Wax oder Die Entdeckung des Fernsehens unter den Bienen

This is a very strange movie. I'm not even sure that I can accurately describe the plot, because it doesn't make any sense and I don't know if it's really a plot anyway. But I'll give it a shot. I rented this based on the quotes on the box, which described it as being like Total Recall, only with 10 times the weirdness. After seeing the movie, I don't know what they were talking about... The whole movie is narrated by David Blair in a very monotone voice, and has no similarities to Total Recall that I see...

The movie starts out with James Maker, who is a member of something called the Supernormal Film Society whos goal is to film the spirits of the dead walking among the living. There's some background on this which seems largely irrelevant. Then we meet his grandson, Jacob Maker who is the main character of this story. Jacob is a programmer who works on aircraft simulation programs. He's also a beekeeper of Mesopotamian bees he inherited from his grandfather.

So, after a bit the bees drill a hole in his head and put in a television, which the bees use to start showing him things. About this time, a statue of Kane outside his house kills the statue of Able, and Kane is marked with the X symbol. Then at work, Jacob wonders why his co-workers never wonder what happens to the missiles they launch that don't come back (never mind that a programmer probably doesn't deal with missile launches), and he realizes that they turn into flying saucers which fly to the moon where the dead live.

About this time, the bees start showing him things on the television and he makes a big pilgrimage to the Garden of Eden Cave which the bees tell him is the entrance to the world of the dead. Jacob then realizes that the bees are actually the dead of the future, and goes to the cave. Although it is a 40 miles walk through the desert, he makes the journey a bit easier by becoming a bomb part of the way. He then learns that he has to kill someone to fulfill his destiny, which is to be reborn in a wax body that the bees make in the cave.

When arriving at the cave, Jacob learns that the cave is actually the entrance to a planet inside of our planet where the bees live. There, he dies and goes to join the world of the dead. For a while, he becomes the X symbol. Then he becomes a poem in the language of Kane. Then he travels to some other planets, including the Planet of Television. Next he becomes a rival beekeeper of his grandfather. Then he decides it's time to fulfill his destiny, which is to kill someone. So, he becomes a bomb and blows up two Iraqi soldiers in a tank. Then he becomes the X symbol with himself, his grandfather's arch enemy, and the two soldiers he blew up.

And that's pretty much it... Make sense? No, I didn't think so... David Blair calls this Independent Electronic Cinema. I don't know what to call it. I can't figure out if this movie is bad because the weirdness of it all is hard to get over. And the filming is worse... One could today make this movie on a home PC fairly easy. There are 3 distinct types of footage in the movie. First, there is a lot of stock footage of bees, bombs, and other scenes. Second, there is footage that was shot with an amateur camera I'm guessing. Third, there were digital renderings. Nothing fancy, these were things like 3D letters and symbols, and renderings of the cave ceiling and floor just on the screen with a black background.

And it's heavily edited. I hesitate to refer to this as special effects, as I think it's overly abused. There is not a point where more than 1 minute goes by without further senseless video effects. Things like the image warping, folding, unraveling into a string, blurring, etc. Basically all the stuff you could do to a movie with a piece of $100 modern software and a video capture card. And it took six years to make. Personally, I don't see what makes this a great art film, as I've seen some reviews and essays claim it is. I think it falls into the trap of being so different and bizarre that people figure it must be artistic. I don't know what the hell it is, and I don't think I ever will. I keep thinking that there must be some meaning in this movie, but I haven't the slightest idea what...

Full review on my blog max4movies: Wax, or the Discovery of Television Among the Bees can probably best be described as a philosophic journey through the paranoid consciousness of the narrator, which is presented in the form of a science fiction pseudo-documentary. Much like documentaries on conspiracy theories, the movie is cluttered with seemingly random information about beehives, ghosts, and weapon's testing - just to name a few central themes. These concepts are mostly interconnected but overall the narrative still lacks structure and coherence. The visual presentation is perplexing with distorted images and heavy use of computer-generated effects, but the abstract shapes and intercut shots of bees match the dreamlike and hypnotic atmosphere of the movie. Overall, the movie presents some great ideas (e.g., criticism of intelligent weapons), and the presentation is, although being a low-budget production, unique and fascinating to watch - even though some aspects don't come together all that well.

We showed this at our local Art film movie-house. It is where it belongs.

Watch it if you think that David Cronenberg's adaptation of Burrough's book, "Naked Lunch," is too linear. If you don't know who William Burroughs is definitely avoid this. This has more to do with surrealist dream films than documentaries.

Delightfully mad IMHO.

Bees, Bouroughs, Book of the Dead. Egyptian myth.

Anti-War Sci-Fi Cyberpunk "My dead wife was in the hive. She fragmented." "They were the dead and vengeance was their life." "I was Cain." "The Planet of Television, transmitting the dead."

It's all pretty schizophrenic. Jacob Maker, beekeeper, in the land of the dead and the garden of eden, Iraq.

Just when i thought i had already seen all the super weird movies that suit a psychedelic movie night, along comes this gem. Total disorientation. Strange fascination. Reprogramming of pathways long disconnected way back by the dead on the moon created by the bees of kain, slayer of abel, inventor of the secret language that would one day come back to fulfill the destiny of creating a simulation of consciousness made from living symbols that contain the souls of the dead of the future in the form of bees from the garden of eden which refers to a cave that exists in the past inside a planet at the end of time and space itself that is folded into a telescope to insert the robotic target seeking consciousness of blind insectoid gods into missiles to come back to the place where my half brother used to live when he was a contractor for a company with ties to the US military that was founded by the grandmother of his stepsister to launch weapons loaded with the embodimend of the mind of kain who slew his brother abel out of jealousy for his bees, to fulfill his destiny of merging with his target in the first iraq war.

It all makes sense at the end.

just wanted to add that i really like the video, and i think its no more weird than any television talk show or game show or news show or presidential election show: it mixes up a lot (in our heads i mean), but the confusion comes from the matter, not from the artist.

it's full of speculations and confusing plot points, as part of what it is about. in fact it was the only movie i ever saw, that was able to both analyze and illustrate the TV strategies of war reporting since operation desert storm (which it is exactly about) and the beginning new world order. that's maybe what seems technically overwrought?

seems to me, other artists like godard or kitano work the same way, merging so many images, synthezising so many parts of life, in the end you're overwhelmed. because we are not used to watch movies that way. because there is little chance to see stuff like this in cinemas.

thx for your attention. ;)