Ken Jacobs, the erstwhile master of experimental celluloid filmmaking, fully embraces video technology in this reworking of the 1929 Laurel and Hardy film Berth Marks. Prior to this digital version, Jacobs presented this film as one of his live "nervous system" performances, projecting identical overlapping frames in a slightly asynchronous manner to create the illusion of three-dimensional effects. This creation carries the filmmaker's live performances into the digital realm through a patent-pending "Eternalism" technique, which doesn't require Jacobs' physical presence at each projection.
In Ontic Antics, Jacobs extends his ongoing exploration of the teeming depths of life contained within individual frames of film. In the first section of this three-part film, Jacobs radically reworks this original sequence of Laurel and Hardy film, so that they end up flipping and twirling around each other. The second section plays back the original film in its entirety. The viewer suddenly realizes how movement, space, and time have been radically transformed by Jacobs' creative vision. In the final part of the film, the iconic images of Laurel and Hardy struggle to resolve themselves against the prominence of the digital pixels. The experience is further enhanced by the use of individual dark filters creating a 3-D effect. Welcome to the electronic universe of Ken Jacobs.