Milky Way

Avant-garde psychedelia, poetic minimalism, meditative tableau vivant, cartoonesque sketch. Depending on the mental state of the spectator when entering the auditorium, the interpretation of Milky Way could go one way or the other. In nine independent scenes, all filmed from fixed position, Benedek Fliegauf makes a study of basic human movements, actions and communication. Without dialogue. The refined, subtle soundtrack is an enigmatic relief and augments the daydream effect of the often absurd vignettes as delayed action shots of a subsidiary reality. And where this leads us, is primarily up to us. There is hardly any plot development. Yet the film never stands still. One can even see modest climaxes, which do not however lead to the usual relaxation. Mountainbikers perform a ballet of balance on a pile of rocks. An aged man in a swimming pool scene finds satisfaction through an initially subtle choreography on the back of an anonymous woman. An old woman collapses in a bare playground and is carried away. Time and place are unknowable and apparently unimportant. Benedek’s tightly orchestrated compositions acquire an almost graphical quality, that tends more towards visual art than towards film. The abstract vocabulary of each small chapter results in a slightly fixated dot in a larger story, that has more a name than a concrete meaning for most of us: Milky Way.

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