While the cat and dog picked through fallen leaves, Ruiz and Erasmus drank coffee at a cafe’ by the sea. Erasmus told Ruiz about his sister, who was a filmmaker, and a film she’d begun that suggested the space of human drama.
He had snap shots, old photographs that he placed on the table one by one, as players do with cards. The first photograph rendered a closed door, the frame lit dimly from behind. The next, a kitchen sink, a candle darkly illuminating, ten a snuffed candle that artfully captured the smoke from the wick by something vaguely floral in the background. In yet another photograph, dark liquid filled the bottom of the sink.
“Is that the same sink?” Ruiz asked.
“Yes,” Erasmus said. He continued to lay down the photos. In another photograph, Ruiz saw a bathroom sink followed by what might have been the same sink but with the taps flowing. In another he saw what he took for a circular sculpture in which a ball traversed a concentric, inner orbiting channel. In the final photograph, a candle flame appeared flattened, which indicated some disruption, the air of a fan perhaps or some passage that hurried the air across the surface of the flame. He thought, Perhaps a ghost, and dismissed the thought.
Erasmus said, “My sister’s objective was to take these images and produce a film that bore evidence of intense human contact in a lived environment. Furthermore, the objective was to mask the human so that the audience would never see man, woman, or child, but the images had to be edited in such a way to suggest an ordered set of events, and finally, leave the audience with a sense of foreboding, that at a final climactic capture, some momentous event or action had taken place.”
Ruiz said, “In other words, from this arbitrary collection of images, your sister had to produce a vivid climax through indirect means. The film, therefore, is the evidence of indirect human activity without ever capturing the human form or those actual events that caused them.”
“Exactly: no dialogue, no direct human presence. Yet, dialogue, human shape, and, best of all, human drama in context would all be suggested by the manipulation and arrangement of these very forms.”
“I must see this film,” Ruiz said. “You must show it to me.”
“Impossible,” Erasmus said. “My sister never completed the film.”
“Tell me,” Ruiz insisted. “Why was the film never finished?”
“Because she disappeared before she could finish it. Taken away. It was ten years ago. They entered her house; all evidence pointed to several bastards. They entered her place quietly and just as quietly departed with her.”
“It’s insidious,” Ruiz said, shaken by this news and the horrible memories it brought back to him.
“You remember those days, the days when all the artists that could be found were taken. My sister: yes, she had cats, she collected rare plants and displayed the work of her artist friends, especially those who worked with stained glass. She loved to cook; she kept her place clean; she was a teacher of children; she used to laugh at my naive predictions of a future of peace.”
Ruiz tried to imagine Erasmus’s sister’s final moments, the theoretical film, the spaces she once filled with candle light and laughter. He watched the cat and the dog play in the leaves. He listened to the sound of water on rocks below.
“Then you must make the film,” Ruiz said. “I can assist.”
But Erasmus had his eyes closed. He seemed to uttering words to himself, sad poems he knew by heart. Ruiz watched him and took a sip of his coffee.
Or with subtle changes near the end:
While the cat and dog picked through fallen leaves, Ruiz and Erasmus drank coffee at a cafe’ by the sea. Erasmus told Ruiz about his sister, who was a filmmaker, and a film she’d begun that suggested the space of human drama.
He had snap shots, old photographs that he placed on the table one by one, as players do with cards. The first photograph rendered a closed door, the frame lit dimly from behind. The next, a kitchen sink, a candle darkly illuminating, ten a snuffed candle that artfully captured the smoke from the wick by something vaguely floral in the background. In yet another photograph, dark liquid filled the bottom of the sink.
“Is that the same sink?” Ruiz asked.
“Yes,” Erasmus said. He continued to lay down the photos. In another photograph, Ruiz saw a bathroom sink followed by what might have been the same sink but with the taps flowing. In another he saw what he took for a circular sculpture in which a ball traversed a concentric, inner orbiting channel. In the final photograph, a candle flame appeared flattened, which indicated some disruption, the air of a fan perhaps or some passage that hurried the air across the surface of the flame. He thought, Perhaps a ghost, and dismissed the thought.
Erasmus said, “My sister’s objective was to take these images and produce a film that bore evidence of intense human contact in a lived environment. Furthermore, the objective was to mask the human so that the audience would never see man, woman, or child, but the images had to be edited in such a way to suggest an ordered set of events, and finally, leave the audience with a sense of foreboding, that at a final climactic capture, some momentous event or action had taken place.”
Ruiz said, “In other words, from this arbitrary collection of images, your sister had to produce a vivid climax through indirect means. The film, therefore, is the evidence of indirect human activity without ever capturing the human form or those actual events that caused them.”
“Exactly: no dialogue, no direct human presence. Yet, dialogue, human shape, and, best of all, human drama in context would all be suggested by the manipulation and arrangement of these very forms.”
“I must see this film,” Ruiz said. “You must show it to me.”
“Impossible,” Erasmus said. “My sister never completed the film.”
“Tell me,” Ruiz insisted. “Why was the film never finished?”
“Because she disappeared before she could finish it. We don’t know what happened, why she left suddenly, or even if she’d been taken. They might have entered her place quietly and just as quietly departed with her. Or, for some mysterious reason, she decided to merely disappear.”
“It’s a strange story,” Ruiz said, shaken by this news and the horrible memories it brought back to him.
“You remember those days, the days when all the artists that could be found were taken. My sister: yes, she had cats, she collected rare plants and displayed the work of her artist friends, especially those who worked with stained glass. She loved to cook; she kept her place clean; she was a teacher of children; she used to laugh at my naive predictions of a future of peace.”
Ruiz tried to imagine Erasmus’s sister’s final moments, the theoretical film, the spaces she once filled with candle light and laughter. He watched the cat and the dog play in the leaves. He listened to the sound of water on rocks below.
“Then you must make the film,” Ruiz said. “I can assist.”
But Erasmus had his eyes closed. He seemed to uttering words to himself, sad poems he knew by heart. Ruiz watched him and took a sip of his coffee.
