Quixote. 1964-65. Revised 1968, 1970. By Bruce Baillie.

(1/27/01)

This was shown in an atrocious preservation print. A lot of the color looked completely faded to brown, but then I remembered that a lot of the film was in black-and-white. At the beginning of the film a bearded old man speaks. I could not hear the words.

This film is a sort of portrait of America, seen from the fringes. We see migrant workers, Indians, outcasts. It is supposed to have a narrative, but I could not discern it. The early part of the film has a lot of movement, what seems like shots taken from moving vehicles. So there was a sense of moving across the land.

There is a lot of fine photography. The images seem to flow into each other and have a rightness or a correctness that one would identify with a successful abstract painting. There are a lot of superimpositions and I especially remember superimpositions where one shot is static (or relatively so) and the other shot has a lot of movement, such as aggressive panning.

Bruce Baillie does have a knack for capturing a gritty, industrial landscape. I remember shots of construction sites, scenes like that.

The soundtrack has a lot of modern music--maybe electronic music. It is spare, or minimal. There are also sections of blues on the soundtrack.

There are many shots of animals. I remember one of horses in the snow.

I remember scenes of a high school basketball game. One youngster was wearing glasses.

I enjoyed individual images of this film and the way it was put together, the look and rhythm of it--or, if you will, the flavor. But I really didn't get what it was all about. It is definitely a film I would like to get to know better.