Maya Deren-'Meshes of the Afternoon'

Maya Deren-American Avant-Garde Filmmaker

Maya Deren is an Avant-Garde director her most popular work was produced during the 1940's and 1950s. She takes an anti-mainstream stance with her films, she promotes the idea of artistic license and creative freedom all of which are very obvious in her work. One of her most prominent films is called 'Meshes of the afternoon' made in 1943. 

Here are some of the class notes we made when watching 'Meshes of the afternoon' (Watch it for yourself below)

-This film is like poetry as it can be interpreted in to lots of different ways.

-It has  a circular narrative- some may have found this very repetitive. 

-The way it has been filmed gives of the idea that it may be a dream or in a dream world. 

-There is lots of significant imagery i.e a flower, a knife, a telephone etc. It isn't clear what seeing all these random objects me but is is up to the audience to draw there on conclusion as to what they may symbolize as they most likely have a deeper meaning. 

-There is the constant contrast between happy and sad. 

-The sound effect aren't too great as they didn't make the film seem that real at all which maybe could have been done on purpose as the whole film is quite surreal although the fact that the sound effects aren't to great is actually just a reflection of the time that this film was made. 

-A lot of different kinds of tensions are built up throughout this film.

-The fact that there is no narrative structure shows just how very experimental this film is.

-The music used is very sacrificial.

-When the second half of the film is watch the story become a little clearer, as the audience we begin to understand and think that the women in the film is very suicidal in which she is fighting with herself, the key that come from her mouth is like the answer almost as if the right answers lie within her. Furthermore thins kind of story line is very Avant-Garde as it is  a very deep issue that has been shown without you any proper dialogue or anything unlike a mainstream film.