Eaux d'artifice (1953) is a short experimental film by Kenneth Anger.
Summary
thumb|Full film|alt=Black and white experimental film showing a woman in 18th-century dress moving through ornate garden fountains at night
The film consists entirely of a woman dressed in eighteenth-century clothes who wanders amidst the garden fountains of the Villa d'Este ("a Hide and Seek in a night-time labyrinth") to the sounds of Vivaldi's "Four Seasons", until she steps into a fountain and momentarily disappears.
Production
The film was shot in the Villa d'Este in Tivoli, Italy. The actress, Carmilla Salvatorelli (not "Carmello"), was "a little midget" Anger had met through Federico Fellini. Anger used a short actress to suggest a different sense of scale, whereby the monuments seemed bigger (a technique he said was inspired by etchings of the gardens in the Villa d'Este by Giovanni Battista Piranesi).
See also
- List of avant-garde films of the 1950s
References
External links
- , including a digital viewing copy
- Eaux d'artifice essay by Daniel Eagan in America's Film Legacy: The Authoritative Guide to the Landmark Movies in the National Film Registry, A&C Black, 2010 , pages 481–482