A new 24 hour long movie about clocks was recently released, and is playing at the Paula Cooper Gallery in New York City thru February 19th. Conceived and orchestrated by the pioneer turntablist Christian Marclay, it is a movie that New York Magazine says ought to be placed on permanent mesmerizing view at one of the local museums as soon as possible.
The clock and clockwatchers movie mixes many thousands of short segments from films, all woven together to depict the passage of time for literally every minute of the day. It reminds be conceptually of the human clocks website where photos of themselves which must somehow creatively depict single minutes of each day and are added to the human clock website. Aside from the usual photos of people next to a grandfather clock, or groups of grandfather clocks with that same time, some of the depictions of time are quite creative.
The difference here is that The Clock is a non-stop action presentation of each minute of each day, not simply many still depictions of wall clocks or mantle clocks at different times of day. Not only are clocks featured but watches and wristwatches and pocket watches are also featured in this film. You may hear and see someone speaking the hour, with an example given of 2:22pm which includes a segment from an Alfred Hitchcock film. Reminds the writer of this post of some movies where mantle clocks, grandmother clocks or grandfather clocks and even a wrist-watch being the villain in movie and book and television productions.
As New York Magazine says, “this is a must-see idiosyncratic masterpiece”.
Don’t forget to reserve either an entire twenty-four hour day to reserve it, or maybe even better wait until it comes out on DVD and watch in on the installment plan.
You have got to love clocks and watches.