The Life and Death of 9413--A Hollywood Extra
Influenced by the French avant-garde and the German Expressionist films of the Twenties, The Life and Death of 9413... is a delightfully satiric cinematic fantasy about a cog in the mighty clockwork of the Hollywood studios. Written and directed by Robert Florey (Hollywood Boulevard, Cocoanuts), designed, photographed, and edited by Slavko Vorkapich (montage and special effects designer and renowned advocate of “purely cinematic expression”), with close-up photography by Gregg Toland (Citizen Kane), the film was an independent production made for under $100, shot mostly at night in Vorkapich's kitchen. Jeremy Butler (Chicago Art Institute) comments: “Vorkapich's painterly view of what ‘pure cinema' ought to be led...to a concentration upon the patterns suggested by the regimented, dehumanized existence of the Hollywood extra.... It is a visualization, rather than a narration, of the plight of the extra.”