Variations on a classical documentary short subject number two. A train ride. The film’s first half is dedicated to the locomotive’s angular industrial-modernist beauty; in certain moments one could get the impression that the steel behemoth moved on its own. Intermezzo: leaving the station, waving goodbye. Second half: watching the world pass by through the moving train’s windows, enjoying landscapes flat and smooth and wide. There’s a brief scene set during a rainy night filled with anxieties, but come morning, everything calms down. One year later, another film historian-director, Jean Mitry, would make the most famous example of this particular genre: Pacific 231.

Olaf Möller and Jon Wengström