Maya Deren
After recommending Maya Deren’s short film, Meshes of the Afternoon to a friend of mine, I took the opportunity to re-watch it this morning. I found it really influential as a film student and it still stands up today.
Meshes is probably her most accessible film, but all of them are great. Her later films, such as Ritual in Transfigured Time, are more abstract and more concerned with choreography (of the camera and of the actors/dancers).
I could go on and on about these films (I wrote an essay or two on the subject almost 20 years ago), but I’ll leave the work of analysis to you. Enjoy.