Compendium of Perplexities

Sam Samore
Compendium of Perplexities
Year: 2011.
Duration: 06mn 53s.
Black and White.
Format: Blu Ray/DVD.

Composed of many threads – this film has no fixed narrative, nor explanations. At the core we see a group of individuals in search of something – sometimes tormented and detached. One individual repeatedly jumps off a balcony – or at least attempts to, but at the last minute she is always restrained from falling. In another group of individuals, there’s the throwing of the dice as a game of fortune to ascertain a future, a reading of the present and so on. Other scenes include: A man digging a ditch to eternity. Someone walking down the street and never looking back. Two men pass back and forth an unconscious woman – ritualistic and arbitrary. These dream-like sequences unfold in a grainy black and white, suggesting the animation of
Samore’s monochrome pictures. There’s a hypnotic soundtrack, perhaps generating alpha waves in the viewer.