Return to Reason
About Return to Reason
Man Ray's short opens with moving geometric designs and night shots of a merry-go-round, then three-dimensional shapes, and closes on bars of light crossing the nude torso of Kiki of Montparnasse, Alice Prin. A short passage uses his piece Dancer/Danger. There is no story.
Cast & crew
More about Return to Reason
Man Ray made the rayograph sections in his darkroom. He cut a hundred-foot roll into strips, sprinkled salt and pepper on some, threw pins and thumbtacks on others, flashed a white light, shook off the debris, and developed the film. He described the method in Self-Portrait.
Themes
In film history
An early Dada short built from cameraless film and a few photographed shots.
Making
The salt, pins, and tacks printed directly onto the film stock, the same way Ray made still rayographs.
Look
Most of the images were made by laying objects on raw film and exposing it, not by pointing a camera.
Technique
Cameraless rayographs: salt, pepper, pins, and thumbtacks exposed onto the negative.
Notes
- The French title is Le Retour à la raison.
- Kiki of Montparnasse is Alice Prin.
Scenes
- Salt, pins, and tacks appear as white shapes on black.
- Bars of light move across Kiki's torso.
Also available
- Internet Archive (ptp_le-retour--la-raison_man-ray_mkv_x264_704x480_193128)
