A Movie

The reviewers are quite a lot. I love comments like "I could have made a better film." This is a film that pushes the bounds of our attentions. Yes, it's a mess. Just because one can get his or her hands on stock footage doesn't mean you can make a FILM. I had never heard of this until I started reviewing several shorts and seeing what people really in the know have to offer. The snobbery comes from watching polished Hollywood productions and seeing nicely photographed images. This is a work of art, spliced together from the available marble in a wasteland.

On the first day of film school, in a class called film aesthetics, this short film was screened. Right afterwards the class was asked to give their opinions on the film.

"I think it symbolized violence" one kid said.

"I think it represented human nature's tendency towards war and desire for sex" a girl from the back of the room blurted.

Then the teacher asked why were the clips separated by seconds of black. She asked what the significance of the music score was. The class went silent as the 30 some odd film aficionados thought of what it could symbolize, what the message was, what it all meant. Then, i raised my hand, and gave my interpretation...

This movie is a collection of seemingly random clips from newsreels and b movies, but is edited in such a way that it constantly begs the audience to ask questions. Why did the titles play 5 or 6 times throughout the film? Why did he show the Hindenburg exploding - backwards? Why start the movie with a topless girl taking her stockings off? What's with the music? Is the filmmaker trying to evoke some emotion with the visuals combined with the music?

Watching this movie is like staring up at the clouds and telling your friends what you see. It means something different to everyone who has ever watched it. By no means is this movie put together poorly, there is no order or theme to the clips, but it keeps the audiences attention even for the sole reason that you never know what your going to see next. If you ever get the chance to see this don't pass it up, it's only 12 minutes of your life but be prepared to spend at least 3 times that thinking about the film.

A Movie, by Bruce Conner, is not only THE classic example of a compilation film, it is an essential part of the experimental film cannon. It consists of various found (stock) footage, edited together to a musical score. The resulting montage inspires thought about a variety of human endeavors, particularly sex and war. A must see for experimental film fans, and a crowd pleaser for all audiences.

an amazing film of film clips, this piece is truly amazing. stunning footage presents the birth of man through metaphor and then, after twelve minutes of imagery illistrating humankind's triumphs as well as failure, conner takes the viewer back to the womb with his water motif. this piece on the whole is one of my favorite shorts, as it portrays the world circa 1960 in a way one might not expect..i also enjoy conner's use of the inaguration of queen elizabeth 2 in the midst of technological failure clips. highly enjoyable, worth the trouble of seeking it out...

A Movie is one of those times where, while Im not sure if the editor of this footage Bruce Conner has a point of view or is working out some definite themes or not, this is most appealing for each viewer to interpret it how he or she will. There are some moments of juxtaposition - basically Conner mocking/celebrating the ideal Kuhleshov Effect in action with the girl on the bed with the guys in the sub, leading up to the first A-bomb - that are nothing short of miraculous. But I'm not sure I'm one to say: "no! This is what he intended to say, this and only this!" With cinema, it's usually (when the art is at its greatest) in the eyes and ears of the beholder. Usually, as is the way with cinema though, the male beholder (if there's an underlying point, however, that... Could be all).

The running theme at least at first is action: cowboys and Indians, tanks, motorbikes, Teddy friggin Roosevelt, other military things, and after the Atom Bomb then we have some dog-fight aerial footage. But what is there to make of the book-ends to the film, with the first image of a nearly naked woman (this after we get in what is the one thing I might say Connor is trying to go for like the opening of Bergman's Persona, just deconstructing what he's got in front of him on the Steenbeck) and then it ends with... Oppression and starving African kids and a manager in the ocean(?)

What Connor does here, looking aside from whatever you may or may not read into the flow of images (ie sex appeal vs action, like notice there's no women really featured aside from the sex bombs, that it's the 50s and so matter of fact about annihilation, etc), on a concrete level, is: cinema is about EMOTION and MOVEMENT (or as San Fuller said, it's MOTION-PICTURES, they should MOVE!) and they do that here and then some. This is 11 minutes of movement and violence scored to rousing music and a sense that anything could happen next.

It really plays as just seeing a succession of things that are captivating in the mis eh scene; while Connor didnt direct the footage himself, everything he chooses is monumentally important. What we are made to see, how he leaves the bomb for so long for us, how he cuts so quickly near the end... There are hardly words to describe on just an objective level how it works so well because it taps into a truth that we all know and yet this truth is the kind we arent shown as kids. That nude woman at the start shouldnt shock or surprise me as an adult who has seen naked women over the years, but it does because... Hey, in 1958? Holy moly!

It's one of the top 5 short films ever.