AnOther Magazine 19 | KM3D-1 Revisited

For A/W10, AnOther Magazine marked its 19th issue with its first adventure in 3D, uniting old friends and new technology in an explosive film

This is why they call it the magic of the movies – the actual process of making a film is so ass-paralysingly slow that it must take a special alchemy to transmute all those hours of effort into minutes of seamless enchantment. Two minutes, to be exact. That’s the length of AnOther’s 3D extravaganza – KM3D-1.

Onscreen, it has the jewelled glitter and dark allure of Kenneth Anger’s underground classic Inauguration of the Pleasure Dome. But in Park Royal Studios, the most immediately striking thing, aside from the mountain of sparkling Swarovski crystal, was the pile of cameras (at least two of them were named Phantoms) easing backwards and forwards on a track with Ridley Scott’s shooter, John Mathieson, at the helm. It looked like something Victor Frankenstein might dream up, rather than the last word in image-generating technology. And, because the monitors were also 3D, all the techs were wearing the special eyewear that will become a matter of course in the future, once it’s given a chic injection. For now, the room seems full of mad scientists.

The whole day had that fantasia-on-a-wing-and-a-prayer feel. Perhaps that’s what you get with a team that includes Baillie Walsh, creative director Jerry Stafford, production designer Alan MacDonald and stylist Alister Mackie. Much hyper-camp badinage. Though Stafford was raving about Rita Hayworth in The Lady from Shanghai, he was waving around a photo of Lucille Ball. Still, it was a trip to India that gave him the idea for Kate Moss as Kali, the Hindu goddess of eternal energy. Perfect casting. Mackie dressed her in a vintage circus outfit, Sam McKnight filled her head with hair, and while multiple wind machines and a Whole Lotta Love blasted, the magic happened at 1,000 frames per second – so slow that movement is almost imperceptible. But there wasn’t a second when Kate broke her pact with the camera. Then she coolly went back to her cigarette and champagne.

Text by Tim Blanks

For the full article, and for all 25 issues in the AnOther Magazinearchive, visit Exact Editions.