Pas de deux

In 1969 I went to a middle-class matinée showing of "Easy Rider". At the break, we all got up to leave, happily surfeited with the phony, sad (and politically correct for the times) ending. Any southern redneck would shoot a hippy on sight. Okay. We bought that and started shifting around in preparation to leaving.

Then as I remember it, a single word appeared on a dead black screen. "Duo". A back-lit ballerina pirhoutted across that screen and danced away from her own still image. She did it again. We were mesmerized.

Ten seconds of stunned silence followed the last frame. The applause that followed had a quality I can only describe as "awed".

Breathtakingly beautiful, that's all.

The thing about this film is that yes, it is a little hard to approach. It was made in the context of the world of animation in 1968. No one had ever done anything like this before. McLaren chose the dance as the subject for his film not necessarily because he loved ballet (though I would guess he probably _did_ like ballet) but because the form of the dance very much lended itsself to the technique being employed (among other less craft-oriented and more art-oriented decisions). The technique used in this film had never been seen before. We look at it now and it seems like nothing special, but no one had ever thought of this multiple-exposure technique before McLaren. This is generally considered to be McLaren's magnum opus, and it is valuable viewing by any student of animation. Wathing it not as entertainment, though, but with an eye toward composition, staging, timing, and so on.

Stunning, enthralling, captivating, breathtaking.

A visual masterpiece composed from two dancers, clever back-lighting, a pan-pipe and some stop motion/multi-exposure effects. Proof that in the hands of an artist the sum surpasses the parts, must be seen to be believed! The progression from the simplest expression of human motion into a cascade of frames and forms draws the viewer from first to last image. The beauty of the initial simplicity turns into a delicious betrayal of epectations as subtle new effects are thrown into the mix. The music, passionate and stark, is a perfect match and even the synchronizing between aural and visual ebbs and flows is impeccable. Should be seen by anyone who enjoys film as art.

I heard that Norman McLaren , the Scots born Canadian animator was a leading pioneer in his field and is famous the world over . Somewhat typically even a Scottish film buff like myself had little awareness of him until I chanced upon this musical short

PAS DA DEUX is a monochrome short featuring a pair of ballet dancers . Exactly , I was thinking the same " Oh a black and white film featuring a couple of dancers . Can things get anymore tedious . Wake me up when it's finished " but there's something rather hypnotic about the way the music and the choreography merge together . I'm also reliably informed that this was the very first time that " after image " had been achieved on film , something that became very popular years later in everything from DOCTOR WHO to MTV pop videos .

It seems somewhat bitterly unfair - though again typical - that everyone in the world is aware of BRAVEHEART , a Hollywood movie filmed in Ireland , starring an American brought up in Australia , but not even Scots are aware of their compatriot who made such an innovative and much copied visual technique

This one is hard to describe, Two ballet dancers perform a piece while various visual effect are added to augment the performance. Some of the effects are stunning, while others are very jarring and don't quite work. Intriguing idea that works most of the time. If you've seen "A Chairy Tale" or "Neighbours" and enjoyed them, you'll like this. But it is unusual and somewhat off-kilter at times. Recommended for those who like the unusual or special photographic effects. Bear in mind that it is over 30 years old.