Free Radicals
In this powerful abstract film with a soundtrack of African drum music, Lye scratched "white ziggle-zag-splutter scratches" on to black leather, using a variety of tools from saw teeth to arrow heads.The first version of the film won a major award at the International Experimental Film Festival Held in Brussels in 1958 in association with the World's Fair.
- Director
- Len Lye
- Signature
- Wonder · Craft · Humour
The Nutevio profile
Movie DNA
How Free Radicals actually feels to watch, measured on the twelve traits our editors track across every Nutevio title.
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Story overview
What It's About
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In this powerful abstract film with a soundtrack of African drum music, Lye scratched "white ziggle-zag-splutter scratches" on to black leather, using a variety of tools from saw teeth to arrow heads. The first version of the film won a major award at the International Experimental Film Festival Held in Brussels in 1958 in association with the World's Fair. Stan Brakhage described the film as "an almost unbelievably immense masterpiece".
Where to watch
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The numbers
Box Office & Release
- Budget
- —
- Opening weekend
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- Domestic gross
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- International gross
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- Worldwide gross
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- Release date
- Apr 23, 1958
- Runtime
- 0h 5m
- MPAA rating
- —
- Language
- No Language
- Country
- New Zealand, United States of America
Figures from the verified production record. Fields we cannot source are left blank rather than estimated.
