Surrealism was the first literary and artistic movement to become seriously associated with cinema, though it has also been largely neglected by film critics and historians. Short-lived as its initial popularity was, it became known for its dreamlike quality; juxtaposition of everyday people and objects in irrational forms; and the abstraction of real life, places, and things. Highly influenced by Freudian psychology, Surrealism sought to bring the unconscious mind to visual life, described by Gina Marie Ezzone as "balanced between symbolism and realism, Surrealist cinema commentated on themes of life, death, modernity, politics, religion, and art itself". The foundations of the movement began in
Paris and coincided with the birth of motion pictures. France served as the birthplace of surrealist cinema due to a fortunate combination of easy access to film equipment, film financing, and a plethora of interested artists and audiences. According to Breton, they ignored film titles and lengths, preferring to drop in at any given moment and view the films without any foreknowledge. Film critic René Gardies wrote in 1968, "Now the cinema is, quite naturally, the privileged instrument for derealising the world. Its technical resources, allied with its photo-magic, provide the alchemical tools for transforming reality." Surrealists realized that the film camera could capture the real world in a dreamlike way that pens and paintbrushes could not:
superimpositions,
overexposure,
fast motion,
slow motion,
reverse motion,
stop motion,
lens flares, widely varying
depths of field, and more bizarre camera tricks could transform the original image in front of the lens into something new once exposed on the film plate. For surrealists, film gave them the ability to challenge and mold the boundaries between fantasy and reality, especially in regard to space and time. Like the dreams they wished to bring to life, film had no limits or rules. referring to Surrealism as a genre implies that there is repetition of elements and a recognizable, generic formula which describes them. Several critics have thus argued that Surrealism's use of
non sequiturs and the irrational make it impossible for it to constitute a genre. While there are numerous films which are true expressions of the movement, many other films which have been classified as Surrealist simply contain Surrealist fragments. Rather than "Surrealist film", the more accurate term for such works may be "Surrealism in film". == Surrealist films and filmmakers ==