“What’s the experiment?” is a simple question I find myself asking constantly when I see experimental cinema. The moniker “experimental” has become tainted, misused, destroyed as of late. Most festivals around the world now feature a section for experimental films, usually shorts, but their definition is cloudy at best, and when it comes down to it, they are generally populated with films that simply won’t fit anywhere else. Which is why we have a responsibility to constantly, vigorously demand an answer to the simple question: “What’s the experiment?” With the films of Stan Brakhage, you never have to ask, but that doesn’t mean the answer is any clearer.

After a modicum of success with the comprehensive, albeit disjointed, two disc set of Brakhage’s works in 2003, Criterion is back with a second helping of the avant-garde pioneer’s films with By Brakhage: An Anthology, Volume 2. The set is not only a brilliantly curated look at the career of a prolific filmmaker, but it is also a major milestone for the Criterion Collection itself. It is almost inherent in the nature of experimental cinema that it not be released on home video. More often than not, the experiment is finite, contained within a movie house or screening room, a public space or gallery. That is why the first volume of the series was so jarring to viewers: it was a pile of films where the new set is carefully prepared, divided into 90 minute sessions. One of the major barriers to home viewing has been obliterated by the team behind this disc, which includes Brakhage’s wife, Marilyn, as well as film historian Fred Camper. Read on…