posted September 24, 2001 17:29            

Review - 09.24.01
Matthew Barney [USA]
Cremaster 1
Gesture on Screen, Festival International de Nouvelle Danse
Ex-Centris Cinema (Le Parallèle)

A cremaster is a muscle that forms a thin network of fascicles around the spermatic cord and testis and elevates the testis (and which retracts them in cold or fear). In the last five days of le grand labo I have seen more male frontal nudity than you can shake a stick at. I'm really starting to wonder if this is a sub-theme for the festival. Thankfully Matthew Barney's Cremaster 1 only refers to male genitalia in an abstract fashion.

This is an artfully created film that sweeps you away to a fantasy world where a Boise, Idaho football stadium has blue astro-turf and surreal chorus girls, in outfits that are like Ziegfield Follies meets the Jetsons, dance an homage to Busby Berkeley. Meanwhile, high above the pastel playing field two phallic Goodyear blimps are floating. Four frosty flight attendants watch over a table where a gelatin model of a cremaster is surrounded by grapes. Underneath this table lives the palid Goodyear woman who claws a tiny hole that she pulls the grapes through. The patterns she creates with the grapes are emulated by the chorus girls below.

This film is dream-like in quality, with a wonderful aesthetic sensibility. It's also has some fantastic fashion; the flight attendants wear uniforms designed by Isaac Mizrahi and the chorus girls wear Manolo Blahniks on their feet. Cremaster 1 is a delightful escape, a sly wink at the relationship between abundance and sexuality.

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