Visual Training

1969

Frans Zwartjes

“Visual Training” is a short 1969 experimental film from the Netherlands. The film looks so ahead of its time, with its goth makeup and gritty look. I wonder if Marylin Manson or the band the Misfits have ever seen Visual Training? A man and two topless ladies sit at a table and eat. They grotesquely smear food on one another. The one girl is blindfolded and covered with baking powder by the guy. The screen sometimes turns black, as the camera cuts fast between shots. When the camera zooms in on the actor’s face, it looks as if he’s staring right at the viewer. The one girl’s nude body is used as a canvas for body food art. Frans Zwartjes has a created a rare short film that’s unique for viewers. It’s like a mild version of the “Vienna Aktionists” for the surreal at heart.

Frans Zwartjes is a experimental Dutch film-maker that creates abstract, artistic cinematic expressions of physical concepts such as eating, sex, desire, the act of spectating, loneliness, the anxiety of a new home, a wife, walls, rooms and companionship, etc. The silent characters expressing ideas are often painted white or employ gothic makeup, they make use of body language and bodily functions, nudity, facial expressions, and various camera movements and editing tricks are used, all suggesting pure and primitive instincts or passions. Made a few silent shorts (all collected on the DVD collection "The Great Cinema Magician"), then some impossible to find full-length movies.