It was around about the turn of the century, and I was fucking miserable. This was partly because I was going through that thing in your mid-20s when you realise you have to be goddamn adult and you first really start to feel time slipping away from you; but mostly it was because I fucking hated the city I lived in.
I was far away from home, with few friends and family around, and it was a town with bad vibes. I had to give up a couple of dream jobs while I was there because the bosses turned out to be total shitheads, and I had absolutely no idea what I was doing with my life.
It took a couple more years before I did get my act together, and now I don't look back on my days in that city with much fondness. Except for the days when I could go to the most excellent video store in town and rent another tape in Kenneth Anger's Magick Lantern Cycle.
I knew who Anger was, long before I ever got to see any of his films. His name would pop up in interviews with other filmmakers, and my favourite comic writers would also often mention him as a strong influence. It was easy enough to find a copy of Hollywood Babylon at my most excellent local library, because that book sold like gangbusters in pre-internet days, but there was only a trace of the more esoteric side of Anger buried in there amongst the gossip.
And then, just as I was at my most miserable in that shitty new city, I saw his Magick Lantern cycle in that store on glorious old video tape, spread out over half a dozen cassettes, and it felt like a whole new world was opening up.
To this day, I stil have no real idea what was going on in his movies, but they never disappointed. They felt weird and strange in just the way I needed at the time, with magickal ceremonies burned into celluloid, strange opera and the kind of homo-eroticism that still had a kinky power.
I had read the Anger biography, so I knew the story behind these films, the way Anger would scrape up the money for his otherwordly visions, and all the scandals and silliness that surrounded them.
But they were also hugely inspirational in ways I still feel deeply. While I wasn't always sure what Anger was telling me, I adored the way he told it, and that he stuck to his guns to try and make the films he wanted, with no care for anything as boring as accessibility or coherence.
It just made me feel better. When the whole world feels a little miserable, these kinds of fims - these kinds of statements - can be a little oasis of joy, and sometimes that's all you need to get through life.
I've seen the whole cycle a few times now, (and with his devotion to the art of the short film, you can see the bulk of it in just a few hours,) and while I still have no real clue what was going on, I till think he is one of the hidden architects of 20th century culture, fusing film and pop music in a way that is still being exploited by the most mainstream of entertainments.
Kenneth Anger has left this world now, and the world is now a bit more grey, a little less bitchy and lacking in just a touch of magick. But we can still enjoy all that he left behind.
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