Fly is a 1970 avant-garde short film directed by John Lennon and Yoko Ono.[1] Filmed a year prior to the release of Ono's 1971 album of the same name,[2] the short depicts a housefly crawling around on the body of a nude woman, actress Virginia Lust. By the end of the film, multiple flies can be seen on Lust's body. The film's visuals are accompanied by "Fly", a composition by Lennon and Ono that would later appear on Ono's album of the same name.[3]
| Fly | |
|---|---|
| Directed by | John Lennon Yoko Ono |
| Starring | Virginia Lust |
| Edited by | John Lennon Yoko Ono Dan Richter Jon Bloom Daniel Seymour Marc Stone Nancy Kallile Andy Burke Bill Holderith |
| Music by | John Lennon Yoko Ono |
Release date |
|
Running time | 25 minutes |
Production
edit| External image | |
|---|---|
 FLY, 1970. (Film still). ©Yoko Onovia: The Lowry [4] |
Fly was conceived as a two-sentence premise initially titled Film No. 11: "About a fly going from the toe to head of a lying naked body, crawling very slowly. The whole film should take about an hour."[5]
Soundtrack
editThe film's soundtrack was conceived in the Regency Hotel in New York on Christmas day in 1970.[5] Lennon recorded the soundtrack on a multitrack Nagra audio recorder in three parts. The first "movement" features vocal improvisations by Ono, and the second features those vocals played back on the recorder while Lennon performs on a guitar.[5] The third part of the soundtrack was recorded as follows: Lennon played guitar against the reversed playback of the second section of the soundtrack; this recording was then reversed (described by scholar Melissa Ragona as "a kind of double negative"),[6] and played alongside another vocal solo by Ono.[6] When the doubly-reversed recording finished, Ono continued performing vocally, and Lennon played a live radio.[6]
The soundtrack would later be released as a track titled "Fly", appearing on Ono's 1971 album of the same name.[7]
See also
editReferences
edit- ^ "Fly". British Film Institute Collections Search. Retrieved 26 August 2024.
- ^ McKinzie, Matt (22 April 2020). "Defragmenting Bodies: Yoko Ono's 'Fly' at 50". PopMatters. Retrieved 12 October 2020.
- ^ Volmers, Eric (16 September 2020). "Unfinished and interactive: Contemporary Calgary's new exhibit on the life and art of Yoko Ono". Calgary Herald. Retrieved 12 October 2020.
- ^ "The Lowry".
- ^ a b c Vernallis, Herzog & Richardson 2013, p. 160.
- ^ a b c Vernallis, Herzog & Richardson 2013, p. 161.
- ^ Vernallis, Herzog & Richardson 2013, p. 162.
Bibliography
edit- Vernallis, Carol; Herzog, Amy; Richardson, John, eds. (2013). The Oxford Handbook of Sound and Image in Digital Media. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0199757640.