Rating: 
Summary: So, who's *really* interested in Onanism?
Review: I saw this as part of the longer Cremaster works, at a film festival, so I can't comment on the quality of the DVD. If you know Matthew Barney, you'll probably be interested in something more collectable. If you don't, well, let's just say "In The Realm Of The Senses" had a lot more going for it, and although that's not a movie I particularly like it's one I can respect. Barney doesn't make movies, he makes 'high' art. Nothing wrong with that, just nothing particularly appealing about his flavor of it.
Rating: 
Summary: Rent it.
Review: I thought Mathew Barneys' creations were beautiful both visually and conceptually. It appears to me that Barneys' performance art and those who enjoy it have fallen subject to a brand of criticism that ignores the necessity of personal interpretation. I think that theres nothing more pretentious than projecting your idea of why others enjoy a performance. I think Self-declared art critics have little if any productive influence on the art community. I think its important for people to see this film and experience Mathew Barneys art for themselves. I am sure glad I did.
Rating: 
Summary: Matthew Barney.
Review: I thought of a few things while watching "The Cremaster" cycle by super-star artist Matthew Barney. However, through the druggery and slow moving death that was Cremaster, all of those things were forgotten. But, I did learn a very important lesson. The lesson is this:With enough money you can do anything, be it winning the presidency or simpley becoming a famous artist. Either way in the end you're going to turn out horrible.
Rating: 
Summary: The correct use of the DVD is hard to figure out!
Review: I totally agree with the reviewer who said it was difficult to figure out how to use the DVD properly. The 30-minute feature is easy to access, but with the extra footage was impossible to access. I'm not the dumbest person in the world, but there must have been an easier way to format this. And if being difficult to access is part of the conception, fooey! The 30-minute feature was brilliant, though, quite moving and surprisingly easy to understand the imagery he was using, to my surprise. Based on the 30 minutes I saw, he really is a genius. But I also found it quite sad, I think he underrates himself, and it shows in his art. It is painful to see his torment.
Rating:
Summary: ripoff
Review: i went to New York to see the show at the Guggenheim. i saw all the films & it was great! I was excited learn 3 was on dvd, & i purchased it here. The product details claims that it has a running time of 240 minutes, but this is not true. in reality, i was duped out of $20, for what boils down to a 30 minute trailer. DO NOT WASTE YOUR MONEY. Wait until they release them, IN FULL LENGTH, because they are worth having.This is not what you want.
Rating:
Summary: Elephantine Vacuity
Review: If there were any doubt about the current state of the art world, Matthew Barney here delivers a kind of state of the union address: it is over-endowed, over-hyped and under-performing, (though at great length!). Private symbols? Personal mythology? Great if you're stoned, I suppose. Even wallpaper is suggestive then. In the 3 hours of Cremaster 3, there is perhaps a half hour of interesting imagery. The rest? Over-inflation! Why not try the films of some real artists, starting with Dali, Bunuel, Cocteau etc. More recently, check out Lynch, Cronenberg, Aronovsky, and others, for the pipeline to the biological unconscious. But save your money on this bad boy. Let someone else show you theirs!
Rating:
Summary: Gorgeous, well-produced surrealist cinema
Review: It's not often that someone with artistic sensibilities as radical as director Matthew Barney's gets to make a movie that appears this well-financed. "The Order" not only kept my attention, it kept me thinking. Above all, I think it is a fun movie to watch.
Vivid, well-chosen colors--blues, pinks, shimmering silvers and creamy whites--bleed from the screen in what is an avante garde narrative about "The Entered Apprentice" [played by director/artist Matthew Barney] and his encounters on various levels inside a large building [which is actually the Guggenheim transformed by Barney into a representation of the "The Temple of Solomon"]. The movie's website goes into more detail about the plot and characters than could be done here; what should be emphasized, though, is the sheer watch-ability of this. Many avant garde films become tiresome, frustrating, or just plain boring. Barney's "The Order" manages to avoid this. In some respects, it's like watching a video game; other parts put one in the mind of the movie "The Cell," David Lynch, Luis Bunuel, or even some of director Andrew Blake's more lavish and recent x-rated films (though this is by no means x-rated, containing only topless nudity and no sex). If nothing else, "The Order" is enchanting eye candy--like having a richly detailed and colorful work of post modernist art unravel on your television screen.
I haven't seen any of the Cremaster Cycle movies. "The Order" is an excerpt from Cremaster 3, which apparently is the most enjoyable of the 5 movies that comprise the series, according to most reviews I've read. The DVD features a "film version" of "The Order," which is just a straight-up narrative; or one can choose between 5 or 6 "scenes," which are individually longer than the scenes watched back-to-back in the "film version." As well, when watching individual scenes one can use a menu in the lower right hand corner of the screen to navigate the video so that one can see what's happening concurrently on various levels of the structure the Entered Apprentice is navigating.
