"The Other Side of the Underneath" explores identity and the self by experimenting with altered states of consciousness and regression into the mind. It explores the feminist tracts on trauma and agency but through a mixture of violent imagery and Clockwork orange theatrics played over the backdrop of an industrial Welsh mining town which is also Arden's place of birth. Jane Arden & her performance troop Holocaust grapple with insanity in this madcap British obscurity. Jane uses experimental formulas to narrate the effects of schizophrenia and report abuses suffered by those affected in former psychiatric hospitals. This is regarded has the only British feature of the '70s with a solo female directing credit, it is also an emotionally searing, genuinely dangerous masterpiece. Sally Minford who has composed the brilliant soundtrack appears throughout the film playing the cello, while artist Penny Slinger both acted in the film and was jointly responsible for its art-direction. It has no coherent storyline, almost impossible to follow plot and despite that, it is one of the most interesting films which feels like a journey to an unknown dimension at times, almost overwhelming. If Barbara Hammer, Roberta Findlay come together to make a disturbing version of Inland Empire/Possession with a dash of Nina Menkes. Pipilotti Rist, Lisa Hammer, Mari Asato, Rei Hayama, Mari Terashima, A. Hans Scheirl and Ken Russell thrown in. A complete nightmare state on the screen, and Jane Arden achieves it through atmosphere and a sense of foreboding, rather than extreme gore effects and jump scares. Of course, it is not "Experimental" as in Anti-Clock (1979), it is rougher, more "dirty". As contemporary paintings can be less "beautiful" than those of the classics. But I still found it as fascinating as usual. Nothing to do with the flatness of the image in porn or in most French films (which are often even uglier when they try to be "aesthetic"). But her way of directing and filming Sheila Allen on Welsh mining town will remain etched in my memory for a long time. I definitely found it to be impressive on a visual storytelling level and it's so daunting and exhausting and confusing and labyrinthine and an absolute nightmare.
