Crossroads

USA 1976, 16mm, b&w, sound, 36:00 min

realized by:

Bruce Conner

keywords:

found-footage
war, pop art

cast&crew:

music:

Patrick Gleeson, Terry Riley

available copies:

Canyon Cinema Inc.:

16mm, 24fps, sound optical track

available for rent

synopsis: Canyon Cinema catalog 1992

"Conner bases his film on government footage of the first
underwater A-bomb test, July 25, 1946, at Bikini Atoll in the
Pacific. Recorded at speeds ranging from normal to super slow
motion, the same explosion is seen 27 different times -- from the
air, from boats and land-based cameras; distant and closeup. The
opening segment emphasizes the awesome grandeur of the
explosion -- the destructiveness, as well as the dramatic spectacle
and beauty. As the repetition builds, however, the explosion is
gradually removed from the realm of historic phenomena, assuming
the dimensions of a universal, cosmic force. And in the film's
second section this force is brought into a kind of cosmic
harmony, part of the lyrically indifferent ebb and flow of life that
one sees in a lingering, elegaic view of the ocean." --Thomas
Albright, San Francisco Chronicle

cinovid / oVid / Werkleitz Gesellschaft and the authors © 1996-2010