As the thematic center of the
Cycle, the creamy
Cremaster middle,
Cremaster 3 serves as the unifying factor which joins together the disparate elements of the other four
Cremasters. As the final entry produced, it is the longest, most complex, most technically assured – and director/cremastermind Matthew Barney’s head is clearly the furthest up his own ass.
Cremaster 3 is no doubt functional on the level it was conceived, but it is wholly self-indulgent (careful editing would do this beast wonders),
and self-referential (God help anyone trying to make sense of it without recourse to the
Cycle as its primary subject). It is the crown jewel of Barney’s whole career, but it occupies a privileged dialogue that excludes basically everyone on Earth.
Did I mention it’s 3 damn hours of self-satisfied navel gazing? That is to say, it’s a work of 20th century fine art – even
if it was made in the ‘00s.
In Ireland is the Giant’s Causeway, with naturally-occurring stone pillars in hexagonal and pentagonal shapes – shapes with great importance to
Cremaster 2 as well as here in
3. Barney saunters along to a silly Irish tune (“deet dit dat dit dut dot”) to collect these stones. The freaking end credits alone reveal he is Fionn, up against the giant Fingal. For a series that is decidedly non-linguistic, closest
cinematically to silent film (though Barney is disgustingly opposed to using
cinematic tricks, rather than merely filming
performance art), you’d think they could at least spare, oh, a
title card to point this out – you know, since knowing the legend of Fionn and Fingal is essential to parsing out this first section. Why bury it at the tail end of the flick? Oh right, just ‘cause it’s fun to be difficult, eh? Oh ART, you perverse and self-defeating practice!
So without immediately knowing the whole legend of Ireland (and better yet, Scotland!), here’s what one can deduce: Giant clomps in water, red-headed little nutbar (Barney) scampers all about to his cottage. Boy, that was worth the ten minutes it took to render on screen, wasn’t it?
But screw that Irish stuff, it mostly won’t matter! For now we’re in some earthy catacomb, as a sickeningly thin woman (that is to say, yet another “tragic” New York artist type) emerges from the grime and filth. There’s some Jewish stuff coming up, so let’s say there’s some Golem in here (
not the Tolkien character, goon!). The briefly atonal soundtrack is one of our few clues of something
once again only the end credits shall make clear – this wench is Gary Gilmore, having presumably undergone Houdini’s sexual metamorphosis suggested at the end of
Cremaster 2. (Look, this is one of the clearest sections in the film, for what it’s worth.)
How long do you think it’d take to show a lady emerging from dirt? Thirty seconds? One minute? How about six or seven? That’s Barney’s problem, he is so damnably proud of his finely wrought imagery, he cannot
fathom parsing it down further! (Considering the 180 minutes of cremasturbation on display here are but
1/20th of the original footage, imagine the beastly two day movie Barney wants us to see!) That’s one of my chief problems with
Cremaster 3: there’s only so much
content available, and mulling over it doesn’t add new meaning. And unlike
Cremaster 2, the imagery isn’t in and of itself so evocative mere to merit this languorous pace. This is where, as film, the
Cycle breaks apart, even while it adheres to the merits of performance art and sculpture and wanking.
Time passes (oh does it ever), and five ushers arrive to, well, ush. They lead the Gilmore girl to a lobby, as Barney slowly reveals our main setting for the day: the Chrysler Building. The number five is important throughout the flick, for it is symbolic…of
The Cremaster Cycle! Yeah, half of the symbolism in
3 is merely
code for its brethren, nothing with, you know, greater import concerning the human condition. You know, art. Still, the film has to stand for a lot. The audience has to stand for a lot as well.
Ms. Gary Gilmore is seen into a black Chevy coupe, as four other sedans surround it – by their colors and patched-over (that is,
unseen) emblems (way to intentionally hide the symbols, jackass), they represent all five
Cremasters. And here in the ground lobby of the Chrysler Building, which
does nicely combine the sterility of
Cremaster 1 and the grime of
Cremaster 2, the cars dance around each other – the same arena display we’ve been audience to twice already. Then it’s a ritualized demolition derby, Gilmore’s vehicle the eternal victim of a scene straight outa
Christine – only ARTISTIC, because it’s too long. Congrats, Barney, you found a way to make automotive carnage sorta boring. Shake hands with Michael Bay.
(By the way, even the
dates of the five cars relate to the five most crucial events in
Barney’s own life – Ah, the 20th century, when autobiographical details and
withheld outside knowledge became essential components to visual art.)
Now we meet our hero – we know he’s our hero, ‘cause it’s Matthew Barney himself, the next step up in human evolution, surely. For the one time in the whole franchise, Barney looks like a normal human being, with his own skin town and a full wardrobe. It is 1930, the final days of the Chrysler Building’s erection (heh heh…and yeah, this sexual metaphor franchise intends that meaning), and Barney is the Entered Apprentice – had to check the end credits to know this, naturally.
Like an Art Deco John McClane, the Apprentice scampers his way up through the elevator shaft, ultimately breaking through an elevator’s roof. He sets the ceiling sprinkler running with a cigarette lighter, and begins the lengthy, mulled over process of using it to mix cement. Then the Apprentice merely slops the cement throughout the elevator, over the course of 20 minutes, as the whole thing floods. I sense a Masonic variation on
The Shining’s elevator scene coming up – except we never do get the “money shot.”
In-film reference fails me, so I take recourse to the artist’s official write-up, meant to “supplement” (that is, just read it and screw the movie). Apparently, the Apprentice has cast a perfect ashlar, when he ought to have hewn it. Thus, the Masonic initiation rites are a sham – Oh yes, to “get” this one, you gotta be conversant in the secrets of Freemasonry. I must’ve missed that Dan Brown book.
At long freaking last the Apprentice bids his ceremonial elevator farewell, and ascends to the building’s Cloud Club. He emerges and spends like 4 minutes standing still and looking at the Maitre d’ (Paul Brady). For reasons seemingly no one is clear on, the Apprentice pulls elevator strings from the shaft, fashions a harp from them (takes another 3 minutes), and the Maitre d’ proceeds to pluck and sing in Gaelic. It’s
Irish, what with the Celtic harp and all, and I’m assured that Irish people think seemingly anything
Irish is automatically “important.” (See James Joyce.) Sure beats actual depth.
Let us get to know the members of the Cloud Club lounge we’ll be spending the next 45 minutes with. In one room are various ‘30s gangsters (a visual so basic, not even Barney can screw it up with his precious little artistic additions). They break out various Masonic tools – the compass, plumb, trowel, square, gavel – and run through a highly-stylized ceremonial act of diddling around uselessly for 10 minutes. Considering the architectural thematics on display here (I am an architect, and am erring on that reading), I like to imagine this as a literal, representative movie, with this silent foofaraw being an
actual process all completed buildings must go through. Makes the movie more fun, thinking that.
Okay, that was pretty simple. In another room is a lass (Aimee Mullins, a paraplegic – read: legless – athlete who was invited to this party not because Barney is about good taste or anything, but because he’s trying to be weird). The woman has the world’s least practical shoes on, which happen to be a machine for dicing potatoes. Ah, I see! Potatoes = Irish!
How very deep and moving! My spirit is elevated, because I see potatoes get cut once, then about seven more times, in another over-long scene! But it’s
Irish, and thus worth fawning over in awe (see also
The Boondock Saints). What next, someone ordering a pint of Guinness?
Next, the Apprentice orders a pint of Guinness. The barman’s efforts to fulfill this Deep, Significant Act make up the Cycle’s one attempt at humorousness (though I
did laugh out of hand at the Oakland Raiders logo in
Cremaster 2). I said attempt. In a rare moment of fidelity to cinematic traditions, Matthew Barney attempts to create a silent film comedy routine, every step of Guinness procurement going “hilariously” awry. Such a thing
could be very funny, say in “
Mr. Bean.” But Barney’s instincts are not to benefit the comedy. Nope, when weirdness and languorousness are possible, he’ll always cede to them! And so a slapstick act of broken pint glasses and spewing beer suds somehow, in Barney’s hands, seems like as much performance art as everything else.
Finally the Apprentice gets his symbolically-laden pint and –
We’re at the racetrack! Five horses race, and I’m assured if you freeze frame these films which will never be released on DVD at
just the right spot, you can make out the emblems for the five entries. Ah. Two teams win simultaneously, so the garland (field emblem) is split in two – I am at least conversant enough in these things to mark that out as the
Cycle’s exact center. And the horses are all revealed to be skinless zombie horses – this is a gore effect more effective than in most horror films. Nice one.
The Apprentice is here now, so three gangsters capture him (as per the notes, because of his spurious ashlar – the concrete elevator). They put, like, trowel stirrups in the Apprentice’s mouth, and bash his teeth in against a railing in a scene that really puts
American History X to shame. What’s it say when a hoi polloi New York art project is more graphically disturbing than movies that
try? (And I haven’t even gotten to the horrible part.)
