Film numéro deux

Directed by Christian Lebrat

For the films in which Lebrat divided the screen he placed a piece of paper with one or more slits in it in front of the lens, allowing only a narrow strip of imagery to register. He then exposed the film multiple times, layering images. The initial effect is confusion—it’s often hard to identify from these moving slits what we’re seeing. But soon the eyes acclimate, and when one does recognize fragments of a nude woman (Lebrat’s wife) in a landscape in Film Number Two (1976), she has the quality of an apparition. Shown in a different way than thousands of years of nudes have led us to expect, this woman is charged with a vital, surprising erotic energy. (Fred Camper)