Hotel Monterey

Chantal Akerman

1972

Film, 00:65:00.
Materials: 16 mm film transferred to dvd, colour

Collection: Courtesy of the artist & Marian Goodman Gallery, Paris/New York.

A film without a plot, Hotel Monterey consists of a fragmented description of a place. It does that in an ascending movement starting from the hall of the hotel and, through the elevator, until the top floor. We see long fixed shots of the corridors, slow travelings going forwards and backwards meticulously focusing on doors and windows, and at the end a long panoramic shot scanning the horizon between buildings and sky.

The influence of the just discovered experimental cinema is evident, and this immaculate capture of space delineates the formal schemes used in future works of fiction, specially regarding duration and seriality. Behind closed doors and away from the abstract comings and goings of anonymous customers emerges a fascinating reservoir of potential fictions.

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