Experimental Film

Fisticuffs 
By Miranda Pennel - 2003 - http://flamin.filmlondon.org.uk/showcase/assets/showcase_items/fisticuffs

This short film was particularly striking, as it appears to play with a few concepts, it seems to play with the temporal state, as the character keeps re-entering the bar like it is being replayed with a different outcome every time, this plays with the audiences preconception of time. The character encounters many different bar brawls, it mimics the sort of scene you might find in a dramatised western, and after a little bit of research I found this was intentional and the film was inspired by western films, so why? The film is quite surrealist and has a non linear structure, it does not take the expected approach to a man walking into a bar, as he is constantly caught amidst violence. It could be said that Pennel is making a connection between western bar brawls and a london pub because they both appear to have senseless booze filled violence all the time, and maybe the statement is that times don't really change, this is reinforced by the constant repetition of the scene, it could connote the repetition of basic human habits throughout history. The fight choreography is really well done, this probably has something to do with Miranda Pennel's background in dance. The fluid movements of the camera almost juxtapose the violence within the frame,



Ballet Mecanique
By Fernand Leger -1924 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9SgsqmQJAq0

This film is truly abstract, the film pays homage to surrealism, and picasso's cubism one of the for-fronting surrealist artists of the time. The sounds within the piece are repetitive and disturbing, Shapes are used within the film to connote a mechanic industry sound, The non linear structure of the film makes it seem dreamlike, a common theme within surrealist film. One of the opening shots is a close up of lips smiling and then going back to normal over and over, this shot is extremely stylised and seems to show emotion in its basic form, almost showing that the smile is fake, it seems to play with the viewers association with a smile as a very real emotion, whilst also showing that because it is a film that the smile is not real. Much of the footage is mirrored in a kaleidoscopic way this shows many different angles of the same thing, possibly connoting the multi faceted view that the same image could represent for a person. The title suggests a fascination of mechanisation of the human form, a shot with wheels and cogs turning, is then quickly juxtaposed by a woman walking, this could be trying to show how the woman is walking through a series of complex movements within the human body, and it could be touching on that biology can be explained in terms of mechanics. In a later shot legs that aren't attached to a human body are moving in a way that suggests the hollywood 'Tiller girls' of the time, the film could be poking fun at conventional hollywood traits, exploring the peculiar movement that was so fashionable at the time. Whatever the intention of the piece it definitely is an interesting watch in terms of surrealism.