Mosquitosophagus debuts lengthy, intriguing movie and adept score at minicine

Eric & Peter
Originally uploaded by trudeau.

The lens of an old movie camera peered at the viewers in the opening of  the new film by Eric Dean, painter and musician. He spent several months making the film that he and trio Mosquitosophagus presented at minicine Sun, Oct 29.

A vignette of suspended romance between elaborately garbed players was langourously enacted. Soon the audience was plunged, however, into a bibliographic world of communication through ancient symbols: physician's diagrams, maps of the human physiognomy. The camera scanned the browned pages of antique and arcane books. Turn-of-the-century objets on a tabletop became an oscillating tableau. Diagrams of insects became a theme. 

Dean's stream-of-consciousness mystery movie linked scenes by design motifs. Book illustrations morphed to fabric patterns. An industrial passage emerged. Clockworks and industrial mechanisms fitted themselves to one another. Lighting was muted; sepia tones seemed to dominate.

Pete Fetterman's drum performance - as the trio provided a soundtrack to the silent film - was symphonic. Adept at quiet time-keeping as well as at odd meters, Fetterman built to a capacious cacaphony in the frenzied peak of the score.

Destiny Toro played violin capably, providing melodies and sonorities that complemented Dean's guitar work. Squawks, crowd sounds, additional guitars and percussion sprang from Dean's computer, the 4th member of the group.

Eventually the lengthy film - over 45 minutes - moved into the contemporary world of  technicolor images. The insects, organic landscapes and cogs glowed atomically. Symmetry and kinematics emerged in colors. Finally there was a hyper extension into a white world with a shredded black energy source dancing in the ether. 

Said filmmaker Chris Jay, “I was happy to know that this group would not be gone in the morning.” Jay referred to the touring multimedia shows presented by David Nelson at minicine.

Ethan Rose was an example of the touring stimulati. A member of Small Sails, the Portland headliners of the evening, he crawled about the floor plucking a miced xylophone and psaltry. Sent out through an extensive effects chain the sounds of his solo number were cathedral.

Small sails had begun their set when I was called away. Alas. Their drummer was tight. Rose’s singing was ethereal. Adam and Ethan performed a contagious dance as the projector began to flicker. The music soared.