chelsea girls

i went to see a screening of warhol's "chelsea girls" on saturday at moma's "to save and protect" film preservation festival. knowing quite well that i would've lost most volunteers with "oh, by the way, it's 3.5 hours long", i went and trudged through it by myself. i had seen some of his films in school, mostly of the more fartsy kind like "sleep" and a handful of his screen tests. having read the warhol bible "popism" a number of times as a teen in the 90s when i was a tad bit too young to be gen-x but glamorized tales of drug use and the underground were prevelantly displayed before me, most of these characters had become shrouded over the years by the mysticisms of their notoriety, and i was generally disappointed to find that they were mostly portrayed as indiscernable pawns and annoying as fuck. undoubtedly there's also the re-hollywoodization of these warhol products to blame, which makes it all become more and more convoluted as generations pass without necessarily building on the mystique of that movement but rather exploiting it's most insignificant elements and capitalizing off the regurgitated trends of that era. of course anyone's proper response would be to say that the venerable king of camp had planted the seeds for that very purpose and would have revelled in the cheapness of its outcome.
the film was mostly unbearable yet fascintaing as expected. i wish i had refreshed my memory a bit beforehand cause my own superficilly charged excitement was subdued while straining to remember who everyone was. bridget "polk" berlin and ondine were the most engaging. buried in their drug/alcohol fueled psycho babble, hints of intellect and witty estimations of their surroundings were poignant. mary waranov (i didn't know it was her until after the movie. thanks pastor!) was outstanding, overdramatic, beautiful and embarassingly cheesy while the rest of the girls (ingrid superstar and international velvet) played their parts as twiggy, spaced-out accessories to the scenes. the film was also bookended by nico, opening with a 20 minute b/w shot of her cutting her bangs in the kitchen and ends three and a half hours later with her weeping as bold swirls of light and projected patterns flash across her chiseled face while drony music a la velvet underground plays in the background (more cheese!). there are of course days worth of conversations to be had about the content, it's cultural significance, or maybe none at all... but all i could really remember feeling in the end was the burning sensation of my poor bladder holding in an entire bottle of vitamin water that i had chugged right before the film... hungover from the previous night's drinking binge and idiotic revelry in new york of course... who am i to judge.