How strange that a 1929 film exploring cinema’s possibilities still feels new, foreign, and transgressive. Dziga Vertov couldn’t have known how Man with a Movie Camera would play more than 85 years after its first unveiling, but its place as a beacon — for documentary, montage-based editing as a formal practice, surrealism, and the city symphony, to name the more obvious categories into which it could fit — hasn’t yet diminished. It’s no wonder this was voted the greatest documentary of all time — last year, in fact, and in the face of competition from any number of titles ostensibly concerned with a more “present” moment.
So I don’t think it’s too hyperbolic to say this preview for BFI’s new restoration — a preview that really only consists of footage from the film itself — is more radical and transfixing than any preview released for a 2015 title in at least the past month or so, if not longer. The latest work done looks rather beautiful, and to see it on a big screen must be an absolute pleasure. If someone reading this can arrange for a stateside exhibition, don’t hesitate to let me know.
Watch the trailer below: