A waste of 90 minutes of my life

While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.

It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Watched about half of this film in one sitting and then came back the next day and had my twin boys (8 years as of this viewing) watch it with me. I wanted to talk to them about the idea of film, I thought maybe through cartoons they had seen fake versions of when the film would get stuck in the projector and start to heat and melt/burn.Indeed for some of us old enough, we recall this in school or at home with threaded projectors before the advent of digital. Plus I used it to talk about the idea of an image that is scrambled can sometimes have a transfixing effect on the viewer, as you are not sure what it is. I left out the porn overtones (they are 8) but in terms of UHF/VHF or any kind of corrupted signal, how interesting that is.And then we just talked about film being experimental and not necessarily telling a story. Like painting or a sculpture. Well, this is that sort of film. From reading one or two reviews here, am I to believe that the film was not doctored in anyway? Rrreaaly? The boys did see the boxer scene, and that was tremendous they had some creative responses to that, but I would have bet the biggest tub of popcorn that it, and several other images (like the reverse images early on) were indeed artistically created rather than merely damaged by time.Anyways, I might have convinced the boys, and myself too. I think some of this sort of film works better in shorter sittings anyways, but I know a friend of mine who clued me into the great Ann Arbor Film Fest definitely digs Morrison, so I was happy to get a chance to see this, albeit at home on, yep, digital disk.Oh and I cannot resist clicking the SPOILER box for this one just for a lark.

This film is a bunch of random pieces of old, deteriorating, film being played with music. Doesn't sound too interesting - and it isn't. According to the interview section on the DVD, Morrison explains that this film is some sort of symbolic expression of the decay that all life goes through. While this sounds like a nice analogy, the film doesn't really convey anything deep or philosophical. Just watching a bunch of old damaged film doesn't really end up conveying much of anything - all we get is to watch old film! The visual effect is sort of cool for about ten minutes, then its just boring. Its all black and white and just seems monotonous. Its like I get the point about decay in the first five minutes. The music in this film is excellent however, is you like abstract and dark ambiance music. In this case, the film isn't worth much but the soundtrack is great!

The premise for this film project is deceptively simple. Take a whole bunch of decaying old film negatives, splice them together and viola: instant art film. This highly recommended film by Bill Morrison creates an effect similar to the visual kaleidoscope you'd see in the Kowaanisqatsi trio of films. Opening with shots of a whirling dervish who punctuates the beginning, middle and end of the film, Morrison sets up a series of "action" shots that when watched slowed down with their naturally occurring decay, take on an otherworldly feeling. Decaying celluloid takes on emotional meaning, reflecting the new readings that the viewer brings to the film. What were probably once quite banal scenes of nuns overseeing children walking through a courtyard, for example, take on an eerie ghostly effect and a scene where a man makes untoward advances on a woman is given heighten tension by the angry swirls the rotting film creates. Some segments were disturbing, others funny, many just beautifully impressionistic.This 70-minute film is quite trippy to watch and your mind will try to make sense of it by finding "things" in the shapes the crackling celluloid creates. (Is that mould? Is it waves crashing on the shore? Neither?) The dramatic score for the film seems lifted off of the disintegrating film, with its odd, oft-times sinister, octaves. At some points near the end, the onslaught of music combined with the repetitiveness of the images was almost too much. Interestingly, no colour film was used. On the one hand it would be difficult to even call this a film, on the other it is actually a film made literally of film. Think Vertov's A Man with a Movie Camera meets Bunuel/Dali's Un Chien andalou. All up, this is a beautiful study in remediation and a film student's wetdream.

I have seen a few films regarding the decay of old film stocks, but this one really brings out the beauty of such images. The slow moving images presented with this progressive avante-garde soundtrack brought back memories of the old school industrial musical movement of the late 70s and early 80s. But when it continues onwards to the scene of the Geisha girl lost in a soup of decay and stains and the music rose with its intensity I felt as if I was witnessing wonderfully horrific. I could actually feel my heart beginning to race with the onslaught of the images and sounds mixing together, moving faster and becoming more agitated and excited.I recommend anyone looking for the modern "art" in films to give this one a try.