The Letter

Name: The Letter
Director: Coni Beeson
Released: 1976-01-01
Cast: Mary Lucas, Mary Lucas, William Neil

1976 · 14 min

A symbolic rape by the Devil and a renewal of self worth.

Directed by Coni Beeson

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Cast

Make it a double feature

1h 42m together

The Letter

The Five Obstructions

A close match in mood and era.

More from Coni BeesonSee all →

Grow Old Along with Me · 1974

Grow Old Along with Me

★ 10.01974

Movie

A reaffirmation that love and sex know no age.

A sardonic film about the clichés laid on women.

Two young women in love communicate through fantasy and touching in a rhythmic buildup, merging time concepts. Flashes of the past blend with the present and future in a collage of themselves, the hills, the sea and their sexuality.

Through a series of dream-like episodes, UNFOLDING suggests universal awareness—aloneness, fantasies, searching, touching, loving. In the vague suggestion of a story, nature and sea mix with hints of legend, ritual, and poetry. UNFOLDING becomes one’s own folklore of imaginings. Double and triple exposure blend ocean, hills, sun, woman, and man, to portray subterranean feelings, ethereal feelings, the freeing of self, in loving and lovemaking, culminating in orgasm.

"These are my past lives when my lovers were black and my lovers were white, when I was male and when I was female." A reincarnation.

Superimposed images of a woman dancing.

A film by Coni Beeson.

Circle the Earth · 1981

Circle the Earth

1981

Movie

Anna Halprin Dancer's Workshop Event

Freedom on the Inside · 1976

Freedom on the Inside

1976

Movie

Five San Quentin prisoners find self identity in spite of their surroundings.

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The Five Obstructions · 2003

The Five Obstructions

★ 6.92003

MovieDocumentary

In 1967, experimental filmmaker Jorgen Leth created a striking short film, The Perfect Human, starring a man and women sitting in a box while a narrator poses questions about their relationship and humanity. Years later, Danish director Lars von Trier made a deal with Leth to remake his film five times, each under a different set of circumstances and with von Trier's strictly prescribed rules. As Leth completes each challenge, von Trier creates increasingly further elaborate stipulations.