It’s no joke when I call this one of the best film experiences of the summer.
A site-specific experimental film at the Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia, this is newsreel translated from Martian.
Shown in a hot, cave-like cell adjacent to the plush Roaring Twenties-like room that once housed Al Capone, this manipulated found footage of the famous prisoner’s psyche-out release plays itself out like a Michael Snow film scored by Steve Reich.
It drove some of the tourists mad – they weren’t bored, they were angry – because the mirror image and expanding loop toyed with their expectations. Just when you think you are going to see something, the rug gets pulled out from under you and you have to start from the beginning again. Only after time do you realize that your “beginning” keeps changing, too.
I’m sure this all makes very little sense – so maybe it makes more sense to hear from the filmmakers themselves.