Back at the bar, the (bloodied) Apprentice accepts his beer. This is surely a loaded and grand moment, because it’s –
INTERMISSION
When I return from voiding in a urinal and scratching my cremaster, I find the Apprentice lashed down in a dental chair, just in time for the extreme body terror we’ve been promised. Is it safe? First up, the gangsters place a sheet of hot plastic over the Apprentice’s face, force feeding him the remnants of Gilmore’s car, now apple-sized. That was the easy part. The Apprentice, now nude (seemingly Barney’s one true comfort zone), exposes his anus for all to see.
Thank you, movie! Then, as we’re all calmly enjoying our popcorn, his
rectum prolapses inside-out and his intestines shoot forth in 3-D to void slime and teeth and blood!...Well then! I’m told that symbolically this represents – Screw symbolism! The man just enacted a YouTube video!...Whatever, Barney’s justification for wallowing in extended butt-horror is…HUBRIS…That’s also
why he did it.
I almost forgot! We also get to see Barney’s penis here (lucky us), which is not usual. It is flat, spiky, and looks like a sea anemone. I don’t think that was a prosthetic.
Excuse me while I take a shower.
Upstairs is the Architect (Richard Serra, maker of non-butt art). At least that’s what
I called him. The end credits, once again the only part of the film worth referencing, call him Hiram Abiff. I guess it’s back to the Internet for me!
Hiram Abiff is an allegorical figure made known only to third degree Freemasons (and Wikipedia users) in a Masonic play concerning the Temple of Solomon and Abiff’s subsequent murder for his refusal to give up the secret name of God (psst: it’s “God”). But you already knew that.
Conversant in the obscurities Barney is in love with, I can now understand how the pentagonal pillars (from pentagonal discs) the Architect ascends are supposed to stand for Jachin and Boaz, the Biblical columns. It’s so obvious! It almost makes the maypole routine the Architect partakes in at the top of the Chrysler Building seem almost too easy in comparison. Of course, all those CGI banners around the spire weren’t cheap, so let’s fill out 5 to 7 minutes with ‘em – which Barney would’ve done anyway.
The Apprentice, now clothed even though his sphincter is clearly still dangling about inside his pant leg, ascends to the spire to do ceremonial battle with our Pagan/Jewish/Irish/Masonic Architect. Between this and
Q: The Winged Serpent (and presumably
The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, had anybody seen it), it seems the Chrysler Building plays host to some
very weird events. I’ll take the ape-ridden Empire State Building myself, thank you very much. The Apprentice closes in on the Architect, I get ready to sip on my jacket and go, and…
And…
And we’re in the Guggenheim’s rotunda!
Noooo! It’s time for “The Order,” a film-within-a-film (a
whole film). I never thought it was possible for an art movie about butthole rending to jump the shark, but I think
Cremaster 3 just did.
Naked ladies emerge from a bubble bath in the lobby (what’d the curator make of all this?), X’s coyly covering their tits in this butt-happy tale. And here is Barney, our hero and superman, in one of the most honestly disturbing sights I have ever witnessed (generously pictured above). His skin is an unhealthy pink, even for a white man, and he has on a Scottish kilt and tartan that is even pinker still – like a gay(er) Scotsman. With a fine silk kerchief lodged bloodily in his mouth. Sexualized gore I can handle (I am conversant in the cinema of Japan
and Korea), but…that ain’t right! I was dreading this moment, as all the
Cremaster material available loves to crow on this image.
This is a choral interlude. Game show music plays as Barney ascends to the first (of five, natch) rotunda levels. Here he faces –
The Order of the Rainbow for Girls. Yeah, overly-curlicue titles spell this out (like everything in Cremaster, even the title visuals are a bit too hermetic and
horror vacui). Fine one, Matt! You finally put explanatory titles on-screen, and it’s just intentionally obfuscating. Moves like this make me wanna not even try playing your fruity little game.
The great Edinburgh poof, our protagonist (an odd choice for so Ireland-centric a piece), goes on to play a fruity little game.
Cremaster 1’s chorus girls line dance on this level, now clad like sheep – ah, sexual temptation for the Scot! Barney moves around in a strange way for a bit, like some sort of art house Konami code, and is thus allowed to proceed up to level two. And really, it’s like a video game, but with rules just as arcane as anything else here. Anyway, onwards!
Agnostic Front and Murphy’s Law. Two hardcore rock bands play, to crowds of happy moshers. Google research explains Barney’s odd title is actually the bands’ shared names. Way to…mean absolutely nothing, actually. The occasional symbolism in here is as empty as the wooden cross box game doohickey Barney’s currently working on. But he gives up, to hell with it all, and climbs up anyway.
