A Tale Part Told (1991)

Overview

The film opens directly and freshly with a screen journey which is also a kinetic light sculpture holding its rotation steadily before our eyes. Many associations emerge as we hear the tale in relation to this image and its shifting background. . . including a bicycle being ridden by the filmmaker, spools and spokes, a feeling of a metal insect or iridescent whirring dragonfly picking up the passing colours. There is a still centre to the radial motion against linear road or landscape. A feeling of cyclical storytelling comes with the account of her own life and giving birth to a ‘computer literate and perfectly bilingual’ baby daughter. We are led to respond to her not being guaranteed to stay in control. Again multiple strands are knotted in this fortune wheel: gain on the swings, lose on roundabouts, with no ‘perfection’ in relations with other beings on the round of merry, or social, or just plain recurring intercourse. -Sandra Lahire