Even: As You and I

Unlike most of its companions on Kino's 2-Disc "Avant-Garde" set, this belated 12-minute film (surprisingly shot Silent) is an entertaining spoof on both movie-making and the general public's penchant to participate in nation-wide contests promising fame and fortune. On this preliminary viewing, it seems to be especially targeting Luis Buñuel's celebrated Surrealist short UN CHIEN ANDALOU (1929) as a razor is seen cutting through various objects at one point…but, frankly, if there is anything that showed up these 'avant-garde' doodles for the amateur experiments with a new medium they truly were, it was Buñuel's first two movies!

Anyway, the three men who made the film under review also took on the leading roles, bringing their minds together (after understandably dismissing their thoroughly conventional initial idea of a "boy-meets-girl" narrative) to come up with a nonsensical scenario to film that would put them on the map. However, when they are done shooting and editing "The Afternoon Of A Rubberband"(!) – which, among other things, sees them lowering a camera inside a manhole to recreate a Surrealist painting and being engulfed in strips of celluloid! – the trio realize that the closing date for the submissions was already past…but their reasonable frustration is quickly brushed off when they stumble on an advert for yet another eye-catching competition!

A Liberty-Pete Smith Amateur Movie Contest is announced. Three knuckleheads all work together to make a film but before they start filming, the see an article about Surrealism--and this greatly affects their work. Working separately, the three combine their footage into a final short that is HIGHLY reminiscent of the Salvador Dali/Luis Buñuel collaboration, "Un Chien Andalou" as well as Sergei Eisenstein's "Battleship Potemkin". It's all very clever IF you've seen these films. If not, it will be a chore--and very confusing.

This silent film appears to have been made using an 8mm camera. Considering it's very humble origins, it is a very effective short--but one that I really can't give a numerical score because of its oddness and lack of commercial appeal.