9/10 (Masterpiece)

Peter Greenaway’s early short concerns (in faux-documentary style with narration) a gaggle of intellectuals reconstructing a film  based on fragmentary footage and virtually incomprehensible notes left by Tulse Luper (a recurrent character in Greenaway’s films) about vertical objects in a small area of countryside (telephones, poles, fences, chimneys, trees, more trees, onion stalks, etc).  An attack (according to Greenaway) on the pervasive structuralism in experimental film of his day.

We are presented with…

A film within a film about vertical objects.

Tidbits of autobiographical content on Tulse Luper.

Recurrent questions…

Is the man in the middle of the above picture Tulse Luper anyway…

And…

Piano.

More importantly…

Is the footage actually that of Tulse Luper or the made by the man to the left of “Tulse Luper” in the above picture…

Another remake of the film about vertical objects (three).

The piano pounds remorselessly as we watch the progression of vertical objects in various 11 x 11 schemas flash before our eyes.

We dare not close our eyes.

We laugh.

Film.

Absurd.