Aimee Mullen. I know now who she is (our potato-slicer), but I cannot see how she clearly must be 1/5th of the gonad’s natural progression (this series’ overall schema). She has crystal prosthetic legs, and attempts a seduction. Apparently, this wasn’t a strange enough image for Barney, so he has Aimee replaced with a cheetah lady, like something out of “
Thundercats” or a furry website. Odd stuff happens, and Game Genie allows Barney to continue.
Loughton Ram (actually, I think it was something more banally obfuscating, but I forget it). This level’s centerpiece is a sculpture made of Vaseline (as are all of Barney’s sculptures – Who makes a career out of this stuff?!). It is a ram chimera thingamajiggus whathaveyou bagpipe, simultaneously specific and random, and somehow disgustingly biological. I hate it. Barney hurls five Vaseline cabers over the damn ram. Thus he beats the level and…beats, mentally, too.
Richard Serra. Barney’s fellow (superior) artist is here, working with a certain molten sculpting material. All I’ll say is it’s a familiar petroleum jelly. He slops it around because – Ah, who cares?! Barney ascends, does nothing noteworthy, and goes back down. Yeah, really, whatever.
You’d think this nonsense was over, but noooooooo! Barney
again runs through the same routine of vague randomness on each level. He tosses more cabers (that sounds like a euphemism). He shows the cheetah woman his butt. He stands near the moshers, to no effect. He crawls underneath the chorus girls’ legs, referencing back to
The Big Lebowski which was referencing the moment in
Cremaster 1 that this is also referencing, and Barney hasn’t 1/100th the Coens’ sense of brevity (hence wit). To them, Barney is worth but a 10-second glancing reference!
Now Barney, our pink Scottish critical darling, returns to the ground floor. So we’re done here, right?
DAMN IT! Barney starts climbing the rotunda
again! Why
why WHY?! So it’s back to the chorus girls, to see if there is anything more one can figuratively milk out of them. Then Barney is back in the mosh pit.
This time, he manages to retrieve (Vaseline) Masonic tools from within the box game, something he really could have done the first time through, 30 minutes ago, except…well, you know how masturbation is. Then Barney returns to the cheetah woman – trust me, the end is near – and brains her with the Vaseline hammer!
A pink hermaphrodite in full Scottish regalia just impaled an anthropomorphized feline with a hardened jelly cudgel in the middle of the Guggenheim. And I don’t even bat an eye at this. It all takes me back to my youth, when I became desensitized to violence. It’s weirdness now!
Okay,
NOW “The Order’s” over. Back in the Chrysler Building (I am surprisingly thankful to be here again), the Architect is
also given the hammer death. Ah, so that past interlude was just a metaphor for this metaphor – which is itself a metaphor for another metaphor which is just a way to say “My testicles dangle.”
The Chrysler spire plummets downwards, killing the Apprentice. Hah hah, you’re fired!
Now we’re back in Ireland, for as much good as it does us, as that giant Fingal closes in on Fionn. Fionn is now dressed as a baby, because I want you to film me dressed as a baby for a while because it’s ART. Fionn severely beats the giant, removes his teeth, and bites off his fingers. I saw the same thing happen in
Leprechaun 2, and no one made
that an installation at the Musée d’art Moderne. Fionn then hurls a crazy stone that looks to me like nothing more than a deformed potato chip, but I am assured (again, only by extra-filmic research) that it’s the Isle of Man. This provides a segue to the Man-set
Cremaster 4 – Isn’t it nice when you already made your sequel 8 years ago?
Then the end credits pop up, providing most of the info I could’ve already used.
Well,
Cremaster 3 is undoubtedly the best of the
Cycle. What went wrong with it? Basically, it doesn’t work as a film – A photo series would get the point across better. Then
time wouldn’t be an issue. Really, after one minute of a shoe slicing potatoes, does another six minutes of it really add that much more insight? And as ART,
Cremaster 3 is profoundly wanting for layers. Oh sure, we have events standing for other events
within the process, but there is no entry level. A film like
Toy Story 3, let’s say, has a nicely complex metaphor for the afterlife, but it
doesn’t demand that you see it that way. Sadly, something like
Cremaster somewhat prohibits divergent interpretation, for how specifically the individual pieces point to a
specific embedded meaning. That’s why
Psycho, a mainstream and representative film, is celebrated as the greatest work of a master artist, even while it is
totally functional as a baseline thriller.
Still, I cannot say
Cremaster 3 was an unpleasant experience. It’s too idiosyncratic for that. And while I’m not sure it achieves its lofty aspirations, at least it aimed for them.
Related posts:• No. 2
Cremaster 1 (1996)
• No. 4
Cremaster 2 (1999)
• No. 1
Cremaster 4 (1995)
• No. 3
Cremaster 5 (1997)
