Hollis Frampton's "Zorns Lemma" is frequently and arguably considered to be the experimental filmmaker's masterpiece in structuralism, and probably his most important contribution to filmmaking in general. Visually speaking, it is a complex work of cinema that doubtless took much work to produce, in the repetitive cycle it goes through; with the rhythm of the alphabet as it is gone through again and again, it seeks to create a pattern with the audience that is mentally effective. While a full hour of imagery put in a loop might sound painfully dull, eventually and gradually the viewer learns to accept the imagery and be brought into a state of meditation.
After a poetry reading at the opening of the movie, "Zorns Lemma" devotes itself almost entirely to showing a progressive loop of imagery, beginning with street signs forming a visual alphabet which are slowly replaced by other images, including construction workers, a talking woman, waves on a seashore, a child on a swing and most memorably the hands peeling the clementine. The changes are brought about slowly and gradually, and just when your mind begins to wander Frampton brings it back by replacing another letter with a new image. As the film progresses, the various actions shown are brought to a close: the clementine is finished, the construction workers end their job, etc. Finally, a ten-minute stationary shot is held at the end, whilst the voices of women recite Grosseteste's "On Light".
If you view this film, I recommend you find a good copy. The copies on YouTube have terrible resolution and I would have gotten even more out of the movie had it been high quality. As a piece of structuralist filmmaking it is a masterpiece, and it is also an important lesson to most conventional movie-goers who walk into the cinemas always expecting gripping action and plot. For an hour, "Zorns Lemma" is, as another reviewer has said, a compelling work that always has you in excited anticipation of what is to change next in the loop of imagery, while at the same time bringing you to accept and understand the plot-less structure and lapse your mind into a state of meditation. It is a boring and painful work to sit through only for those who refuse to let it capture them.
After a poetry reading at the opening of the movie, "Zorns Lemma" devotes itself almost entirely to showing a progressive loop of imagery, beginning with street signs forming a visual alphabet which are slowly replaced by other images, including construction workers, a talking woman, waves on a seashore, a child on a swing and most memorably the hands peeling the clementine. The changes are brought about slowly and gradually, and just when your mind begins to wander Frampton brings it back by replacing another letter with a new image. As the film progresses, the various actions shown are brought to a close: the clementine is finished, the construction workers end their job, etc. Finally, a ten-minute stationary shot is held at the end, whilst the voices of women recite Grosseteste's "On Light".
If you view this film, I recommend you find a good copy. The copies on YouTube have terrible resolution and I would have gotten even more out of the movie had it been high quality. As a piece of structuralist filmmaking it is a masterpiece, and it is also an important lesson to most conventional movie-goers who walk into the cinemas always expecting gripping action and plot. For an hour, "Zorns Lemma" is, as another reviewer has said, a compelling work that always has you in excited anticipation of what is to change next in the loop of imagery, while at the same time bringing you to accept and understand the plot-less structure and lapse your mind into a state of meditation. It is a boring and painful work to sit through only for those who refuse to let it capture them.