Pu­tres­cence and Po­etry

by Cor­rado Nai

Spoil(er) Alert: The short time-lapse film Wrought by Anna Sigrithur and Joel Pen­ner dis­sects de­com­po­si­tion in a mes­mer­iz­ing way.

Flick­er­ing stars fil­i­gree the cos­mic void. A green, in­can­des­cent planet bursts on the screen. We didn't know we were watch­ing a sci­ence fic­tion movie. Drum­rolls cli­max into the next frame. Sud­denly, fic­tion is stripped away, and in a heart­beat we are thrown into the heart of sci­ence and cul­ture. We are not star­ing at the in­fi­nitely large but ob­serv­ing the mi­nus­cule at work.

"Fes­ter… molder… ripen… pu­tresce… go bad. This lan­guage has a lot of words for rot," nar­rates a sooth­ing, play­ful voice over a gi­ant close-up sec­tion of a kiwi car­peted with mold. "But is it due to ap­pre­ci­a­tion, or squea­mish­ness?" We feel that an an­swer is soon to emerge from the com­post heap. The movie doesn't tell. It shows.

We are star­ing at spoilage, fer­men­ta­tion, and com­post­ing. It's en­larged de­cay of fruits, veg­eta­bles, and fo­liage, ac­cel­er­ated de­com­po­si­tion of plants and an­i­mals. Wrought (2022) is an award-win­ning short time-lapse film ex­plor­ing rot, fer­men­ta­tion and de­cay (18', Canada, Biofilm Pro­duc­tions; free to watch on Vimeo) co-di­rected by Anna Sigrithur (voice, script) and Joel Pen­ner (videog­ra­phy, edit­ing).

Fig. 1. Wa­ter­melon juice flow. When juices from a fer­menting wa­ter­melon looks like cos­mic land­scapes. Source (cour­tesy of Anna Sigrithur/Joel Penner/Biofilm Pro­duc­tions). Fron­tispiece: Kom­bucha mother. A float­ing planet (in fact, a fer­ment­ing jar of kom­bucha). Source (cour­tesy of Anna Sigrithur/Joel Penner/Biofilm Pro­duc­tions)

The nar­ra­tor helps us nav­i­gat­ing amidst float­ing colonies of bac­te­ria, mi­nus­cule ice­bergs form­ing dis­pro­por­tion­ate snowflakes. It's not lu­nar land­scapes and cos­mic gases we are watch­ing, but pu­trid mush leak­ing from an over­ripe melon. "Don't turn away in dis­gust," in­vites the voice. "Come a lit­tle closer and see the uni­verse that un­folds in these for­saken places."

The voice in­ves­ti­gates while im­ages drift, mag­ni­fy­ing and speed­ing up time with­out rush­ing for an an­swer, hint­ing at con­clu­sions and ac­cept­ing al­ter­na­tive in­ter­pre­ta­tions. The movie dis­tances it­self from the fic­tional di­chotomy of good and bad, does not fall prey to triv­ial du­al­i­ties. We should all em­brace be­ing part of nature's cy­cle, the voice re­minds us, well know­ing that not all steps come with­out pain, strug­gle, or in­trin­sic self­ish­ness. "When mold col­o­nizes con­tested land­scapes, stak­ing its claim on nu­tri­ents I had saved for my­self, I de­clare that things are go­ing bad."

"But would rot, if called by any other name, still reek?" While wait­ing for an­swers, new per­spec­tives arise. We are look­ing at a jar teem­ing with trans­for­ma­tion. When yo­gurt and cheese are "a taste for milk shared by hu­mans and bac­te­ria," we know we are up for a nar­ra­tive treat. When fer­men­ta­tion is "spoiling's cul­tured twin, […] the hope­ful treaty be­tween hu­man and mi­crobe that says, 'eat this now, so I may eat it later,'" we re­al­ize we are thrown into some­thing big­ger than our­selves, even if in­con­spic­u­ously small.

Fig. 2. FFF logo. Logo of Fungi Film Fes­ti­val. Source (cour­tesy of Pe­ter Mc­Coy)

The leap from fer­men­ta­tion to pu­tres­cence is seam­less; the hope, which de­com­posed mat­ter wrought into new life brings, doesn't let us wait. No film be­fore Wrought has wo­ven de­cay, fer­men­ta­tion and de­com­po­si­tion with such rich nar­ra­tive and vivid im­ages. It's no won­der Wrought won nu­mer­ous ac­co­lades. The movie, seven years in the making,was pre­sented at the third edi­tion of Fungi Film Fes­ti­val (FFF) in De­cem­ber 2022, "world's only film fes­ti­val ded­i­cated to the beauty, weird­ness, and hu­man in­flu­ences of mush­rooms, lichens, and mi­cro­fungi" ini­ti­ated by Rad­i­cal My­col­o­gist Pe­ter Mc­Coy. The or­ga­niz­ers de­scribe the fes­ti­val as a "niche" one, which would be amus­ing if it wasn't sadly ac­cu­rate. Imag­ine how vaguely di­rected would a di­rec­tor feel if en­cour­aged to sub­mit a film to an An­i­mal or a Plant Film Fes­ti­val.

Wrought is ex­cel­lent in por­tray­ing mold and de­cay with im­ageries and nar­ra­tives un­bur­dened from overly neg­a­tive con­no­ta­tions, as so of­ten the case when fungi en­ter the arts and works of fic­tion. (The au­thor of this blog and the di­rec­tors of Wrought are well aware that fungi are just some of the play­ers in the ecosys­tem of de­cay.)

Fig. 3: As­sorted Mush­rooms New be­gin­nings: Mush­rooms sprout­ing from ves­tiges of de­cay. Source (cour­tesy of Anna Sigrithur/Joel Penner/Biofilm Pro­duc­tions)

Be­cause there is no film cri­tique with­out crit­i­cism, I will say that the artis­tic choice to switch be­tween the "I," "you," and "we" per­spec­tive is not al­ways clear. The im­ages have (very) rare flaws, too; their power is di­min­ished when they are forced into fit­ting the nar­ra­tive, for ex­am­ple when re­verse lapses of de­com­po­si­tion are used to por­tray growth of new life. Do not let these crit­i­cisms spoil the ab­solute joy of watch­ing Wrought.

"In a world ob­sessed with growth, we over­look ten­der pos­si­bil­i­ties of de­cay," says the movie. Don't be fooled: it's not hope­less ro­man­ti­cism nor naïve op­ti­mism. Wrought does not steer clear of the pos­si­bil­i­ties of sheer hor­ror. When the nar­ra­tor says that "fer­men­ta­tion leav­ens and spoilage threat­ens, while com­post rein­car­nates," she doesn't ne­glect the per­spec­tives of par­ents star­ing at the rot­ting flesh of their off­spring. "Is this trans­for­ma­tion meta­mor­pho­sis or ruin? The an­swer de­pends on where, within rot's vast net­work, we stand. […] But come my time to dis­solve, I am far less brave."

Wrought mes­mer­izes and dis­sects. The movie fails to do so asep­ti­cally as it teems with life and de­con­structs de­cay into a new vo­cab­u­lary. Wrought is vi­sual deca­dence and lit­er­ary ef­fer­ves­cence, pure po­etry in im­ages and words.

 

Cor­rado Nai (@jan_corro) is a for­mer fun­gal re­searcher turned fun­gal com­mu­ni­ca­tor. At FEMS and cu­ra­tor of the #FEMSmi­croBlog by day, writer about all things fungi by night. Cre­ator of the Wikipedia page on «Fungi in art». He lives in Jakarta with his wife and daugh­ter.

 

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