Entr'acte

Entr'acte (1924)

Stop-motion photography blends with extreme slow-motion in Clair's first and most dada film, composed of a series of zany, interconnected scenes. We witness a rooftop chess match between Marcel Duchamp and Man Ray, a hearse pulled by a camel (and chased by its pallbearers) and a dizzying roller coaster finale. A film of contradictions and agreements.

Date of release
1924-12-04
TMDB
7.0 / 10 (153)
Runtime
22m
Genres
Comedy, Fantasy
Director
René Clair

Casting

Interesting facts

Entr'acte is a silent French Dada short film directed by René Clair. It premiered on 4 December 1924 at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris as a prologue and entr'acte for the Ballets Suédois production of Relâche, based on a book by Francis Picabia, which had settings by Picabia, was produced by Rolf de Maré, and was choreographed by Jean Börlin. The music for both the ballet and the film was composed by Erik Satie.

Production and release

For this production, the Dadaists collaborating on the project invented a new mode of production: instantanéisme. The complete film runs for about 20 minutes and uses such techniques as watching people run in slow motion, watching things happen in reverse, looking at a ballet dancer from underneath, watching an egg over a fountain of water get shot and instantly become a bird, and watching people disappear.

The "Prologue" section runs about 90 seconds (though time indications are approximate, as film and music techniques at the time of the premiere did not allow accurate timing). It was played at the beginning of the ballet, right after the "little overture" ("Ouverturette"), and before the curtain was raised ("Rideau"). The music to this part of the film is called "Projectionnette", and is included as the 2nd item in the Relâche partition.

The "Entr'acte" section runs about 18 minutes and 40 seconds. It was played between the two acts of the ballet. The score for this part of the film is not included in the Relâche partition, but was written down by Satie in a separate score, titled "Cinéma".

In 1974, the film was shown at the Cannes Film Festival.

The film was included on the Criterion Collection DVD of Clair's À Nous la Liberté (1931).

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

Recommended