Worcester debut
Emmancipation [sic] clocks in at just over eight minutes, but the chronological focus of this film, showing at Worcester College on Friday 24th February as part of its Arts Week, is not restricted. Through its non-linear narrative structure it takes us on a life journey. There is an effective and symbolically-charged opening shot of a frying pan, first in black-and white and then bursting into life and colour as an egg is cracked into it.
There follow three separate but related episodes, exploring first childhood, then adolescence, then adulthood. What the three scenes have in common is the theme of female entrapment engendered by dominant males.
The title may may be about escape, but the only hope we are offered is in the final sequence, where an old woman, looking through a photo-album made up of stills from the film, presumably photos of herself, peacefully passes away, leaving us with the familiar close-up of the egg now cooked and whithering.
23rd Feb 2006