The Games of Angels

8/11/2013

**Angel Games in a Machine World**—Walerian Borowczyk’s Les jeux des anges (1964) Earlier this month at the Goethe Institut of Paris, a gem of 1960s surrealist animation was projected : Les jeux des anges (1964), a 13-minute short made by Polish director Walerian Borowczyk (1923 – 2006). François Bonenfant, coordinateur pédagogique cinema et arts visuels at Fresnoy (Tourcoing, France), gave a brief introduction to the film, remarking that the short was “pictoral”, resembling a love-child of “Guernica and Francis Bacon”. Ambitious as it is to say, the film offers exactly that. The film starts with a low rumble, the industrial sound of being within the bowels of a train, and almost-entirely black screen with a pan of grey that chugs along the bottom. This image stops, leading to the dé