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This bizarre video shows a series of alienating situations in which the nagging boredom of the characters and their screaming inability to communicate are dominating themes. Street bustie and French chansons breeze in through the window, music-hall ballads of long ago. All this serves to suggest Flaubert. The actor supposed to personify him looks out resignedly, decadent and cigarette-smoking, at the bustling street-scene. To kill time and boredom, the characters frequently change position. Endlessly they change their clothes, to end up ultimately as 'corpses'. They subject themselves to careful examination by Flaubert, which he carries out in a rather detached way. Texts as 'Consciousness is a mechanical phenomenon, a chemical process' complete the languid ambiance, from which 'Knocking on heaven's door' and 'It's a long way to Tipperary' comes as absurd relief.
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Sonja van der Burg
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Camera and editing: Ken Kobland, Production: The Wooster Group, With: Willem Datoe, Anna Kohier, Nancy Reilly, Peyton Smith, Irma St. Paule, Kate Valk, Ron Vawter, Jeff Webster
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