Review of Ballet Mécanique (1924) by Edgar C — 07 Feb 2014

Experimental and avant-garde masterpiece by Fernand Léger and Dudley Murphy is, without further ado, one of the best short films ever made.

First, a note on art appreciation. It more than interesting how the perceptions towards the experimental, unusual, unknown and avant-garde held in average, haven't changed a bit since this revolutionary film trend started to appear all over Europe, which the United States would adopt later. Comments abound stating that this kind of projects are "pretentious", "boring", "ridiculous". They claim that any meaning that could be obtained from them would be utter nonsense, and that people praising them are "people who take cinema too seriously", the latter being one of the most narrow-minded, ignorant and self-centered statements any human being with no art appreciation whatsoever could utter from his disgusting mouth.

Ahhh... I feel better...

Anyway...

Not to be confused with Surrealism, Ballet mécanique (1924) is authentic poetry in motion, and film composition techniques reaching an unprecedented level. My reviews are quite famous for listing things. That is how my mind works, because I find it easier to decompose any work into fragments for then identifying those that are the most relevant, and how they connect, if such is the case. An exception will not be done here:

Aspect I.- It is not Surrealism (same case with Cocteau, a self-proclaimed and critically acclaimed film poet), because it does not employ fantastical imagery and/or symbols to communicate allegories, nor it takes its visual material to emotional extremes in order to exemplify an idea. It uses images simply as a form of abstract communication. In both cases, the ideas transmitted can be, most of the times, a task for the viewer to unravel. Surrealism may do this, but not always. These avant-garde and experimental testaments always do it.

II. There is a role reversal. Inert objects gain life and motion; people become motionless. Both engage in repeated patterns through an intoxicating kaleidoscope plagued with a remarkable energy and unexpected sequences which include: machinery, kitchen utensils, celluloid reels, cylinders, carnival, a garden, and a creepy smile.

A good way to identify a good artist is to evaluate the intensity of the reactions that his work(s) caused in the spectators, and how much meaning can be extracted from them. Either fascination or disgust, happiness or anger, alienation or closeness, our organism can respond in hundreds of ways. We are a conceptual map. The issue, though, is that we haven't discovered all of its branches. We need these artistic contributions in our lives to light the turned off bulbs in each one of them. Even if it is something too abstract to connect, or a culture too distant to empathize with, or intentions too vague to comment on them, all of them perfectly reasonable and understandable reasons that may cause the viewer to lower the final rating, the capacity and vision of the filmmakers of this era are things great enough to gather all audiences that saw it in a single table, have a terrific buffet and an excellent collection of beverages, and have a long conversation, whether they liked the short or not.

100/100.