Three Essays on Sexuality

[Mistress Fei]

Here's a quote by Freud on Sadism in his Three Essays on Sexuality:

 

"In sadism, long since known to us as a component instinct of sexuality... we have before us a particularly strong alloy... between trends of love and the destructive instinct... in sadism the death instinct twists the erotic aim to its own purpose yet fully gratifies the erotic aim,"

 

Some food for thought 

[purgatorio]

Yes, I eat that.

[Dogzilla]

Mistress Fei, You always keep us on our toes!

[Mistress Kang]

Almost everything can be linked in this world.  Fei, knowing your love of foreign films, have you even seen "Benny's Video"?  It's very macabre and shows how the Internet/social media places can make people feel disconnected, even "protected" in a way. The entire movie is on YT for free.  There isn't much dialog but it's in German with Spanish subtitles.

 

Me fact: I love watching (and always do watch) shows with subtitles even if it's English to English.  Whenever I go to the movies, I wish so badly for subtitles.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMUkrSJNcfs

[Dogzilla]

Me fact: I love watching (and always do watch) shows with subtitles even if it's English to English.  Whenever I go to the movies, I wish so badly for subtitles.

I like subtitles too. As long as they're well timed, I find that I get more focused on the movie. It's subtitlephilia!

[Mistress Fei]

Almost everything can be linked in this world.  Fei, knowing your love of foreign films, have you even seen "Benny's Video"?  It's very macabre and shows how the Internet/social media places can make people feel disconnected, even "protected" in a way. The entire movie is on YT for free.  There isn't much dialog but it's in German with Spanish subtitles.

 

Me fact: I love watching (and always do watch) shows with subtitles even if it's English to English.  Whenever I go to the movies, I wish so badly for subtitles.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMUkrSJNcfs

YES I have!! I loved it for its darkness and brutality.

 

A film I'm watching now that actually made me think of Benny's Video is Noriko's Dinner Table. It has similar themes of violence as entertainment, depersonalization through exposure to media/internet, and a dire need for authentic connection due to the disconnection in the technological era.

 

Haneke is one of my favorite directors. He's very confrontational about the purpose of media/surveillance, why we consume what we consume, and whether we should. Cache and Funny Games are some of my favorites of his along with Benny's Video.

[tommygermany]

Does anyone know the Korean movie "Aragami"

it was a sneak preview OwS (Original with Subtitles)

at our cinema...which means you pay for a movie, and

you don't know, what they will show you until the

movie starts.... like a mystery mistress session if

you like to compare it....

and the movie and story was so bad, it was already

Cult... there were only 4 characters ...

[Mistress Fei]

Does anyone know the Korean movie "Aragami"

it was a sneak preview OwS (Original with Subtitles)

at our cinema...which means you pay for a movie, and

you don't know, what they will show you until the

movie starts.... like a mystery mistress session if

you like to compare it....

and the movie and story was so bad, it was already

Cult... there were only 4 characters ...

no i don't.. tell me more!

[loveinthetimeofcollaring]

Does anyone know the Korean movie "Aragami"

it was a sneak preview OwS (Original with Subtitles)

at our cinema...which means you pay for a movie, and

you don't know, what they will show you until the

movie starts.... like a mystery mistress session if

you like to compare it....

and the movie and story was so bad, it was already

Cult... there were only 4 characters ...

 

I hadn't heard of Aragami before this post, but the name of it sounded more Japanese to me than Korean so I decided to look it up:

 

 

 

Aragami is a 2003 Japanese action film directed by Ryuhei Kitamura. It was Kitamura's contribution to the Duel Project, a challenge issued by producer Shinya Kawai to him and fellow director Yukihiko Tsutsumi to film a feature length movie with only two actors, battling in one setting, in only the time frame of one week.

 

This might explain why it's so bad

[Mistress Fei]

I hadn't heard of Aragami before this post, but the name of it sounded more Japanese to me than Korean so I decided to look it up:

 

 

 

 

This might explain why it's so bad

i'm fascinated by imposed limits though! have you heard about the french group Oulipo? All about writing with limits.

