The 24-hour film that took Dune 2 director Denis Villeneuve

You don't become one of Hollywood's most successful directors without a deep love for cinema and cinema history. This is certainly the case for Denis Villeneuve, who has achieved superstar status with films such as “Arrival,” “Blade Runner 2049” and more recently “Dune” and “The Dune: Part Two.” At a recent Dune 2 screening I attended at the Directors Guild of America in New York City, Villeneuve spoke briefly about the production process. Of course, being the huge movie buff that he is, he also took the time at the end of the discussion to promote another movie that made a huge impression on him recently, and it's not quite what you'd expect.

The film in question is the 2010 film The Clock by artist Christian Markley. is currently part of the exhibition At the Museum of Modern Art in Manhattan. You might be wondering what kind of film would qualify as an exhibit of modern art, and the answer is one that is 24 hours long and consists of footage from throughout the long history of film. “The Clock,” which has never been released for home viewing, is essentially an all-day montage, but it's much more than that, and it clearly made a huge impression on Villeneuve.

“I'm a little late with the news,” the director joked, since the film has been around for a decade and a half at this point. “I was blown away by this movie last week.”

“Clock” is not just a collection of shots from famous movies. Each section of the footage references a key concept of time, spanning 24 hours with shots of characters looking at their watches, looking at their watches or telling the time. Gary Cooper looks at the clock while “High Noon?” It's there. That's how lightning will strike the clock tower in the movie “Back to the Future” at 22:04. The night hours might have dream sequences, the morning sections show the characters waking up and getting ready for the day, and so on. Everything from James Bond movies The works of Ingmar Bergman, old Western classics and more modern films such as V for Vendetta are played across the screen, creating a mesmerizing audiovisual display that pays homage to the history of cinema while also focusing on its artistic themes.

No wonder a director like Denis Villeneuve would be so enamored with this film. “I invite you to go,” the director told the audience at the DGA, referring to the current exhibition at MoMA. “You can walk into the theater, you can stay there for 10 minutes or four hours.” Villeneuve even delved a little into the thematic material of “The Clock”, praising Marklay's reflections on time as a unifying concept. “Every frame is connected to the idea of ​​time, and we see that through the history of cinema,” he said. “The shot of the clock, the shot of the clock, the tension, the tension, the beauty of time. So you're looking at 24 hours, time. And it's very entertaining, I swear. Go.”

Those in the greater New York metropolitan area can see The Clock for themselves at MoMA through February 17, 2025.