Regen of Ivens - Autumn in Varsovie of Ligeti

Watching Regen while thinking at Autumn in Varsovie. Listening Autumn in Varsovie while thinking at Regen... The movie of Ivens, the piano etude of Ligeti. It's 1929 and it is raining in Amsterdam, I'm thinking at an autumn in Warsaw. It's 1985 and it's autumn in Warsaw, I'm thinking at a rain in Amsterdam. I cannot dissociate them anymore.



Autumn in Warsaw! Its mutating chromatic chords and wild rhythms draw me inexorably into the vortex of the music, escalating to an exhilarating climax and concluding in a kind of controlled chaos (Joanna MacGregor performing).... not only does the pianist play in up to four different speeds at the same time, but an individual part of the texture can change speed over time from 3 to 4 to 5 to 7, speeding up gradually or slowing down. All these individual lines are played over an underlying gridwork of fast, regular pulsations; as one of the parts that changes speed criss-crosses this background of pulsating notes, fascinating patterns are created along the way (Ligeti and his influences)... titanic Autumn a Varsovie, where the lamento theme from the finale of the Horn Trio is simultaneously presented in multiple different rhythms. The music becomes darker and more complex until a fortissimo passage crashes down to the bottom note of the piano, ending the piece (Aimard performing).



Gilles Deleuze gives a wonderful reading of this film in which he argues that the film is no longer a representation of rain, but is attempting to give the viewer the feeling, or pure quality of rain, called a qualisign. The editing is not unlike Robert Bresson in the fragmentation and use of what Deleuze calls the any-space-whatever. In Rain the shots do not have a signed linear sequence, and have no forward movement in time (there is no character moving through the spaces, nothing to make one shot before or after another one in time). This means that all of the shots could have happened all at the exact same time, theoretically. This is one of the qualities of an any-space-whatever, a space in which the spatial and temporal potentials are deconnected (unlike a fiction or documentary film which has cohesive spatial and temporal dimensions) (Dick Whyte).



In 1932 Joris Ivens asked Lou Lichtveld (who also made the music for Philips Radio) to make a sound version of it, and in 1941 the film inspired Hanns Eisler to compose his Fourteen ways to describe rain in the context of a Film Music Project. I haven't yet had the chance to listen to the variations composed by Eisler, and I watched Regen with the music of Lichtveld.




I had read a lot about Regen - so when I watched it for the first time I was expecting a masterpiece. Something was not there - something was missing - or something was too much. I saw it for the second time. The images were fantastic - but something was impeding me to feel the masterpiece.

I thought that I was too tired - Regen was coming after two hours of watching other short movies, by Epstein, Eisenstein, Weinberg ... So I was definitely tired.

I took a break and went to the kitchen to eat something, then I came back. I saw it once more. I had an idea - I cut the sound - and I watched Regen again - and now I felt the masterpiece! It is a masterpiece. Only in its simplicity it has a grandeur, a greatness - and the music of Lou Lichtveld (which is fine) is not at the same level of greatness - of simplicity and greatness.

I saw it then several times - it is like a spell, it is binding you.

A very talented video artist (cbnjulie) created Weathered, as a homage to Regen of Ivens. Her choice for the music was Chopin's Nocturne No. 20.

I sent her a comment regarding the score for Regen: someone should try also with some more modern music, like Autumn in Varsovie. Because Regen is very modern in his cinematic language. It's not only that. It's true that Regen is balanced and flows quietly while Autumn in Varsovie is wild. It's true that Regen has a Mozartian poetry, a noble and generous insight, while Autumn in Varsovie is provocative. However, there is the same any-space-whatever (see the explanation of Deleuze) in Regen as it is in Autumn in Varsovie. Any fragment comes unexpected.



Of course, Regen is around 12 minutes long, while Autumn in Varsovie is much shorter. So my suggestion is impossible.

And it is also something else. Regen is in its images music so pure that it does not need sound.


(Joris Ivens)

(Musica Nova)