Elsewhat

Here is a classic short film from one of my heroes, Scottish/Canadian filmmaker Norman McLaren. It’s haunting, beautiful, and was groundbreaking for 1968.

Four years earlier, in 1964, McLaren (with Grant Munro) used essentially the same technique of overlaying film to create something with the complete opposite vibe, which is one of my favourite short sequences of film, the second half of his hodgepodgey film Canon. The relevant bit starts at exactly the 4:30 mark:

The difference in these two clips shows one of my favourite aspects of McLaren’s work: his flexibility. They both use essentially the same technique in different ways to create a very different effect.

Tags: Art, Montréal, Videos