Passage of the Bride

‘Solomon's work - some of the best of contemporary experimental film - is difficult. Its optical and moral density eludes language, as if the films, which are often dark and cracked, were a palimpsest of obscured meaning. His Passage of the Bride is dedicated to Duchamp's alter ego, Rrose Selavy - the title recalls Duchamp's The Bride Stripped Bare by her Bachelors, Even - and is itself a ready-made, composed entirely from a 100-foot roll of wedding footage and what appears to be the honeymoon. Passage of the Bride is hypnotic, dreamy. Solomon compulsively repeats recognizable images until they melt like the distilled essence of the originals: the bride’s run across a lawn, her climb into a car, a man (her husband?) emerging from a swim all become undulating black-and-white swirls of grain, ripples of water ....’ - Manohla Dargis, The Village Voice.