Scott Beauchamp
  • Home
  • Writing
  • Contact
  • Blog
  • Home
  • Writing
  • Contact
  • Blog
An Aggregate of Last Moments

a well spent life - les blank - 1971

6/18/2018

2 Comments

 
Picture
I'd known of director Les Blank by reputation, but until last weekend had never actually seen one of his films. Having been on something of a late 60's / early 70's doc kick recently, binge watching Luis Malle's Phantom India and half-ironically watching Chariots of the Gods (the book frightened me when I read it while camping at Lake Wappapello as a kid), I felt ready to move on to something a little more..."wholesome" isn't the right word. Maybe "soulful". Something smaller scale. More focused. Something cutting a little bit closer to the bone. 

I expected the music to be good. Mance Lipscomb is one of the most accomplished and recognizable blues guitarists America has ever produced. What I didn't expect were the almost Wendell Berry-esque themes of longing, change, and a beautiful simplicity being run over roughshod by what Lipscomb calls our "fast living". Lipscomb was born in the late 1800's. The film was made in 1970. A Well Spent Life is a time capsule within a time capsule. It's both a celebration of folk art and a record of what we lost in the ascendant fevered anti-culture of celebrity. Makes you want to sing along mockingly with Lipscomb at the banal figures who currently loom in our public consciousness: "You aint so big / you just tall, that's just about all" 
2 Comments
rush assignment link
9/26/2018 03:17:53 am

There had been many people who had lived their lives very happily and we should be getting more ideas from such people. They are surely having all the secrets of life which are good to make it better for us.

Reply
www.robloxrobuxtix.com link
10/23/2018 10:15:07 pm

Hey really such a great post dear.

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    Scott Beauchamp

    Writer - Critic - Poet - Editor

    Archives

    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018

    Categories

    All

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly