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Muybridge Film

Anne Rees-Mogg pays tribute to Muybridge’s studies of human motion with this portrait of filmmaker Renny Croft.

Animation & Artists Moving Image 1975 4 mins Silent

Overview

Fellow filmmaker Renny Croft is captured performing a cartwheel; the action is first shown in accelerated motion and then slowed down. This film is reminiscent of Eadweard Muybridge’s studies of human and animal motion in the 19th century, which would contribute to the invention of cinema. Muybridge invented the zoopraxiscope in 1879 in order to project his photographic sequences of motion studies as moving images.

Founded in 1966, the London Film-Makers’ Co-operative started life at Better Books, a counter-culture bookshop on Charing Cross Road, where a group led by poet Bob Cobbing and filmmakers Stephen Dwoskin and Jeff Keen met to screen films. Initially inspired by the activities of the New American Cinema Group in New York, the London Co-op grew into a pioneering organisation that incorporated a film workshop, cinema space and distribution office. During its four-decade history, the Co-op played a crucial role in establishing film as an art form in the UK and participated in a vibrant international film scene. This BFI Player collection brings together new scans of films distributed by and/or produced at the London Co-op.