2012 Movie #13 - Demolition Man (1993) I am an unabashed fan of DEMOLITION MAN. I’ve seen the film probably 10 times, although this viewing is the first time I’ve seen it for over a decade. I need to remedy that, and watch this film again every few years. The most fascinating aspect of DEMOLITION MAN is that it works not only as both a big-budget straightforward science-fiction action film but also as a sly satire of early 90s American culture including big-budget straightforward science-fiction action films! The biggest discovery from this recent viewing resulted from the impetus to figure out what happened to the director of DEMOLITION MAN. When the film ended, I just couldn’t figure out why Marco Brambilla didn’t become a huge Hollywood director. He only directed two features, DEMOLITION MAN and EXCESS BAGGAGE (not as good as DEMOLITION MAN). He directed the miniseries DINOTOPIA in 2002. He also directed a segment in the DESTRICTED anthology. And that’s it. At first I thought he was just another case of a director who maybe got screwed around by the studio system, maybe was a difficult personality, or any other reason why talented people somehow get a series of unlucky breaks. But the credit on DESTRICTED is what gave me the clue to keep searching. DESTRICTED is an anthology film with segments directed by Marina Abramovic, Matthew Barney, Larry Clark, Gaspar Noé, Richard Prince, Sam Taylor-Wood, and…Marco Brambilla. Now this list contains a lot of high-profile “auteur” filmmakers, and I was fascinated by the inclusion of Marco Brambilla. A director whose only other IMDB credits are DEMOLITION MAN, EXCESS BAGGAGE, and DINOTOPIA. Despite my love of DEMOLITION MAN, none of these are considered artistic high-points or “auteur” driven works. Why was Brambilla included in this anthology? So my search continued, and I quickly stumbled onto Marco Brambilla’s personal website. The answer became clear. Brambilla is a successful and in my opinion, quite incredible, video artist. You’ve probably seen at least one of his video art pieces, as he created the promo for Kanye West’s POWER, setting the stage for what I consider to be the defining work of Kanye’s career with the release of “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy.” Amusingly, back in 2001, Brambilla had an exhibition called In Action, at Henry Urbach Architecture in New York with a piece called Sequel described as: “Film footage of Sylvester Stallone in Brambilla’s 1993 debut feature-film, Demolition Man, is re-photographed through the gate of a 35mm projector. The movement of the film is gradually slowed down until the intense light from the projector arc lamp starts to disintegrate the celluloid.” The scene in question is the one of Sylvestor Stallone being cryogenically frozen. Here’s a still image from the piece, and you can clearly see Stallone’s figure. I feel oddly validated in my love of DEMOLITION MAN seeing what Marco Brambilla has been doing since then, and I suspect he’s finding more creative satisfaction in his new career than many of his fellow 90s action directors. Some more excerpts from Marco Brambilla video art. (I believe that full versions of most of his pieces aren’t available online, but you can find his work in many galleries around the world.) Flashback (POV), 2010Christopher Grimes Gallery, Santa Monica Flashback is the first in a series of sampled works exploring subliminal collective consciousness in film. This piece weaves together Film Noir imagery to create a kinetic video canvas visualizing the spectrum of human emotion and recall using the principles of cognitive psychology. Civilization (Megaplex), 2008Collection Fundacion Sorigue, Lleida, Spain Civilization is a multi-layered tableau of interconnecting images that illustrates a contemporary, satirical take on the concepts of eternal punishment and celestial reward. More than 300 individual channels of looped video are blended into an expansive landscape that continuously scrolls upward, from the depths of hell to the gates of heaven.  Sync, 2005Private Collection, HoustonCollection Metronome Foundation for Contemporary Art, Barcelona Sync features three screens of densely edited film footage, each organized around a different theme—fight scenes, sex scenes, and theater audiences—all progressing at the rate of 12 shots per second. Overlaying all three is a violently percussive audio montage. The result is a new visual choreography that rapidly builds to a state of sensory overload, emphasizing how viewers develop a resistance to graphic sex and brutality, both in the movies and in the news media in general.  See more on Marco Brambilla’s website or on the Christopher Grimes Gallery website. High-res

2012 Movie #13 - Demolition Man (1993)

I am an unabashed fan of DEMOLITION MAN. I’ve seen the film probably 10 times, although this viewing is the first time I’ve seen it for over a decade. I need to remedy that, and watch this film again every few years. The most fascinating aspect of DEMOLITION MAN is that it works not only as both a big-budget straightforward science-fiction action film but also as a sly satire of early 90s American culture including big-budget straightforward science-fiction action films!

