This film series celebrates the life and legacy of Black, queer experimental filmmaker Edward Owens. See his four restored short films at 8 pm, tomorrow at filmcenter. | ✍️ Kat Sachs
is distinctly opaque, an assemblage of still and subtly moving images set against a stark, black background, which sometimes obscures and sometimes helps to reveal that appearing before it. The performers—seemingly all white, including Owens’s then-girlfriend, Gloria Rich—are beautifully shot, evincing a world of their own to which viewers are not privy.
The vacantness, however, is evoked in the lack of a specified lexicon. Represented most substantially are a man and woman who appear to be getting married. At one point their faces are situated similarly to the iconic shots from Ingmar Bergman’s where one’s profile obscures half of the other’s face as it appears to look into the camera. I’m not sure if that’s an established point of reference, but Owens’s idle imagery stands stark in contrast to Bergman’s symbol-laden compositions.
Markopoulos lamented Owens’s use of music here, which is likely why it was initially cataloged as being silent. But, as the Chicago Film Society notes, Owens suggested that it be played first with the music then again without. Also of note is that at the beginning ofOwens can be heard reading the credits, the most obvious insertion of himself into any of the films. is a fitting denouement for this quartet, as it contains elements of all those that came before it.
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