A milestone in French avant-garde filmmaking.

Venom and Eternity (1951, 90 min., 16mm) has been both praised and condemned for decades. Lettrist Jean Isidore Isou?s film destroys current cinema as he perceived it and then teaches us what cinema should be by showing us some examples. Included are poems ?constructed for the pure beauty of their noise,? abstracts made by the tearing and scratching of film, attacks on the film stock itself, and turning film on its ear by shooting upside-down and backwards. Appearances by Jen Cocteau, Jean-Louis Barrault, Blaise Cendrers, and others. ?The day will come, perhaps, when Isou?s style will be the fashion. Who can tell? (Jean Cocteau)