An Optical Poem

An Optical Poem (1938)

A dance of shapes. A title card tells us this is an experiment in conveying the mental images of music in a visual form. Liszt's "Second Hungarian Rhapsody" is the music. The shapes, all two-dimensional, are circles primarily, with some squares and rectangles, and a few triangles. The shapes move rhythmically to the music: receding from view or moving across the screen. Red circles on a blue background; light blue squares; white rectangles. Then, a red background of many circles with a few in the foreground. Red gives way to blue then to white. Shapes reappear as Liszt's themes re-occur. Then, with a few staccato notes and images, it's over.

Date of release
1938-03-05
TMDB
6.8 / 10 (40)
Runtime
7m
Genres
Animation, Music
Director
Oskar Fischinger

Interesting facts

  • Based on: Hungarian Roidy No. 2

Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

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