British Universities Film & Video Council

moving image and sound, knowledge and access

Man Ray Films

Synopsis
Four films by Man Ray (Emmanuel Radnitzky), Dadaist and experimentalist well-known for his photographic work. During the 1920s he made four films that established him as a major figure of avant-garde cinema. The video also contains 11 short ‘autobiographical’ films, some of which are home-movie style and star his friends Pablo Picasso, Lee Miller, Paul Eluard and Roland Penrose. Presents an intimate portrait of an extraoardinary life and a fascinating personality.
1 (1923, 3 min): A film made without a camera - Ray’s attempt to confuse and confound the participants of the last great Dada convention. Produced using film cut into strips and randomly placing objects such as pins on them to produce X-ray like images. The strips were then glued together and a few camera-made shots were added.
2 (1927, 18 min): Ray employes surrealist techniques to create an unconventional surreal film, an abstract Dadaist cine-poem of spirals and landscapes, containing a nonnarrative plot within a nonlinear structure.
3: (1928, 15 min). A surrealistic film based on a poem by Robert Desnos, which uses a gelatin filter on the lens to distort the images, creating rhythmic patterns in dream-like sequences.
4: (1929, 25 min). An unsolved mystery in a modern villa designed by Malet-Stevens.
Series
History of the Avant-Garde, A: Series
Language
English
Country
France
Medium
Video; Videocassette. VHS. b&w. 112 min.
Year of production
1940
Availability
Sale; 2000 sale: £15.99 (inclusive)
Subjects
Media studies
Keywords
experimental film & video; Picasso, Pablo (1881-1973); Ray, Man; short films; surrealism

Credits

Director
Man Ray
Contributor
Lee Miller; Pablo Picasso

Sections

Title
Retour ‡ la raison, Le
Synopsis
1 (1923, 3 min): A film made without a camera - Ray's attempt to confuse and confound the participants of the last great Dada convention. Produced using film cut into strips and randomly placing objects such as pins on them to produce X-ray like images. T

Title
Emak Bakia
Synopsis
2 (1927, 18 min): Ray employes surrealist techniques to create an unconventional surreal film, an abstract Dadaist cine-poem of spirals and landscapes, containing a nonnarrative plot within a nonlinear structure.

Title
Etoile de mer, L’
Synopsis
3: (1928, 15 min). A surrealistic film based on a poem by Robert Desnos, which uses a gelatin filter on the lens to distort the images, creating rhythmic patterns in dream-like sequences.

Title
Mystères du chateau du dé
Synopsis
4: (1929, 25 min). An unsolved mystery in a modern villa designed by Malet-Stevens.

Production Company

Name

Paris

Distributor

Name

BFI Video

Email
video.films@bfi.org.uk
Web
http://www.bfi.org.uk External site opens in new window
Phone
020 7957 8957
Fax
020 7957 8968
Address
21 Stephen Street
London
W1T 1LN
 

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