BSA106: Surrealism (Week 9)

Surrealism was a European artistic/cultural movement starting in the 1920s. It was predominant in painting, literature and cinema. Founded as a movement in 1924 by Andre Breton who drafted a manifesto declaring what surrealism was. The movements used shocking, irrational and or absorb imagery. The aim was to derange, upset, disorientate and shock people.


Luis Bunuel & Salvador Dali
The short film is a succession of dreamlike sequences that violate conventional narrative schemes

Bunuel states the script was sparked by images from their own dreams both of them brainstormed a series of images that had no rational connection to each other

Jean Cocteau

He was a poet, novelist, painter, playwright, set designer, and actor

Destino

On January 14, 1946, Salvador Dalí signed a contract with Walt Disney to make a short animated film entitled Destino

Production was brought to a halt after 8 months because of financial difficulties and only 17 seconds of test animation was completed

In 1999 while working on Fantasia 2000, Walt Disney's nephew Roy E. Disney unearthed the project and decided to have it completed

Walerian Borowcyzk

He directed 40 films between 1946 and 1988. Including Theatre de M et Mme Kabal.

Jan Svankmajer

Czech surrealist filmmaker.

Dimensions of dialogue:

David Lynch

BBC Surrealist Cinema

Rabbits

Research

Provide a summary of Surrealist film and include the following –

Time period

Surrealism started in the teen years of the 20th century and was founded as a movement in 1924 by Andre Breton the movement slowly died down in the late 2000's with David Lynch's Inland Empire though surrealist influence can still be seen in films today.

How does Surrealist film differ from Western film conventions?

Surrealist film pushed most convention of western cinema, image was considered a priority rather than narrative or characters. The plots or lack of plot are usually non linear and convoluted. The films were made to confuse and frighten people rather than telling a "nice" story that western cinema is used to.

Discuss how the films of a contemporary film director or Animator have been influenced by the Surrealist film movement.

Andrei Arsenyevich Tarkovsky (4 April 1932 – 29 December 1986) was a Soviet and Russian film-maker, writer, film editor, film theorist, theatre and opera director.

Mirror is noted for its loose and nonlinear narrative. It unfolds as an organic flow of memories recalled by a dying poet (based on Tarkovsky's own father Arseny, who in reality would outlive his son by three years) of key moments in his life both with respect to his immediate family as well as that of the Russian people as a whole during the tumultuous events of the twentieth century.