As with his masterpiece MACHINE IN THE GARDEN, Richard Kerr takes a physical surrounding and turns it into a living being with some rhythmic editing. Seemingly shot frame-by-frame, this short is a study of the Montreal River.
The camera "pans up" its varied subjects, in a fragmented way, resembling stop-motion (which is perhaps due to the frame-by-frame shooting). Yet this motion is so mathematically precise, and its persistent rhythm gives one the illusion that the picture is breathing. As the "organism" pulses, so too the colours change from their natural habitat to over-saturated hues of aqua, turquoise, green and red.
Where Richard Kerr would later make rather slow, dreamy, meditative pieces filmed at bodies of water, this film has none of that eloquence. It instead evokes the overwhelming, muscular surrounds with its exaggerated movements.
The camera "pans up" its varied subjects, in a fragmented way, resembling stop-motion (which is perhaps due to the frame-by-frame shooting). Yet this motion is so mathematically precise, and its persistent rhythm gives one the illusion that the picture is breathing. As the "organism" pulses, so too the colours change from their natural habitat to over-saturated hues of aqua, turquoise, green and red.
Where Richard Kerr would later make rather slow, dreamy, meditative pieces filmed at bodies of water, this film has none of that eloquence. It instead evokes the overwhelming, muscular surrounds with its exaggerated movements.