..................THE ART MAGIK
...A WITCHES & WIZARDS FOR A FREE WORLD PROPAGANDA FILM
(mysterious music. Montage of magikal images, stars, fractals, old fantasy flicks, etc.)
(exterior: a stately castle)
(interior-- two wizards meet; one wears dark glasses)
Wizard 1: They're in trouble again.
Wizard 2: I know.
(they walk down an ornate corridor and go through a door)
(interior: the Witches and Wizards Council Chamber: a long table littered with magical objects, newspapers, and candles. Witches and Wizards are seated and standing around. Some argue, some read, one dangles a yo yo, one smokes, one blows bubbles, one dozes, two are eating over a chessboard. (loud voice: "Didn't we just have a meeting a decade ago?" another voice :"Oh, you brought cookies! How nice!") An imposing Witch stands and calls twice for order, but is ignored except by irrelevant calls for pancakes, pizza and yogurt. She looks around impatiently and waves her wand. The room silences. She brings the wand down: a puff of smoke begins the meeting.)
OPENING:
Witch 1: Our situation is not at all amusing, I'm afraid. Your reports, please. (looks left. camera begins to move around table. Each mage gestures and is transported into a scene. Their eyes, ears, mouths, and hands are superimposed onto many images.)
Scene: industrial damage.
Earth Witch: Grandmother Earth is very ill-- worse than ever. Poison fills the water and air, the spirits are leaving the woods and fields. The creatures are dying, and many of them are refusing to have young.
Light Witch: (Touching her) Here, dearie-sniff this (holds up celery) It's a restorative.
Scene: Koyaanisquatsi sky moving
Earth Wizard: The wilder among the elemental spirits are outraged; more and more they rampage over the seas, in the winds, and under the earth. They're dangerous.
Scene: urban desolation
Dark Glasses Wizard: The desolation is growing day by day: vast wastelands, where evil breeds. As you well know.
Scene: beautiful cityscape
Light Wizard: They've a genius for building. They've made a beautiful world-unfortunately, it's also a beautiful prison for souls!
Scene: Koyaanisquatsi city in high speed
Metaphysician: They're spinning-- in the madness of their materialism. They don't hear the music of the spheres anymore.
Witch 1: We've tried deflecting our energy from its being; hoping things would get better. We've neglected our responsibilities as mages. For too long! (slams table for emphasis)
Earth Wizard: It's that blasted Industrial Revolution! It's disrupted the balance of things!
Dark Wizard: Their technology's too primitive-- all that burning, that concrete and plastic!.
Light Witch: We can't even fly anywhere without running into those dreadful jet things!
Earth Witch: Running coaches off of nasty smelly explosions-- what a stupid idea! (all agree)
Dark Wizard: Have you seen their media? It creeps into people's hearts, wrapping their minds in layer upon layer of ignorance! It's sorcery!
Metaphysician: Their barren materialist metaphysic has caused desolation of the land; that leads inevitably to desolation of the soul! We must stop this sequence at the root!
Witch 1: They have to change the way they live! (more murmurs of agreement)
Light Wizard: My friends: I enjoy a good carping and throwing blame around as much as anyone-- but this is not very productive.
Dark Wizard: Neither is trying to ignore out of existence.
Witch 1: I agree with my brother wizards. It's high time we raise our powers and DO something! But what? (long silence while they think)
PROPOSALS
Dark Wizard: We could put an end to it…
Light Wizard: Oh, that would be gallant!
Dark Wizard: Listen to me… the elementals are ready to unleash earthquakes, tidal waves, winds that blow faster and stronger and never stop. Volcanoes. All we have to do is let them.
Earth Witch. And lose our beautiful world? I won't allow it! (murmers of agreement. Dark Wizard and Earth Witch raise their hands-Other mages rise from their seats. The metaphysician intervenes)
Metaphysician: Come come-are we Mages or not? Let's transform it….
Earth Witch- Wonderful idea! I'd love to turn all of those sport utility things into gecko lizards!
Earth Wizard: We could turn all the petroleum into yogurt!
Dark Wizard: We could hex all the media people: Everyone who lies breaks out into virulent, oozing green boils! (chuckles) Retroactively!
Earth Witch: Change all the roads into forests and the streets into gardens!
Light Witch: (sighs)
Light Wizard: No, No, you're all wrong! Their technology is for them what magik is for us! We can't just take it away...
Witch 1: Gallantry, my friends, Gallantry!
(Silence, pause)
ANALYSIS
Mystic Wizard who has not yet spoken: There are those who say that there's no need to interfere at all- since the cosmic energy is perfect, there can be no disharmony. Chaos is but a dream.
Dark Wizard: From which they cannot awaken! (rolls dice, inspects them) There's plenty of raw energy in humanity-- but it's stuck. It just spins around at a low level, generating violence, selfishness, greed-- all kinds of confusion.
Light Witch: (turns over a tarot card) Their dreams have the power to shape reality-- they just don't remember it, and they're not sure what they want.
Earth Witch: (looking into a teacup) They spend all their time chasing dreams.
Mystic Wizard: (looking into crystal ball) Those dreams are haunted by strange desires.
(Koyaanisquatsi clouds moving dissolves) When I go into them, I see deserts lit by bright stars, vast green oceans, thunderstorms; lightning of no color…
Light Witch: (picks up another card) Ah! They're near, very near!
Dark Wizard: Near what?
(Light Witch makes a spiral upward motion with her finger and winks; Dark Wizard raises eyebrows)
Earth Witch: Well, shall we help them, then?
Earth Wizard: Give them a little push?
Light Wizard: A nudge? Hee hee!
Witch 1: No! Every time we save them it blows up in our faces!
Dark Wizard: Just ask Merlin about that.
