Unseen cinema. 4, Inverted narratives. The bridge / Cineric, Inc. presents ; by Charles Vidor.
INVERTED NARRATIVES is part of the retrospective UNSEEN CINEMA that explores long-forgotten American experimental cinema. Vidor's The Bridge, an adaptation of Ambrose Bierce's story "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge", utilizes flash-forward techniques to visualize a condemned ma...
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| Format: | Electronic Video |
| Language: | No linguistic content |
| Published: |
[United States] :
Filmmakers Showcase,
1929.
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| Subjects: | |
| Genre/Form: | Experimental films. Silent films. Short films. |
| Summary: | INVERTED NARRATIVES is part of the retrospective UNSEEN CINEMA that explores long-forgotten American experimental cinema. Vidor's The Bridge, an adaptation of Ambrose Bierce's story "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge", utilizes flash-forward techniques to visualize a condemned man's escape fantasy. It effectively creates a mixture of objectivity and inner subjectivity and was released in 1931 to great acclaim under a new title, "The Spy". -- JAN-CHRISTOPHER HORAK The similarities shared between Vidor's 1929 short film and Jean Genet's 1950 "Un Chant d'amour / Song of Love", the underground gay classic, reverberate male sexual fantasies tied to imprisonment, punishment and release. Even though Vidor's film suppresses much of the overt homosexual references graphically shown by Genet, the complex themes explored center on threats of physical violence - death by hanging in "The Bridge" and rape in "Un Chant d'amour" and the basic human desire for freedom. --BRUCE POSNER After an apprenticeship at UFA in Berlin, Charles Vidor came to Hollywood in 1924. He produced "The Bridge" independently (1929), but didn't work steadily until RKO hired him in 1933. Later directed at Paramount and Columbia, where he became a specialist for big budget films with Rita Hayworth, like "Cover Girl" (1944). --JAN-CHRISTOPHER HORAK. Alternate title: "The Spy". 35mm 1.33:1 black and white silent with music 18fps 9:41 minutes. Music by Bob Vaughn. |
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| Item Description: | "New directions in storytelling". Title from resource description page (viewed June 29, 2020). |
| Physical Description: | 1 online resource (11 minutes) |
| Playing Time: | 00:10:43 |
| Production Credits: | Music by Bob Vaughn. |
| Language: | Silent with music. |