Contrasting Meshes of the Afternoon and You Can Drive the Big Rigs

by Julianne Arnstein

I have seen Meshes of the Afternoon three times now, and it seems like a very easy film to make sense of. Maya Deren has clear symbolism between the key and knife and dreaming and being awake. Her film is of surrealist style, trying to tap into the unconscious mind, especially in dreams; she almost creates a narrative. Her film is also experimental in its camera movement and characters. The cameras sway with the movement of the character up the stairs and angles jaggedly upward to see into the bedroom. The characters repeat themselves in continued actions, such as chasing the cloaked figure and picking up the key, and with their bodies, such as the three Maya Derens. Deren also creates a comfortable set with a slight breeze and a homely villa, but she distorts it by adding sharp knives, keys, and mirrors, and by tipping herself (or the camera) upside down and sideways in seemingly dangerous angles.

You Can Drive the Big Rigs has a completely different feel. It is definitely an experimental film based on images and sounds and not on any type of narrative or subconscious narrative. The only continued characteristics are the sound of the beating fan, the clack of the turning clock, and the clinking of a man’s coffee cup. Leighton Pierce focuses on the images of the sticky-feeling diner with its older patrons who seem tired of life. Pierce photographs the diner as it is and presents it with no comment or change. He pieces together sound to create situations that do not exist. The viewer is not trying to figure out a point to the piece; the viewer simply watches and chuckles at the random customers caught on tape.

Deren and Pierce have created very different films, but have also managed to photograph places and situations in a very different light from the normal Hollywood style.