Before reading what "The Order" was really about--Masonic initiation rites and the Temple of Solomon--I thought I had it all figured out myself. To be honest, I still prefer my interpretation, and found the real story behind it to be a disappointment. Masonic initiation rites--well, that disappointed me. In my own head, I worked out the story as as being about The Entered Apprentice--that is, Matthew Barney-- attempting to ascend through various phases of his life, perhaps reflecting a life growing up in New York City [but later this interpretation was proven wrong when I found out Barney is actually from Boise, Idaho!].
The first level, "The Order of the Rainbow for Girls," shows Barney amidst what looks like a parody of radio City Music Hall's Rockettes, but dressed as cartoonish lambs. The playfulness here could represent childhood. Barney--sorry, The Entered Apprentice--then ascends to the next level, where he finds two New York City hardcore bands, Agnostic Front and Murphy's Law, dueling with each other by playing the opening riffs of their songs at one another. There's a circle pit in the middle; in the middle of this are several tools Barney must extract from the ground. This level could represent his teenage years, I thought. That's mostly who seem to be in the audience here--teens.
Barney goes up another level and encounters paralympics gold medalist Aimee Mullins using what look like glass prosthetic legs.Barney transforms into a kind of butcher-looking figure grotesquely distorted, again making one feel as if one is watching an outtake from "The Cell" or maybe a snippet from a particularly well-financed Marilyn Manson video [which is not a slam against the movie; let's be honest, it does look a bit like a music video in some parts]. In my brain, which was still trying to figure out what was going on, I thought this could have represented finding true love, getting married, etc. The woman turns on Barney, bites him, and changes into a dangerous she-cat. The two fly out into the air in combat. Eventually Barney must get the tools from the circle pit and come back to kill her.
Alas, I realized my interpretation of the movie was incorrect when I researched the film further. Oh well. At least it gets one thinking analytically.
If you're into hardcore punk, you should get, or at least rent, the movie just to see the unexpected appearances of Agnostic Front and Murphy's Law. I was blown away to find these two tough guy, thugcore-ish bands appearing in this, an outre, surrealist movie. Watching the two bands swivel on their podiums in the intro got a chuckle out of me. Some of the "extras" on the DVD include 6 songs from each band.
Apparently the full Cremaster series is supposed to be released on DVD "soon." However, I'll probably this, as I'm a fan of experimental cinema, and, as I've said before, I simply found this a fun movie to watch. I wouldn't say that "The Order" alone is up there with Luis Bunuel or Alejandro Jodorwosky, but as spectacle I can think of nothing like it I've seen that quite measures up in recent years.
Rating:
Summary: Its a game!
Review: Just as the apprentice is learning how to solve the masonic puzzles, you need to learn how to navigate the game. I can't believe people are having trouble with this, I figured out what is going on in two seconds. Look at the field map in the bottom of the screen! Hint: Up on your remote= up one level in the Guggenheim, Down = down one level in the Guggenheim, left = up two levels, right = down two levels. Push enter to get to the secret level selector where you can see all levels at once. Never play a videogame? Jeez. This is the only creative use of multiange I've seen - outside of porn. Its great that they put a DTS track on for the film version and the music. Every Agnostic Front and Murphy's Law fan should buy this just beacause its the only audio recordings of them in 24bit 5.1 surround! I'm surpised I'm the first to mention the High Definition Window Media 9 file on the DVD. This is amazing! If you put the DVD into your PC you can playback the film version in full HDTV quality! I can't believe how good it looks, it blows away the T2 wm9 disc! I hope more films are released in HD format like this in the future - but congratulations to Barney on being cutting edge not only in his art but in his tech too!
Rating:
Summary: For the lover of conceptual art.
Review: Matthew Barney has secured his place in art history. His Cremaster series, consisting of five films, uses the narrative cinema form to deliver a layered discourse of a unique brand of conceptual art. The Order, which is set in New York City's Guggenheim Museum, is presented as a game of ascendance both physically and metaphorically. It makes reference to the media frenzy from which it is born as well as to Barney's artistic influences, most notably through his on-screen praise and subtle mocking of the great minimalist artist Richard Serra. Matthew Barney's Cremaster Cycle films are vivid, complex and referential, while the narrative content can sometimes be somewhat less than apparent, the conceptual elements are consistantly strong.
Rating:
Summary: Staple for fine art gurus
Review: Matthew Barney is continually scrutinized by artists and critics alike. Ignore them and see his work for yourself. Matthew Barney successfully combines both his visual and conceptual ideas in the Cremaster series through an orchestrated, cinematic production of five Cremaster cycles, shot and released out of sequence. The Order (Cremaster 3) is just one of those cycles, but is the final of the series, bringing closure to his project which has been produced over the course of a few years. The Order takes place in the Guggenheim Museum of New York, where a Tartan-clad Barney scales five levels of the Museum to confront different challenges before gaining his rite-of-passage. I won't spoil the excitement. This dvd is cutting-edge to the modern art scene, and the only affordable version of Matthew Barney's project that has been released to the public. With an interactive feature that allows you to watch the entire cycle, each section individually, or all five sections (angles) simultaneously, I'd say anyone who purchases it is getting one hell of a deal.
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