ABSTRACT
This essay examines the present moment of digital anachronism, wherein the most contemporary of media are haunted by celluloid specters, through a diverse series of images, texts, and concepts spanning film history. Hollywood turned to silent cinema of celebrating and mythologizing its most recent self: Hollywood Cavalcade, promotes Technicolor in its retelling of the transition to synchronized sound; and Sunset Boulevard reflects on rapidly changing industries and competing platforms like television as it evokes silent film styles and stars. Tom Gunning speculates about the synergies between early cinema and the avant-garde. Recreation is a kind of "decreation", as Corne explores the numerous ways attractions and sensations of early cinema are resurrected by After Life's characters as well as by the film's own mingling of celluloid, video, and other screen memories. Avant-garde filmmakers and artists point to ways of winding the gears of Burch's "clock" back to their supposed zero hour.
