Experimental Film Program: Projection Instructions

'Wavelength': Canadian-born and New York-based artist and filmmaker Michael Snow (1928-2023) made a decisive mark on the art of cinema with this structuralist masterpiece from 1967. A film that in many ways is the ultimate exploration of cinematic space.

Shot in a typical New Yorker loft, the film appears as a mixture of a technical/cinematic linguistic study and a collection of mysterious fiction fragments. Nothing happens, and yet something happens all the time. The image is disturbed along the way by various forms of 'optical noise' (inset colour filters and other forms of manipulation). Just as on the soundtrack, various elements appear, some of them seemingly real sounds, others synthetically produced (most significantly a sine tone, which is introduced after about eight minutes and then increases in frequency for the rest of the film's playing time). In addition, a number of sequences in which anonymous actors enter the scenery and perform actions that are not explained in the context. In one sequence, two women listen to The Beatles' latest single, 'Strawberry Fields Forever' (with the message “nothing is real”). In another, we are witnesses to something that could be a criminal intrigue, but again no explanation comes. And while all this goes on, the camera moves almost imperceptibly forward to a point where the 'wavelength' of the title takes on a surprisingly concrete meaning — yet again without any 'explanation' of the film.

On the occasion of the world premiere of 'Wavelength' in Belgium in 1967, Michael Snow wrote a letter of intent stating, among other things, “I wanted to make a summary of my nervous system, my religious hunches and aesthetic ideas. What I had in mind and planned to realize was a time monument in which the beauty and tristesse of equivalence would be celebrated, thinking about and striving to create a definitive statement of cinematic space and time, a balancing act between 'illusion' and 'fact', all about seeing.”

Ken Jacobs is renewing and transforming a collection of some of the very first footage in film history. Images from Paris, Venice and Cairo glide by and gain new depth through a simple optical effect. The audience is given a filter, which must be used along the way. As the camera passes through the tunnel in the middle of the film, a flash of red light signals that the filter should be moved from the right to the left eye. The effect is strongest if you sit centrally and some distance from the screen, where the experience of depth is amplified.

The work of the film operator is essential to any cinema performance, but takes place in the shielded operator's room and therefore remains hidden from the audience. 'Projection Instructions' by Morgan Fisher draws the operator's work onto the canvas. The film consists of a series of written instructions to the operator and becomes a performance between the film and the operator.

A haunting film about the fragility of the analog film strip. It opens with the image of a film reel in motion. On the strip you can sense a close-up of a match and a woman's face, but the actual subject is the film medium itself and the projection. Suddenly, the picture catches fire. The chemical reaction causes the subject to dissolve into small explosions. This destruction is then re-photographed and made part of the film anew. '3rd Degree' examines how the cinematic image both exposes and resists destruction and mutilation. Even while the material burns and decomposes, the film strip continues to exist. The film can be shown as a simultaneous installation on three canvases or sequentially on a single canvas. We show the film in the latter form.

Directed by: Michael Snow
Country/year: Canada, United States, 1967
Running time: 45 min.
Formato: 16mm
Language: Without dialogue

Part of the series: The Many Lives of the Cinema
For 30 years, the cinema halls in Gothersgade have been the beating heart of Cinemateket. We celebrate this with a series of films set in and around cinemas, depicting life in the hall, the foyer and behind the scenes. Welcome to the cinema!