Daily Movie Rec 7/11/2023

The Garden (1990)

"I offer you a journey without direction, uncertainty and no sweet conclusion. When the light faded, I went in search of myself."

Directed by: Derek Jarman

Cinematography by: Christopher Hughes

Country: United Kingdom/Germany/Japan

Genre: Drama

Plot:

Released two years after Jarman was diagnosed HIV-positive, The Garden is a non-linear, kaleidoscopic odyssey of loosely related poetic montages in which Jarman reflects on his own mortality, grieves the loved ones he lost to the disease he was currently battling, and viscerally lays bare the heinous results of homophobia and bigotry.

Reasons to watch:

Jarman was passion unfiltered, living proof that you don't need to be a mastermind technician to create stunning works of film art. He was the epitome of art as self-expression; watching his films is watching him, truly seeing who he was as a person. His heavier avant-garde works often lack a lasting emotional punch due to how fleeting they can be - constantly shifting with a boundless visual fluidity overflowing with ideas - but in The Garden, backed by an evocative score from Simon Fisher-Turner, Jarman's deeply poetic impressionism, gleeful experimentation, irreverent humor, poignant vulnerability, scathing ire, surreal nonsequiturs, confrontational politics, and limitless imagination build off of each other under his indelible artistic vision - where all those abstract elements that occasionally clashed in the past finally coalesced in a profoundly affecting symbiotic crescendo. Disturbing, campy, haunting, eccentric, beautiful, mournful, unforgettable.

Where to watch:

The Criterion Channel/Kanopy