PFA Collection Prints

Winter in Armenia: shepherds slide perilously down a snow-covered mountain, one after the other, cradling their fleecy charges. A kind of chivalry inhabits The Four Seasons, a breathtaking depiction of the hardships and vigor of rural life, set, not incongruously, to Vivaldi. It is one of many cinematic poems by Arthur Peleshian, a master of montage who is a true descendant of Vertov and Eisenstein (and contemporary of Bruce Conner). Yet his "distance montage," the counterpoint over time of images and sounds, effects rhythms and moods his predecessors never attempted. We builds toward its "cardiogram of the national soul and character" of Peleshian's native Armenia. In the Beginning depicts the crowd as herd, in all its surprising potential. These films are recommended for anyone who has ever edited a film, wondered why we exist, read Tolstoy, counted sheep.