Gunvor Nelson's 1972 film TAKE OFF is an entertaining and unsettling avant-garde vision. Burlesque performer Ellion Ness dances a full routine to the music of Pat Gleeson. She's lit with what is probably an arc lamp and glows beautifully against a black background. Nelson employs overlapping techniques in the editing so that Ness often appears ethereally doubled.
For about eight minutes it seems the purpose of the film is to celebrate the beauty of Ness and the gestures of her craft. Perhaps, too, there is some early deconstruction work going on regarding the male gaze (that term doesn't actually get introduced into feminist theory until 1975).
The final minute of the film is utterly strange cinema. The exaltation of natural beauty gives way to something disturbing and profound. It becomes a strobing nightmare, in which Ness disassembles herself into a torso that goes spinning into outer space.
David Lynch fans will admire this precursor to his peculiar female type: a beautiful blonde woman who signals cosmic unsettledness; the strobing combat between inscrutable forces of light and dark.
The movie sharing service Fandor allows you to stream TAKE OFF in HD. I rate Fandor an excellent site for the discovery of avant-garde films.
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