Pièce touchée

Arnold's original material is a piece of found-footage from the 50s. 18 seconds long and very typical for the period. A quiet take: a living room, a woman in an arm-chair. Her husband opens the door, kisses her, then moves out of the picture accompanied by a disturbing pan, his wife follows him. In Arnold's film the sequence takes 16 minutes. Cadre by cadre, it becomes an exiting tango of movements. But pièce touchée is more than just a matter of forms. The reflections, distortions and delays it displays challenge Hollywood's stable system of space and time.