Wax, Or the Movie I'm Not Afraid of Anymore

from mubi.com

Saturday it had been decided: We are going to be beekeepers for real.

Beekeeping is something I've wanted to do since I realized how delicious honey is. I was eating honey straight from a bear-shaped bottle. When I started reading more about honey and began trying different types of honey, I wasn't so afraid of bees anymore, as I had been as a kid. Beekeeping is something Jeremy has always wanted to do since he began learning more about the idiosyncrasies of bees.

After brunch Saturday we visited Independent Nature, a plant store inside of a garage on Church. At the desk was a guide to beekeeping. The notion that buzzes in our brains every so often, along with our dream of having a garden plot and chickens, popped up then. It took until Sunday night for us to do a little research on San Francisco urban beekeeping. Hopefully I will follow up on developments there.

All that talk about bees made me think of Wax, Or the Discovery of Television Among Bees. The very first time I saw any of it, Jeremy and I had just eaten a pancake, bacon, and eggs dinner at his old place in Pittsburgh. Noting that Wax is the first film to be watch-able on the internet, Jeremy started playing the file before it fully loaded on the screen. The all-too-calm narration didn't grab me, and I lost interest quickly in favor for a game of Dr. Mario.

The second time I watched it, I had the patience and attention span to follow the narrative. I became increasingly engrossed as the narrator became increasingly engrossed in his bees. His thoughts grow stranger and stranger. He says things and I thought, "He must be stressed out." He then says more things and I thought with concern, "He must be a little crazy." Then he says very dark things and I thought, "He is dangerous." Though, his tone never changes.

"What?" you ask. Watch the movie! Image from Freaky Flicks.

At one point, he is wearing his bee suit, lying on the floor of a cave in New Mexico. He mentions, as a matter of fact, that he's now dead. This part disturbed me very much. There wasn't any apparent death, nor any apparent death after he mentions he's dead. At that point I was very worried for this man who seems to have wandered into the desert and is now lying on a cave floor. I wondered if this was a documentary or a fiction. It occurred to me only at this point that the genre was never presented to me.

I dozed off right after this part and woke to more desert wandering and cave meandering, and yet still more lying dead on the floor. It was very freaky, and I felt very strange. I felt similar to the way I felt during one of the only ghost encounters I think I've had.

That night I had some sort of dream that stuck with me, though I don't remember it. That next day, I felt like a sticky dream film wouldn't lift from my skin, and I felt a nebulous stinging of mild paranoia. I just felt funky, and I blamed it solely on that terrifying fucking movie.

This past Sunday night, not only did I have bees on the mind, but craved something "out there," to watch. I just wanted to hear a new kooky story about visitations from the Pleiades or a diatribe about the invisible animals that live in the sky. I put on my brave suit and said,

"Jeremy, I know you want to read," he looks up from Only Revolutions, "but I feel like I can watch Wax."

He hops up, says "Okay!" and begins chanting "Bees! Bees! Bees! Bees!" playfully.

The film is lead by Jacob Maker, the disturbingly-calm narrator I've been referring to. He writes programs for computerized military weapons at work, and cares for black Mesopotamian bees at home. These bees were inherited from his grandfather, "Hive" Maker mentioned in the excerpt above. "Hive" combines Spiritualism with early 20th century electronics, which together form a flavor that's better than honey and graham crackers. From there, a series of serendipitous events lead up to Jacob and his wife, Melissa living together in New Mexico with the bees.

So, the movie isn't just about bees or wax or television. It's about one thing, I think, that I figured out while finishing the movie Sunday night. I figured it out and so I wasn't afraid anymore. What I think the movie "means" is something I will keep to myself because I'd rather you watch it yourself and make your own determination first. You can watch the whole film for free online via the link below. If you do, let me know what you thought!

Watch: WAX, OR THE DISCOVERY OF TELEVISION AMONG BEES