Jean Cocteau's "Blood of a Poet" is, on the surface, something of a free-association creation of connected vignettes that embrace surreality and art. Stylistically, it's an exploration into the two-dimensionality of screen space and how the camera tricks the eye. Cocteau uses line drawings, perpendicular angles, and makeup effects to constantly trick and bend the eye between perceptions of depth, gender, and narrative.
But oh, that's not all! "Blood of a Poet", while not a dream-logic by technical considerations, is a pastiche of commentaries on, of course, society. The bourgeois are criticized for their spectatorship of each other, sexual curiosity leads to the promise of death, suicide dreams are simultaneously fulfilled and frustrated, and the public both enjoys and ignores the sadism of school-children: all in just 55 short minutes!
Apparently this was the first sound film in France, and like most first sound films, the sound doesn't sync quite the way modern audiences think it should. Luckily for it, the effect is somewhat more surreal from a modern standpoint because it goes against expectations. That said, the use of sound is very cogent and experimental as well, as Cocteau includes a very flamboyant voice-over narration and ambiguous uses of noise and music to effectively change the result of the images.
Finally, Cocteau is not above admitting the personal nature of the film by literally including inter-titles that explain how he cannot avoid getting trapped into the film himself. That, mixed with the film's embrace of dualities such as "this is a real documentary of unreal things" shows why this film isn't necessarily created to be understood, it's created to be experienced.
--PolarisDiB
But oh, that's not all! "Blood of a Poet", while not a dream-logic by technical considerations, is a pastiche of commentaries on, of course, society. The bourgeois are criticized for their spectatorship of each other, sexual curiosity leads to the promise of death, suicide dreams are simultaneously fulfilled and frustrated, and the public both enjoys and ignores the sadism of school-children: all in just 55 short minutes!
Apparently this was the first sound film in France, and like most first sound films, the sound doesn't sync quite the way modern audiences think it should. Luckily for it, the effect is somewhat more surreal from a modern standpoint because it goes against expectations. That said, the use of sound is very cogent and experimental as well, as Cocteau includes a very flamboyant voice-over narration and ambiguous uses of noise and music to effectively change the result of the images.
Finally, Cocteau is not above admitting the personal nature of the film by literally including inter-titles that explain how he cannot avoid getting trapped into the film himself. That, mixed with the film's embrace of dualities such as "this is a real documentary of unreal things" shows why this film isn't necessarily created to be understood, it's created to be experienced.
--PolarisDiB