Parade

Viewing cinema as a parade of images, Lock focuses here on the potential of editing as a multifaceted form of storytelling. Divided into three chapters, this very short experimental film unfolds through three distinct narrative modes, recalling the competing formal approaches of 1920s cinema. Embracing the linearity of classical Hollywood drama, its “sordid tale” of roommates is immediately intelligible, centering on the familiar tragedy of waiting for the bathroom in a shared living space. Yet Lock quickly subverts the causal logic of shot/reverse shots editing through an unexpected cut that follows a glance through a keyhole. For the creative filmmaker, he seems to suggest, the narrative expectations generated by conventional editing provide the perfect opportunity to surprise the viewer.

What follows are two expressions of simultaneity that offer complementary visions of urban experience. The first assembles anatomical fragments—hands, feet, a bewildered face—superimposed upon the silhouette of a city, creating a phantasmagoric relationship that recalls the dreamlike imagery cherished by Surrealist cinema. The third chapter is more Eisensteinian in spirit, preoccupied with questions of rhythm and visual metaphor. It evokes the city symphonies of Vertov and Ruttmann, but set in 1970s Toronto. Here, the stresses of daily life coexist with the specter of consumerism and the sublimated eroticism characteristic of Lock’s work, in a world of unfulfilled desires—both sexual and material. The result recalls the impressionistic texture of his earliest films while foreshadowing the playful bawdiness of The Ache (2009).

Olivier Thibodeau
Critic

Presented in collaboration with