Had been trying to find this video for some time. Found it on accident one day on another blog (Thanks Jeff Scher - http://fezfilmsblog.blogspot.com/). It's an amazingly vivid film with intense effects-all done naturally via specialized, custom optics. Francis Thompson was rather close-lipped about his experimental processes and sadly took the secrets to his grave. Luckily he left the film behind to amaze unconditionally.

Francis Thompson made this jewel of a film in 1957. He was a painter and art teacher before discovering filmmaking. Inspired by cubism and futurism, this film is a uniquely cinematic celebration of the spectacle of the modern city. It is a city symphony unlike any other as it is simultaneously abstract and figurative. Every shot is manipulated by mirrors or prisms that he assembled and manipulated himself. The abstraction dramatically enhances the feeling of the soaring, bustling city with singular wit and visual exuberance. He worked alone, almost in secret. He described his production process for a screening of the film on Reel New York. “...it was a magic, secret process of bending, twisting, and turning inside out. It was a self funded project that involved my roaming about New York City with a camera over my shoulder”.

He went on to make many more films including the Oscar winning “To Be Alive”, a three screen celebration of life made for the 1964 World’s Fair. He died recently at the age of 95, after returning to painting in his later years.