DADA, Surrealism, and the Cinematic Effect

Appendix 7

703 Analysis of Lawrence Jordan’s Duo Concertantes Part One: The Centennial Exposition (Intro shot 1) A handwritten jittering Roman numeral “I,” in white on a black ground (the figure “I” is scratched into the film). (Intro shot 2) The frame moves down, revealing the words “Gaiety Theatre” and, on a new line, “no fees for booking programmes, or cloak rooms.” (Intro shot 3) [blank, then words appear] “The Centennial Exposition” [small text below, unreadable] “No Fees” Various figures appear around these words; possibly characters from unidentified theatrical presentations. 1. A still image: the camera/frame moves out to give a full view of the exterior of a large building; possibly an arcade (flags hang at the end of peaked roofs). Commentary: The building’s dome resembles that of a Cabalistic-Alchemical temple, such as that depicted in an altarpiece of a church in Bad 7 Appendix Appendix Seven 704 Tenach (near Calw). Tommaso Campanella, in Civitas Solis (The City of the Sun, 1623), writes of an alchemical temple with flags flying over its dome. Furthermore, Jordan might have associated the image with the old Ocean Beach pavilion (and its nearby windmill). 2. Inside an arcade—in the background is a woman looking into a shop window: the collage presents the upper body of a moustachioed man with a book, who “slides” across the frame—he enters at the right and leaves at the left; the book is open to an illustration of a birdcage; he holds open a page and peers at it, then looks up. Commentary: As Benjamin’s writings show, an arcade, with its wondrous collection of objects severed from their usual context and implausibly assembled according to no discernible rational principle, but in such a way as to elicit desire, is an inherently Surrealistic form. 3. Birds sit on a ledge below an opening (a window), among bushy plants; a hand, with a bird sitting on an outstretched finger, enters through the opening (window); the hand rises to let the bird fly off (it leaves the frame on the left). The movements of the figures vary from the time it would take to perform them in reality: sometimes the time is distended, sometimes contracted, and sometimes it is difficult to determine the relation between screen time and “real time.” This endows the sequence with a marvellous quality—in the course of commenting on collage and its cinematic origins in Les pas perdus, Breton specifically cites the expansion and contraction of time, an effect readily achieved by film, as a means of engendering the feeling of le merveilleux. Commentary: Ernst frequently used avian imagery to suggest transcendent knowledge—and the volatile spirits that escape during the alchemical process (which is akin to the distilling process). Even by this point, viewers will have recognized the film’s oneiric character —it presents itself as a familiar, even comforting, dream. Jordan’s mentor, Robert Duncan, spoke of this dreamy state as being that in which deep understanding emerges, in the form of myth. 4. The man with the book moves along the bottom of the frame, from the right towards the middle, and stops; he tilts his head back and looks up; in the background, various groups of people stand around in the arcade’s interior (a narrow structure with a doorway at the end); as the man looks up, the camera/frame tilts to show the rest of the structure, which, we discover, is a windmill or, perhaps, an arcade/entertainment centre in the form of a windmill (after the style of Paris’s Moulin Rouge); the camera/frame stops on the rotating windmill and its peaked roof—a bird flies by, entering from Analysis of Lawrence Jordan’s Duo Concertantes 705 the top-right corner and leaving the frame at the left, then another enters at the left and perches on the roof, then two birds enter from opposite sides. 5. The man with the book moves along the bottom of the frame, entering at the right and leaving at the left; in the background is a building with flags of various nations on a number of gables; there are also several groups of people in the background. Commentary: A reader is a fascinated subject. The building itself resembles traditional illustrations of the memory theatre. 6. A ball bounces down chairs arranged in tiers; the camera/frame tilts down as the ball moves down to the...