Magical History Tour: Letters in movement

Flowing cascades of signs, rotating words, dancing letters, scratched, embossed, double-exposed, superimposed, animated – from the beginning of cinema printed characters have been freed from their static identity and rendered dynamic in multiple ways. Letters that succumb to movement have very different functions. They open or close films, act as a commentary or a metaphor (of storytelling), as providers of information or graphic elements, as a dramaturgical tool or as an emotionalizing factor. Writing in film opens up new areas of association asking questions about visibility and structure, perception and materialism, mise-en-scene and innovation, The Magical History Tour is making an excursion into the moving world of letters, presenting examples of how writing was examined in early avant-garde and experimental cinema, "classic" Lettrist films, and also looking at contemporary feature films with writing leitmotifs.