User Reviews

A lush creation by famous underground avant-garde film-maker Kenneth Anger, this film of a celebratory religious ritual mixes several of Anger's favourite themes and obsessions while remaining mysterious enough that it can be interpreted on a number of levels depending on the viewer's background and opinions. I can see here a fascination with the occult and its symbols and trappings, many of which look like deliberate parodies and send-ups of Christian ritual and symbolism, into which Anger has inserted his own interest in the work and philosophy of English mystic Aleister Crowley. There is also a sense of people creating their own selective mix of mythology and ritual. Coming from another angle again, I can see criticism of formal religion, a suggestion that ritualistic religious ceremony can be corrupted and rotting from within, as much a prison from which there's no escape except death, as it is a source of comfort and affirmation for its followers. In the midst of ecstatic communion, laughter and joy, there is also violence and an offer of a sacrifice to dark gods. The sacrifice could be interpreted as liberation as well, a release into a new clean world without sin and corruption. If we interpret the symbolism of "Inauguration ..." very broadly, the film also becomes a critique of Western culture and people's subjective notions of what is culturally acceptable and what is not.

The actual film itself is set to the music of "Glagolitic Mass", a composition for solo voices, choir, organ and orchestra by Czech composer Leos Janacek, and could be seen as a very long music video. There's no dialogue at all, no background or other ambient sound. The film builds up steadily with static diorama-like scenes up to the moment where various participants consume an intoxicating drink and then the visuals explode into layered scenes of bursting, flaming colour and strange superimposed juxtapositions and combinations of repeating images, Hindu-god figures with green skin (a symbol of death), Egyptian gods and maenads (female acolytes of the Greek god Dionysius, lord of ecstasy) tearing apart a young man. The film's close, near-fetishistic attention to objects, the actors' elaborate costuming and studied appearance, and the staged, mannerly look of scene set-ups recall the equally camp kitsch film classics made by the Armenian film-maker Parajanov in the 1960s and 1980s.

This is obviously not a film for everyone: much of it up to the 20th minute is slow and appears quite remote, not at all concerned about drawing viewers into its ritual and secrets. Characters are preoccupied with consuming rosary beads, a snake and a jewel. Religious rituals have never been about entertaining or informing viewers of their purpose after all; you're always assumed to have undergone some training or education in the religion's basic practices and knowledge and to receive further knowledge you have to be selected by the religion's standard bearers whose expectations of you and your conformity to its precepts may be severe. Eventually the film does immerse viewers into its realm but you need to interpret its goings-on for yourselves: there's no attempt to explain what's happening for the benefit of first-time participants in the ritual. Is the death scene of the young blond man a send-up of Christian Holy Communion ritual as well as a literal interpretation of Dionysian ritual? Is it a reference to the destruction of a particular worldview or civilisation? Is there the possibility of rebirth, that the death is but a necessary initiation step he must take into another (and better) plane of existence?

People with no interest or appreciation for arcane religious ritual, veiled symbolism and the eclectic mixing of deities, figures and stories from different religious and folkloric traditions will be bored by the film and perhaps should pass it over but they will miss its layered symbolism and message of initiation, celebration, ecstasy, death and the hope of new life.

Kenneth Anger is a near-daily part of my life. He's a nexus point who has opened my mind to older film, to the power of gossip, to Crowley and to the art that film can be. His first words in the seminal Hollywood Babylon, quoting Crowley, inspires me: "Every man and every woman is a star."

At once one of America's first openly gay filmmakers and also one that ran to instead of from homosexual content within his film, he's also - despite being born into a middle-class Christian Presbyterian family - one of the foremost occult figures of the 20th century.

Anger may or may not have been a child actor, but what is true is that his films were incendiary from the beginning, with Fireworks finding him facing obscenity charges. Yet over the next few years, his work would inspire editing techniques and music videos before they even existed.

It's astounding that Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome was made in 1954. It could be 2022 or any time or any dimension, as it exists in nearly another universe. Anger was inspired to make the film after attending a Halloween party called "Come as your Madness" and Crowley's ritual masquerade concept - where party guests dress as gods and goddesses - is shown within this short.

Samson De Brier plays the roles of Shiva, Osiris, Nero, Alessandro Cagliostro and Crowley. De Brier was rumoured to be the bastard son of the King of Romania or the son of an Atlantic City politician who was murdered by a jealous woman. He modeled for Picasso, he hosted a radio show in New York City, he rescued old silent movie costumes from the trash. He also had a regular salon that discussed the occult at his Barton Avenue home which made up of minds like Anger, Curtis Harrington, Anaïs Nin, Jack Nicholson, Dennis Hopper, Jack Parsons, Marjorie Cameron and Anton LaVey. This movie was filmed in his home, a place that was a refuge for a retired Anger in the 80s.

That guest list stars in this film. Joan Whitney is Aphrodite, with Katy Kadell as Isis, Nin as Astarte, Harrington as Cesare, Anger as Hecate, Renate Druks as Lilith, Paul Mathison as Pan and Peter Loomer as Ganymede. Perhaps the most important 20th century occult figure outside of Crowley, Marjorie Cameron, appears as The Scarlet Woman and Kali. There is no irony here, as Cameron may be the actual Scarlet Woman who ushers in the end of all things.

The imagery of this movie - even if you don't comprehend the symbols - can unlock many feelings within a viewer. I've often stared at the still image of Cameron from this movie, but seeing her moving shape is a revelation. I wish that these colors always existed in our world and not for this short moment in time, which we may endlessly rewind.

How strange is it that an occult movie has the same look and feel of beliver Ron Ormond's The Burning Hell? They both exist in their own universes, but the wall between them is so thin that you can feel the fingers on each side.

Clocking in at just two minute short of the arbitrary divide between short film and feature length film as designated by the IMDb, this movie is quite a feast of color and imagination constantly rolling to hallucinatory lengths. That, of course, is the point.

I didn't count, but I'm pretty sure all seven of the deadly sins are represented within this film, but there's a particular focus on gluttony and lust. Everything in this film is engorged, or seems engorged. It at first starts out a little like Puce Moment (and in fact, later a shot from Puce Moment is reused as one of the multiple exposures), but as the character we see literally consumes a pearl necklace, he's lead into what is apparently the Pleasure Dome, which is pretty much Hell filled with passion.

The pacing of this film is pretty amazing. As more and more stuff happens it just builds up, a glutton for more, causing the need for more and more, and so on. Usually fast editing and multiple exposures are used as a way of showing the deconstruction of a character, but this time the fever dream seems more of a conglomeration of More and More in an appetizing pursuit to... more.

It sounds exhausting, but is in fact actually quite pleasurable to watch. The presence of such colorful and vividly imagined characters brings it into a wonderful sort of clarity, making the whole movie tempting. It's tempting to join them in their lust, it's tempting to delve into such a realm. Which is why, at 38 minutes, it still seems like it's less than 20.

--PolarisDiB

Unfortunately this description applies to a large percentage of Kenneth Anger's body of work and this movie from 10 years after World War II is no exception. It runs for almost 37 minutes and is one of the longest films from the director. The thing I enjoyed most about it was the music (1978 Eldorado version), but that could not really make up for the uninteresting story that was going on. It dragged a lot and I can only really recommend this to huge fans of the director or people with a great interest in theater and mythology. This is one of Anger's most known works (he also acts in here, but not one of the major characters) and he was not even 30 when he shot this. Today he is approaching 90 and still making films. I hope his more recent works are better than his very early films. About "Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome", not recommended.