shrinking world seems to conjure up--and yet, it does so on its own terms, conducting a unique visual experiment that succeeds.

Not quite as successful, though quite gripping nonetheless, is Kalin's Prayer (Narrative Film Shorts II, 10/7 @ 9:45, Cinema 18), a headlong rush of blurred images and fractured sounds that skirts around the story of a lesbian model and the stages of her failed affair with a civil-rights lawyer. That it manages to conjure up as much information as it does, without ever resorting to dialogue or even narrative imagery, is testament to the film's visual confidence. Indeed, the film only suffers from the poor performance of the lead actress--a slight problem in a strong film.

Other recommendations include Seattle director Russ Thompson's elegiac, personal WTO document, 30 Frames a Second (10/10 @ 7:30, Cinema 18); Documentary Short Subjects (10/13 @ 5:00, the Little Theatre), a series of surreal and poetic documentaries; Metal (10/10 @ 9:30, Cinema 18), a meditation on urban decay; and The Widower (10/13 @ 3:00, Cinema 18), about a man living with his dead wife.

There is a huge selection in this year's festival, meaning there are that many more risks for the audience to take. I'll hazard a guess that your risks will pay off handsomely. Certainly, it's an experiment worth pursuing.