ABSTRACT
The word flicker calls attention to a fundamental quality of films, their presentation in a darkened theater where the variability of light and shadow contributes to an atmosphere of fascination, magic, and mystery, not unlike the prevailing ambience of dreams. The author thinks that consciousness is so altered in such a setting that inner and outer reality are less clearly demarcated, creating possibilities for interpenetration that yield new and unforeseen experiences. Fusion refers, in part, to these unique experiences, but also, the author hope, to the way his critical instrument interacts with the flickering images and finds resonance in the eyes and minds of readers. Further, it carries the author's aspiration to rescue the disparate elements of the films and of his remarks about them from the matrices of language of which they are necessarily made, to attain a novel coherence.
