Out of a fusion of live-action and special effects derived from optical printing, Pat O'Neill brings to the screen the confrontation of spaces inherent in sculpture, the medium from which he came to film. He also brings a humorous spirit akin to Dada, with its startling juxtapositions and personalized anachronisms, in such films as Runs Good (1971), Sidewinder's Delta (1976) and Let's Make a Sandwich (1982), among many others. O'Neill is very much a Western man and his latest film (his first in 35mm) has a narrative "flow" connected to its subject-water and power in the Wild West (and other ambiguous frontiers). Stunning Western landscapes and cityscapes, brilliantly transformed with layers of imagery achieved by superimposition, are the visual equivalent of the text's transformation of genres (from Western to city noir to sci-fi). Stories embedded in other stories eddy like the water of the film's title. Indeed, as O'Neill writes, "Water and Power was made over a period of years, without a script, relying on the chance confluence of places, people and conditions. It turned out to be very much about water, in all of its physical states, and about cyclic motions...Stories and progressions rose up out of the material, the written texts appeared, and the ending became the beginning-several times." Working in Los Angeles, O'Neill has turned his expertise in special optical printing effects into a business-creating titles and other effects for film and television-with which he supports his personal filmmaking. Water and Power has been selected for the New York Film Festival '89.