Hart of London

Hart of London
Hart of London

1968-70, 16 mm, b/w & colour, sound, 79 min.

"... Hart of London (1969-70), Chambers' last film, is a dense, feature-length, multi-image symphonic work whose scope is breathtaking. Without doubt it is a masterwork. In its quick cutting, its transitions from positive to negative imagery, its jittery, anxious camera movement, its vision of death as the slaughter of innocents, and above all its deep interest in the qualities of light, it resembles the work of American avant-garde filmmaker Stan Brakhage, whom Chambers much admired. Although Chambers' familiarity with Brakhage's work may have expanded his formal vocabulary, the film remains unmistakably his own. Hart of London is composed largely of newsreel, proto-cinematographic images which are wedded to a particular place and time. For this reason they evoke a sense of loss. These images are often arranged in patterns which consist in the alternation of icons of birth with icons of death. Made shortly after Chambers learned that he was suffering from leukaemia, the film, rather than suggesting that death balances birth, implies that death sooner or later savages every living thing."

R. Bruce Elder
Image and Identity: Reflections of Canadian Film and Identity, 1989