The biggest discovery from this recent viewing resulted from the impetus to figure out what happened to the director of DEMOLITION MAN. When the film ended, I just couldn’t figure out why Marco Brambilla didn’t become a huge Hollywood director. He only directed two features, DEMOLITION MAN and EXCESS BAGGAGE (not as good as DEMOLITION MAN). He directed the miniseries DINOTOPIA in 2002. He also directed a segment in the DESTRICTED anthology. And that’s it.

At first I thought he was just another case of a director who maybe got screwed around by the studio system, maybe was a difficult personality, or any other reason why talented people somehow get a series of unlucky breaks.

But the credit on DESTRICTED is what gave me the clue to keep searching. DESTRICTED is an anthology film with segments directed by Marina Abramovic, Matthew Barney, Larry Clark, Gaspar Noé, Richard Prince, Sam Taylor-Wood, and…Marco Brambilla. Now this list contains a lot of high-profile “auteur” filmmakers, and I was fascinated by the inclusion of Marco Brambilla. A director whose only other IMDB credits are DEMOLITION MAN, EXCESS BAGGAGE, and DINOTOPIA. Despite my love of DEMOLITION MAN, none of these are considered artistic high-points or “auteur” driven works. Why was Brambilla included in this anthology?

So my search continued, and I quickly stumbled onto Marco Brambilla’s personal website. The answer became clear. Brambilla is a successful and in my opinion, quite incredible, video artist. You’ve probably seen at least one of his video art pieces, as he created the promo for Kanye West’s POWER, setting the stage for what I consider to be the defining work of Kanye’s career with the release of “My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy.”

Amusingly, back in 2001, Brambilla had an exhibition called In Action, at Henry Urbach Architecture in New York with a piece called Sequel described as:

“Film footage of Sylvester Stallone in Brambilla’s 1993 debut feature-film, Demolition Man, is re-photographed through the gate of a 35mm projector. The movement of the film is gradually slowed down until the intense light from the projector arc lamp starts to disintegrate the celluloid.”

The scene in question is the one of Sylvestor Stallone being cryogenically frozen. Here’s a still image from the piece, and you can clearly see Stallone’s figure.

I feel oddly validated in my love of DEMOLITION MAN seeing what Marco Brambilla has been doing since then, and I suspect he’s finding more creative satisfaction in his new career than many of his fellow 90s action directors.

Some more excerpts from Marco Brambilla video art. (I believe that full versions of most of his pieces aren’t available online, but you can find his work in many galleries around the world.)

Flashback (POV), 2010
Christopher Grimes Gallery, Santa Monica

Flashback is the first in a series of sampled works exploring subliminal collective consciousness in film. This piece weaves together Film Noir imagery to create a kinetic video canvas visualizing the spectrum of human emotion and recall using the principles of cognitive psychology.

Civilization (Megaplex), 2008
Collection Fundacion Sorigue, Lleida, Spain

Civilization is a multi-layered tableau of interconnecting images that illustrates a contemporary, satirical take on the concepts of eternal punishment and celestial reward. More than 300 individual channels of looped video are blended into an expansive landscape that continuously scrolls upward, from the depths of hell to the gates of heaven. 

Sync, 2005
Private Collection, Houston
Collection Metronome Foundation for Contemporary Art, Barcelona

Sync features three screens of densely edited film footage, each organized around a different theme—fight scenes, sex scenes, and theater audiences—all progressing at the rate of 12 shots per second. Overlaying all three is a violently percussive audio montage. The result is a new visual choreography that rapidly builds to a state of sensory overload, emphasizing how viewers develop a resistance to graphic sex and brutality, both in the movies and in the news media in general. 

See more on Marco Brambilla’s website or on the Christopher Grimes Gallery website.