Not to See Again (1980)

Overview

Misrecognitions and simulacra. An anti-montage film: a series of discrete shots that nevertheless gel at one or two points to produce simple meanings. Hovering on the line between abstraction and representation, the film hopes to problematize them both. According to Peter Gidal, “the abstract quality (never total, for the objects are always recognizable as objects) helps Hamlyn to negotiate sexual imagery as it occurs in the film by rendering those images relatively abstract and on a par with other objects depicted. The effect is to drain the image [of the naked body] of its conventional sexual meanings and associations (with pornography, for instance) and instead neutralize it almost.”