State Of Flux (Wave #1)

A roar, splashing below, waves stitched and cropped like repeating tile-sections in a videogame. According to online notes, footage was filmed exclusively at barrages, and the power and energy associated are evident. Neatly interlocked and solid repetition of fragments of that same wave, grey and verging on static, a sense of something vast and nearly ominous. There is something in its slightly changing same-ness, water following the same course, the same river twice.

Apparently one of a series of three, Wave #1 only just avoids outstaying its welcome. In a different context it might afford a better reception, but as with many films that interpret, interpolate themselves to something that might be better watched, it might be better to watch the thing itself.

While one could delve into uncertainty as to what is and is not manipulated, the titular flux-state layered to dizzying post-modernity, natural and unnatural and a soundtrack the programme describes as "menacing", it loses some of its power in presentation. Not knowing that the water movement it shows is unnatural does not help it, but the same is true of so much of experimental film, particularly in a festival context. Too often shorn of contextualising information, these works are left to stand for themselves - without a frame they roll up and are lost.