SATRAPY

Year Released: 1988 MPAA Rating: Unrated Running Time: 13 minutes Click to Expand Credits: Created by Scott Stark

A fast rhythmic pattern of black and white stripes of varying widths. A sound score alternating between notes one fifth apart, which sounds as if it could be the result of projecting the stripes themselves over the film’s optical sound track. The incantatory sound is reminiscent of certain forms of East Asian folk music. The fast oscillations create mild sensations of color. Gradually fragments of pornographic playing cards intrude into the image, changing on each frame. Torn edges of cards and of the striped paper create a sense of a shallow, layered space, reminiscent of early cubist collages. Occasional glimpses of edge lettering and sprocket holes keep returning us to the physicality of the celluloid surface. Eventually the playing cards are seen on stone, brick, grass. A world is depicted of tactile, alive surface textures, where vision itself is eroticized. The rushing speed of the images creates an active, dancing visual field in which different surfaces and rhythmic patterns leap out of the screen to engage our eyeballs.

Posted on December 15, 2003 in Reviews by David Finkelstein

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