Sunday, December 17, 2006

Izzi Is Isis (je suis aussi)


I saw The Fountain a couple of weeks ago, and I just gotta say...

if I had not spent the past 20+ years immers'd in strange, forbidden knowledge, maybe it just would have been a semi-charming love story w/ really cool
non-CGI (!) special effects. Maybe.

As it "is," I sat there, in the dark, not believing my eyes, because I was watching a very beautiful and moving presentation of
  • the Isis/Osiris myth
  • the Shakti/Shiva myth
  • the Adam/Eve myth
  • the secret of the ancient mystery schools
  • the Sophia/Christ myth
  • the tzim-tzum of Kabbalah
  • the IX° of a certain palindromic magickal order
The filmmaker, Darren Aronofsky, has made Kabbalistic films before, including π, which I liked but felt a bit let down by--the magick or the mystery or whatever being a bit pedestrian for this jaded reporter. But The Fountain...! I felt like those characters in Valis who go out to the movies and are stunned by the subtexts-within-subtexts of an elegant work of symbolism that seems almost to be looking back at them, into their eyes, into their souls. And then they go on their quest, to find the mystery school or conspiracy behind the movie...

but the real truth is, we are all members of the conspiracy...as we find when we begin to chart the star-field of Creation, only to find writ there already the story of our journey, in the hieroglyphic code of God coming to know Her/self.


k∞

2 comments:

  1. Anonymous1:46 AM

    I have seen this movie as well, and I think it's one of the best cinematic adaptations of Ayn Rand yet committed to the screen. Also one of Gary Cooper's best performances. Patricia Neal and Raymond Massey are also quite good. I didn't realize that all of Roarke's buildings were depicted without the use of CGI. Aint that sumthin'!

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  2. ok...dawg...I don't wanna pull film rank on you or anything, but the best adaptation of Rand is that lo-budget German one from the early 1960s (that Fassbinder was assistant cameraman on)...this is the one that only consists of Roarke wobbling around and then falling off the roof of a series of ever-more-impressive edifices.

    c'est magnifique! or whatever they say in German.

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