Dir. Dave Fleischer

I saw this animated short tonight and when trying to describe it I couldn't go beyond, "wierd", "different", "wiggly."

I realize now the best word is "experimental."

Realizing this, I then realized there are two kinds of "experimental."

There is the ususal kind-- art that breaks the mould, tries something new, diverges from expectations or value judgements. (Feel free to expand on this list, which is itself a value judgement.)

But there is actually another kind, which is art that is groping the in the dark, is operating without existing conventions, flailing like Olive Oyl's arms.

Perhaps only early art in new medium (or new context) can be this second kind of experimental. Perhaps we should mine early videogames, early film, early webpages, early writing more deeply, seeing it as the trunk of a tree that could have grown in totally different directions.

I recently saw Charlie Chaplin's The Gold Rush, and based on just the little bit of context I have, I have the impression it is a bit of a prototype for long-form feature films, just generally. Maybe a large part of our whole tree of cinema grew from this one film.

What about other movies made at the same time, by (perhaps) less talented people, or less successful films by talented people? Are there failed experiments? What do these failed experiments represent? Are they are branches that did not grow because they could not, or are they branches that did not grow because other branches did? Or they did not grow, because they were pointed only slightly in the wrong direction?

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