The Anti-Films of J. J. Murphy

In the archive, condition reports are used to monitor changes in film prints and document their gradual transformation over time. In this series, filmmaker Juan González Monroy shares moments of discovery from his work inspecting prints in the Arsenal collection. This edition is devoted to four films by J. J. Murphy. Together, they reveal his enduring fascination with the paradoxes of film and its apparatus. We begin with three works that serve as appetizers: SKY BLUE WATER LIGHT SIGN (1972), SCIENCE FICTION(1979), and PREVIEW (1979), each a short puzzle constructed through games of perception and narrative. The main course,MOVIE STILLS (1977), goes further by doing less. Murphy isolated individual frames from existing footage, used them to create Polaroid photographs, and then filmed the photographs as they developed. For the inquisitive eye, the result offers a series of philosophical conundrums concerning movement and stillness, fiction within nonfiction and vice versa, and time unfolding despite its apparent negation.

(jg)

Films:
Sky Blue Water Light Sign USA 1972 16 mm without dialogue 9 min.
Science Fiction USA 1979 16 mm without dialogue 5 min.
Preview USA 1979 16 mm OV 4 min.
Movie Stills USA 1977 16 mm OV 44 min.