Structural / Conceptual Film

In our lecture on Structuralist film we learned how in structuralist film theory the film maker makes the viewer aware of the mechanisms of film and blatantly expose the equipment, structure and production of film within the work.  The films emphasis was on the film "as material" and not "the cosy world of narrative".

At it's height in the '60s and '70s structural film combined predetermination with chance.  The works rejected visual sensation and tended towards self-reflexiveness.

Form became content and the process reduced film down to it's structure, and viewing became an act of reading.

In researching the topic further I came across this definition from the Lux website which is taken from part one of Peter Gidal's introductory essay Theory and Definition of Structural / Materialist Film to the book Structural Film Anthology published by the BFI in 1976:

"Structural/ Materialist film attempts to be non-illusionist. The process of the film's making deals with devices that result in demystification or attempted demystification of the film process. But by 'deals with' I do not mean 'represents'. In other words, such films do not document various film procedures, which would place them in the same category as films which transparently document a narrative, a set of actions, etc. Documentation, through usage of the film medium as transparent, invisible, is exactly the same when the object being documented is some 'real event', some film procedure', some 'story', etc. An avant-garde film defined by its development towards increased materialism and materialist function does not represent, or document, anything. The film produces certain relations between segments, between what the camera is aimed at and the way that 'image' is presented. The dialectic of the film is established in that space of tension between materialist flatness, grain, light, movement, and the supposed reality that is represented. Consequently a continual attempt to destroy the illusion is necessary. In Structural/ Materialist film, the in/film (not in/frame) and film/viewer material relations, and the relations of the film's structure, are primary to any representational content. The structuring aspects and the attempt to decipher the structure and anticipate/ recorrect it, to clarify and analyse the production-process of the specific image at any specific moment, are the root concern of Structural/ Materialist film."

Extract from Peter Gidal's Theory and Definition of Structural / Materialist Film

In our session we watched several structuralist / conceptual films which included three films by Austrian film maker Peter Kubelka, four films from American film makers including Paul Sharits and Hollis Frampton and the wonderful film Downside Up by UK film maker Tony Hill.  I really enjoyed Downside Up which used the camera on a specially built pivot crane to arc over the action and give amazing, different angles.

Below are my notes from the screening of films during the lecture: