Les possibilités du dialogue

This is a rather interesting short film from legendary animator/filmmaker Jan Svankmajer that looks at the notions of communication breakdown and personal alienation. It is a completely stop-motion piece of animation; offering something of a social parable broken into three individual chapters. The sequences include Exhaustive Discussion, Passionate Discussion and finally, Factual Conversation. Each segment is supposed to represent a satirical comment on various aspects of communication breakdown within modern Czech culture, though whether or not you choose to follow this particular interpretation will be entirely down to you.

Regardless of the message, which could be viewed as somewhat simplistic in relation to Svankmajer's more engaging works - such as The Flat (1968), Jabberwocky (1971), Alice (1988) and Conspirators of Pleasure (1996) - it is the animation that remains the truly impressive factor in this film's overall design, with the director creating some wonderful characters and scenarios out of a variety of old, inanimate objects. If you are a fan of the bizarre, provocative and imaginative world that this particular filmmaker creates, then Dimensions of Dialog (1982) (or more fittingly, Possibilities of Dialog, given both the design and thematic subtext) should be required viewing.

Jan Svankmager's "Dimensions of Dialogue" is a collection of short films made up of stop-motion photography, live action, and animation. In the first act, Exhaustive Discussion, two heads made of all sorts of food and utensils are reduced to chunks and pieces through unique stop-motion animation. The heads devour and regurgitate each other into new forms over and over in a apologue of Evolution until we have clay heads continuously devouring and regurgitating. In the second act, Passionate Discourse, the two heads have become male and female, fall in love, and have sensual sex where they blend together. When they revert back to man and women there exists a needy lump of clay in between them, seemingly their child. Neither wants to care for the child and they begin to throw the lump back and forth at one another. The fight continues to escalate until they have virtually destroy one another. In the final act, Factual Conversation, two new heads appear-those of middle-aged men-and they begin spitting out and sucking back into their mouths various objects, interacting with one another through physical use of their tongues to manipulate the various objects for their dual benefit. Their exchanges become increasingly irrational, finally ending in destruction. Through use of human forms which are dismantled, scattered, merged and then weirdly constructed, "Dimensions of Dialogue" serves as a visually entertaining pessimistic study about the types of dialogue people have with one another, and the way that these dialogues can go horribly wrong. Some feel that it is Svankmajer's greatest film, and one of the most astounding animated shorts ever made. Whether that's true or not, his films have had a huge influence on modern avant-garde and stop-motion animators, as well as influencing the likes of Tim Burton and the Brothers Quay, and it is a film well worth watching.

It was with a little uncertainty that I approached my first animated short film from Jan Svankmajer. When it comes to surrealism, he is considered to be one of the greatest, which is from whence my first misgiving came: I'm really not much of a fan of surrealism. Whilst I can admire the craftsmanship that went into creating a given film, I prefer a slightly more literal approach to film-making; to put it simply, I'm completely incapable of deciding whether a film is a surrealist masterpiece, or if it's just going out of its way to be weird. In Svankmajer's case, I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

The 12-minute long 'Moznosti dialogu / Dimensions of Dialogue' is divided into three distinct sections, entitled, respectively: "exhaustive discussion," "passionate discourse" and "factual conversation." In the first, a collection of heads – created in the style of Giuseppe Arcimboldo's paintings – sequentially devour each other and regurgitate the remains, eventually eliminating all variation and reducing the population to numerous copies of the single bland human. In the second, a clay couple dissolve into each other during the act of love, before quarreling over a remnant of leftover clay (suggestive of a child, most likely) and tearing each other into a frenzied pulp. In the third section, two elderly male clay heads protrude a selection of ordinary objects from their mouths (toothbrush and toothpaste; bread and spread; pencil and sharpener; shoe and shoelaces), eventually using them in every possible combination and withering themselves to fragments.

The stop-motion animation of 'Dimensions of Dialogue' is undoubtedly done very well, and the "exhaustive discussion" section has an iconic feel to it that has often been imitated. It was, however, quite repetitive, and there's only so many times that you can watch a Arcimboldo head devour another and spew forth its fragments before your interest starts to waver. The second section moves forward quite quickly, and, using the clay man and women, Svankmajer was able to convey very effectively the rage that each person was feeling, as they tore into each other's flesh with their fingernails. The third section, not unlike the first, repeated itself, I thought, one too many times, and I didn't think that so many reiterations were necessary to drive home the filmmaker's message. However, if I were to watch this film again, it would certainly be for the remarkable visuals, and I can say little to fault the wonderfully vibrant stop-motion animation.

The grotesque charm of this trio of short films is hard to beat. They each work separately but gain a lot from being seen together.

They convey in a language of images profound truths in a lively, eerie, unpretentious way. There is always something neat to look at and went away from this just feeling full, the way you do after a good meal, not needing anymore.

The mix of creepy animation and clear - precise message is the main virtue of this not ordinary animation , reflecting impressive rich animation, fair requisitorium and the great use of ordinary materials and clay for remind old truths , too easy to ignore but defining us. Short, impossibility of dialogue in three admirable . examples.