Chelsea Girls

      One night in Portland, Oregon, in 2005, my friend took me to a maze-like video store.  She had to get to bed at ten, I was used to going to bed at two, so she had suggested I watch a rented movie in my guest bedroom.  I only had about thirty minutes in the store.  The selection seemed complete in terms of most of the history of cinema.  Among the scores of films I wanted to see I came across a double videocassette of Chelsea Girls (1966), directed by Paul Morrissey and Andy Warhol.  I considered it as a strong possibility, though it's over three hours long.  

     Finally, I picked Michelangelo Antonioni's L'Eclisse (1962).  I'm not sorry for the choice, it's a great film, but that moment when I nearly selected Chelsea Girls has stayed in mind for fifteen years as I've known I could've watched it then.  It proved elusive, too.  

     Eventually, just last night I located the film on YouTube.  A good print, sound not perfect, but presented (necessarily) in its original aspect ratio approximating Cinemascope, or 2.35:1.  

     The film throughout its 194 minute length is a split screen affair showing a succession of two different long unedited side by side images, Warhol and Morrissey using thirty-five minute film strips, creating very long takes in what is essentially a six and a half hour film shown in two pieces on one screen.

     The title refers to New York's Chelsea Hotel where much of the film was shot.  Actual rooms in the building serve as readymade sets.  The immediacy of the present (of 1966) makes the film contemporary no matter when it's watched.  Warhol and Morrissey also used a technique throughout consisting of putting audio on just one of the images while the other side of the screen is silent.  Activities, movements of characters on one side seem to have no relationship with what's going on with the group or individual on the other side of the screen, but sometimes there are curious synchronicities, as when Hanoi Hannah (Mary Woronov) appears in scenes on both sides, her long angular face (familiar from Death Race 2000 and Rock 'n' Roll High School) seeming to look towards herself in the other shot.

     Since it feels like we're looking in on private lives, people who know each other speaking about subjects and other people they know about, much of the film possesses an opaque quality.  Faces conceal whatever's going on in the brains inside.  It's quite possible to feel wonderment at this after watching for a while.  The movie, if the viewer allows it, pulls one into its structure, its rigorous conditions, and its recurrence of personalities.  The camera operator (Warhol himself) travels about the faces, the objects, walls, uses the zoom lens like a bug landing on someone and then pulling back rapidly.  Deliberate out of focus shots become mirrors of a character's mood.  

     The sequence dealing with Eric Emerson on LSD is visually marvelous; colored lights playing over the cast standing about and talking on the other side of the screen while Eric embarks on a trippy monologue (referenced in the Sonic Youth song, "Eric's Trip").  In this sequence, the denizens of the Chelsea, seen before mostly in black and white, acquire mysterious presence in bursts of color, the women's hairdos illuminated like strange towers in blue, red, white, yellow light.  Eric himself, sober, is on the other side of the screen with the others while his chemically altered self speaks of sweat, wanting to grow his hair down his back so he can experience the sensual feel of it on his skin, and of a goddess only he sees and knows about.

     Ondine on the left screen and Nico on the right begin the film, Nico in a kitchen with Eric.  Her white pants covering her long legs standout in a very bright scene with no sound while Ondine, acting the part of a priest, hears confession from someone named Ingrid.  Since this comprises the opening half hour of the movie it represents the challenge to the viewer of staying with it or giving up.  This is the film's format; it's uncompromising, but with patience comes the rewards.

     The final segment has Nico on the left side of the film in color, crying and then sitting quietly, but lit beautifully with a variety of colored lights, as with Eric's LSD sequence.  On the right side is "Pope Ondine," shooting up and then hearing confession from someone who pisses him off when she calls him a phony.  Ondine's freak out may have been staged, but it seems real as he slaps her a few times and chases her away, browbeating her for several minutes after she's gone.  Doesn't like to be called a "phony."  At one point he says to an off camera Paul Morrissey, "Did she really think I'm the Pope?"

     Ondine's sequence goes to black while Nico's beautiful colored face stays on the left screen, accompanied by the guitar music that's been playing live on the Pope Ondine side for the last ten minutes.  The movie's sudden ending causes a sense of wanting it to continue, as if the viewer suddenly realizes, "Okay, I get this."  

     Warhol said that due to the split screen effect, each viewing of the film will make for a different experience.  Indeed, there a lot of moments to digest in this movie.  While something's happening on the left, one may miss what's going on to the right and vice versa.  

     Mary Woronov is the one performer who stands out as what could be called an actress.  She's had a long career in film and TV since Chelsea Girls.  In this legendary experimental film she's great, possessing movie star screen presence.  Overall, it's a remarkable film.

Vic Neptune