Straight Line (Stevens-Duke)

Synopsis

Dedicated to his American heroes – the filmmaker George Stevens and the jazz-musician Duke Ellington – Straight Line is the first part of Tomislav Gotovac’s (1937-2010) Belgrade trilogy, which, along with Straight Line, included Blue Rider and Circle, all made in 1964. Conceptually elegant in its simplicity and logical consistency, the trilogy stands out as the culmination of avant-garde film practice in ex-Yugoslavia and its earliest example of structuralist film, made, moreover, by one of ex-Yugoslavia’s most charismatic avant-garde artists who was also known for his experiments with photography, collage, and performance art, in addition to film. Straight Line was shot with a single camera positioned on the front landing of a tram as it moved at an even speed through the city in a straight line, thus offering an unbroken view of the tram tracks, the street along them, and the passersby walking on the street. In all three parts of the trilogy, the dialectic of a strictly predetermined method and the randomly recorded scenes makes the films into uniquely kinetic experiences.