(everyone looks in the same direction. Cut to Merlin, bound by spiderwebs in a hollow tree)
Merlin: Yes, that's true. (pause)
Witch 1: The situation is truly difficult.
Earth Wizard: I hope it's not too late?
Philosopher: Not at all! The sequence of cause and effect can be interrupted, you know. (gestures and is transported to a pool table. Makes a shot.) Whenever someone, uh, does something, it creates an energy path, or chreode. Actions lead to effects, and all actions are magical. And any process can be stopped before it causes its result (stops a ball before it can hit the 8 ball into the corner pocket). We can make new paths for that energy to follow. (with a whistling noise, carries the ball to a shelf where a pint of guiness sits. Picks up the pint and toasts the camera.)
SOLUTION
Philosopher: I agree that we should avoid trying to manipulate things. But there is a way. Establish a new chreode, and their own powers will start to follow it.
Earth Wizard: In time, it will grow stronger and deeper, like a river following a canyon.
Light Witch: We should start with something utterly harmless and gentle-that's the way!
Light Wizard: Yogurt!
Philosopher: Yogurt??
Light Wizard: No, not really. Yes! Yogurt! A culture. Art.
Mystic Wizard: Art. The realm of dreams.
Witch 1: Where we are strongest and the powers of so-called reality are most vulnerable.
Light Witch: We need a charm! A charming, enticing charm, rich in resonance and compelling to behold!
Dark Wizard: A psi-field transducer!
Philosopher: Of course!
Light Wizard: (unrolls a colorful chart; objects scatter to the floor) Every energy has its higher resonance-Lets refine passion into kindness, materialism to generosity, dreams into vision….
Earth Witch: I was just thinking about spiders--
Light Witch: Some of my best friends!
Earth Witch: --They eat bugs, you know….
Light Witch: Well, someone has to!
Earth Witch: …and turn them into silk! If we spin all the energies into a coil….
Earth Wizard: The energies that keep them stuck in the industrial age!
Earth Witch: they'll be refined!
Philosopher: Hmm-a transformer.
Light Wizard: Exactly! They love tearing things down-- Let's cast a spell to help them take down their industrial civilization and create a simpler, more elegant one! One that doesn't burn oil, and doesn't destroy nature!
Earth Witch: That would be very very nice!
Light Witch: We could call it a love transformer!
Earth Witch: I like the sound of that! (voices of agreement)
Dark Wizard: High time the place got a good remodeling..
Mystic Wizard: It will find its place, where the fabric of reality is woven.
Philosopher: In fact, it doesn't really matter whether it works or not! Charms are like dreams, they fade. But the vision of a new world will grow in people's minds-- as Art!
Witch 1: We should cast a protection circle all the same.
Light Witch: And if we hold the pure mind of kindness and compassion, our actions will cause no harm.
Light Wizard: We should call on the wisdom beings, of course.
Earth Wizard: Of course! The charm can't be too small, and we should have a lot of them-- over as much of the globe as possible!
Dark Wizard: How do you suggest we do that? There are so few of us left.
(pause)
Light Witch: (light bulb goes on over her head) I know-- Let's make a movie! An educational film on how to build a love transformer…
Philosopher: "Psi-field transducer"
Light Witch: …We can burn it onto cds and distribute them to covens and colleges throughout the world!
Wizards: Brilliant!
Witch 1: All in favor?
Wizards: Aye!
Witch 1: All in favor of making a movie?
Wizards: AYE!
Earth Wizard: What's a cd again?
fade out on Witches and Wizards shaking hands and excitedly making plans to make a movie.
TITLE: LOVE TRANSFORMER
MAKING A PSI-FIELD TRANSDUCER
Narrator: What is magik? It is all around us. When you move your finger, or even just think about moving it, you are making a bridge between mind and matter.
(Exterior: A beach with a view of a large city. Witches and wizards bless the site)
narrator: You can't Make magic happen; you can only invite it to happen, like getting a wild thing to eat from your hand. Like playing music, or falling in love.
A triangular hole is dug in the sand
narrator: First, make the matrix; this represents the cosmic womb of birth and death.
Three wooden poles are placed in a tripod formation
narrator: The armature represents the present, the sacred time when all magic happens. When you cast a spell, keep your heart open, full of kindness and respect for the world.
(offering substances are placed in the matrix; the mouth is outlined with red sand)
narrator: Simple actions performed simply; Just be, and heaven and earth are joined in that moment. You are already always one with the energy of evolution.
Wizards wind colored string around the poles
narrator: The armature is wound with threads of the three primary and three secondary colors. This symbolizes the strands of energy that make up the world.
offerings are placed around the circle
narrator: Offerings are made to the local spirits; the sum total of all the natural and human energies of the place. A red candle so that destructive passions may become creative; oranges to transform selfishness into confidence; yellow flowers so that greed may transform to generosity; evergreen to transmute all activity into healing; a mirror to enlist mind in the service of wisdom; and an eggplant for crazy vision and ultimate joy.
The fire is lit and the Assembly empowers the transformer
narrator: As the strings and the offerings burn, the energy of wishes makes a path in the fabric of reality-- a path that is made clearer every time someone repeats the charm.
Wizard: Now
Heaven and Earth join together
Now
Matter and mind are one body
Witches and Wizards:
Now. Let the roots be nourished
Now, let technology evolve
Now, let the Earth be healed
Now, Let suffering be abated
Now, Let kindness breed
Now, Let wisdom be born
Now. Now. Now!
all make noise. With gestures, they send the energy out over the city, and out in all directions.
narrator: with the extinction of the fire, the spell is complete
(The matrix is filled back with sand)
(exterior: the transformer, on the beach at sunset, with the city on the background)
