All Sides of the Road

Directed by Paul Kaiser

All Sides of the Road derives from a twelve-minute 3D video capture of Old Highway 101 entering and departing Dewitt, Iowa. After the title image, the cameras are pointed directly down at the highway, which becomes a rushing microcosm of the world that evokes landscapes both of America and of the mind. The resulting spectacle is both utterly photorealistic and phantasmagoric. In addition to landscape, this digital film also evokes earlier forms of analog film, especially those of the American avant-garde, for the physical properties of the highway are like those of celluloid. In motion, the textures of asphalt and concrete look a lot like film grain, while the lane markers flickering by are easily mistaken for the lines and letterings on film leader rushing through the projector gate.