MFT: Alex Proyas Picket Fence Video

This is a video shot by great australian filmmaker Alex Proyas (The Crow, Dark City). It depicts white picket fence surrounded by green plants and blue sky accompanied by the piano rendition of Radiohead's "Everything's in the Right Place". The video consists of a single uninterrupted shot of a picket fence slowly moving from left to right. Nothing really happens in this video. Just a picket fence surrounded by nature.

It is tempting to say that there is nothing really to talk about but it is not exactly true. It is what it says on the tin "a shot of picket fence" and some other insignificant unworthy of mentioning. But there is more to it than initially seems.

It is extremely slowed down and it adds to an uneasy vibe of the video. But it is still empty. Its hollowness is ominous - because mind is unable to get over the fact that something can be that simply. Such episodes can occur in the sleep and there is no particular explanation for them. They just happen. Why can't they be visualized?

In some way, it is an ambient video. It evokes certain mood and allows to stop for a moment and contemplate about something. Something like breathers scattered here and there in the third season of Twin Peaks. There is no practical purpose to them and yet they are extremely effective in letting previously perceived information to settle in and cool down.

On the other hand - it is definitely a riff on slow cinema and Andrei Tarkovsky in particular. The man was a fan of ultra-dense tracking shots where nothing of particular happened and yet something important occurred. Here it is more of a Godard tongue-in-cheek whammy than a piece of information.

Around the minute mark we get an intertitle "Christopher O'Riley plays Radiohead". He plays piano rendition of Radiohead's "Everything's in the Right Place". It veers on chaotic and barely keeps from falling apart. All while nothing happens at all. Just white picket fence from left to right. You expect something. About thirty seconds later we are informed that "Alex Proyas shoots a white picket fence". And that's it. The video concludes with a a cutoff.

This shot of picket fence can go on forever like this.