erase and rewind

We find ourselves inside the program of a twenty-first century picture. Its status is one of self transformation. The film begins with black-and-white shots of collapsing buildings, yet the concrete forms slowly dissolve after a short time, become unclear, are transformed in a new visibility; soon they are recognizable only
as masses of abstract surfaces, which show peculiar spots of colour all in the red-green-blue range. The surfaces, bubble-like formations, are turbulent, rhythmic; they "dance" to an underlying electronic sound field of crackling noises. The visual reality´s new state is fluid, amoeba-like. The "inner" work on the objects, however, is incomplete, or unclear; the vibrating bodies push beyond themselves and in the end the objects once again return to
their original forms, or oscillate between levels of reality. Here, it is possible to recognize the traces of what happens "in" the picture – the pixels´ assimilation to new laws and the quasi reversible operations done to the old.
The film is based on the idea of focusing what is initially an intentionally blurred, masked image and thereby returning to the starting material. In this process, however, through the multiple blurred masks and subsequent focusing of the image, new forms arise which display no references to the initial starting material. What is visible is a dismantling of form and colour no longer able to find its way back to its original state. In the end, it becomes clear how greatly human logic differs from that of a machine.

(Stefan Macheiner, Marc Ries)

Translation: Lisa Rosenblatt


The opening scene is awash in grey as bystanders look on while anonymous buildings crumble to the ground. As the buildings fall, the camera loses focus and the grey panorama suddenly becomes infused with color and light. Erase and Rewind oscillates between the realistic depiction of foreboding events and Morris Louis-like abstraction and it is the tension between these polarities that gives the film its piquancy.

(Isaac Lyles, 9. Cinematexas International Short Film Festival 2004)