Search - Rubicon on DVD

A mind-bending experience with a beautifully composed score

Robert Cotton | Allentown, Pa United States | 10/22/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This film is definitely not for everyone, and even the most ardent supporters of experimental film will have a difficult time sitting through the entire thing, especially the parking meter section which was cool but just seemed to go on about ten minutes too long. Artistically this is inferior to the work of Stan Brakkhage but I found it to be more entertaining than a majority of his work - perhaps the presence of music helped. Ah yes, the brilliant soundtrack by Edward Kurland is both a wonderful complement to this extraordinary work and a beautiful specimen of ambient non-pop on it's own. I will admit that I was initialy drawn to this film by the presence of Edward Kurland's music but now that I've seen the film twice, I will in the future keep my eyes open for films by Simon Tarr. I am not quite sure what Simon is trying to say with Rubicon, if anything at all, and he does have a slight tendency towards self-indulgence. But what great experimental artist working in these postmodern times does not display such tendencies. I actually think this strenghtens the work, as we are forced to meditate on the same themes as the artist. When I watch a scene of this film, for example the scene with the birds, I can tell that I am only seeing a minutia of what the film-maker was seeing by the time he was through editing. This is a beautiful thing because one knows that there is an infinitude of layers and codes(and not to mean "codes" in the classic or even literal sense) contained in each frame. Five stars - would give it six if I could. This film needs to be seen by many more people than it has."