[loveinthetimeofcollaring]

i'm fascinated by imposed limits though! have you heard about the french group Oulipo? All about writing with limits.

 

Oh, when I said 'This might explain why it's so bad', I meant 'bad' relative to expectations of works of art with no deadlines and higher budgets. I haven't seen the movie in question though, so I may not be the most qualified to weigh in on it

 

Nor have I heard of Oulipo, but a group of writers and mathematicians exploring writing with limits sounds right up my alley. This is probably a tad tangental but it makes me think about how attitudes towards 'infinity' have changed throughout the course of history. These days, people want more--infinitely more--and say they're most happy when they have an infinite degree of choice in their lives. But in more 'classical' times (think Romans, Greeks), there was a lot of disdain and even fear towards the infinite. These people saw tremendous value in constraint, and believed that by removing the rails there was a loss of focus and structured innovation that was corrosive to mental and spiritual pursuits.

[Mistress Fei]

Oh, when I said 'This might explain why it's so bad', I meant 'bad' relative to expectations of works of art with no deadlines and higher budgets. I haven't seen the movie in question though, so I may not be the most qualified to weigh in on it

 

Nor have I heard of Oulipo, but a group of writers and mathematicians exploring writing with limits sounds right up my alley. This is probably a tad tangental but it makes me think about how attitudes towards 'infinity' have changed throughout the course of history. These days, people want more--infinitely more--and say they're most happy when they have an infinite degree of choice in their lives. But in more 'classical' times (think Romans, Greeks), there was a lot of disdain and even fear towards the infinite. These people saw tremendous value in constraint, and believed that by removing the rails there was a loss of focus and structured innovation that was corrosive to mental and spiritual pursuits.

I can see that. With infinity there comes a sense of hopelessness

I used to hate constraints- budgets, schedules, and preferred everything to be spontaneous. Within the last few months I've fully realized the liberation that comes with constraints. Counterintuitive, yes, but all constraints free up your mind instead of using up energy dealing with randomness

 

It was Godard who had this lovely quote about big budgets. I'm paraphrasing here, but he said that big budgets dilute film to the lowest common denominator. 

[loveinthetimeofcollaring]

It was Godard who had this lovely quote about big budgets. I'm paraphrasing here, but he said that big budgets dilute film to the lowest common denominator. 

 

I have to admit that I haven't seen any of Godard's films (though I know his name). The paraphrased quote rings true though, as evidenced by the steady and speedy decline of the Hollywood Blockbuster. I actually think this 'budgeting' issue shows up in other areas too, such as when a famous author grows too comfortable with lax editors, an eager public, and an easy life style--this 'budget' definitely dilutes their later work (though, masochist that I am, I keep reading these later works hoping that somehow the trend will reverse itself; it never does).

[siggy]

Mistress Fei,

 

Freud is good, but I wonder what you think about this quote by philosopher Michel Foucault?

 

I don’t think that this movement of sexual practices has anything to do with the disclosure or the uncovering of S/M tendencies deep within our unconscious, and so on. I think that S/M is much more than that; it’s the real creation of new possibilities of pleasure, which people had no idea about previously. The idea that S/M is related to a deep violence, that S/M practice is a way of liberating this violence, this aggression, is stupid. We know very well what all those people are doing is not aggressive; 

they are inventing new possibilities of pleasure with strange parts of their body–through the eroticization of the body. I think it’s a kind of creation, a creative enterprise, which has as one of its main features what I call the desexualization [i.e., the “degenitalization”] of pleasure. The idea that bodily pleasure should always come from sexual pleasure, and the idea that sexual pleasure is the root of 

all

 our possible pleasure–I think 

that’s 

something quite wrong. These practices are insisting that we can produce pleasure with very odd things, very strange parts of our bodies, in very unusual situations, and so on.

 

and

 

 

“…if there was no resistance, there would be no power relations. Because it would simply be a matter of obedience. ….resistance remains superior to the forces of the process; power relations are obliged to change with the resistance.” (again from “Sex, Power, and the Politics of Identity”)

There are some more, but I thought these would be a good starting off point….the creation of new possibilities of pleasure, and resistance must be a part of it. 

I hope to see you again soon Fei

 

siggy