THE BLOOD OF A POET ***

A masterpiece of the avant-garde, Jean Cocteau's "The Blood of a Poet" demonstrates not just an extraordinary imagination at work but remarkable technical skill as well and you must remember that this was also Cocteau's first film. A young artist, (Enrique Rivera), brings a statue to life, on her instructions enters a mirror, (a sequence he was later to develop in "Orphee"), and finds himself in a strange hotel where nothing is real. Plot-wise, that's it but the imagery shows just what cinema was capable of even as early as 1932.

You could say it was also decidedly homoerotic. Cocteau's artist, his poet, is shirtless almost throughout and Cocteau puts great emphasis on his physicality at least until the midway point when the poet becomes a card player in full evening dress and the statue, his partner and film becomes a surreal satire on the bourgeoisie, (his object of desire is now a young, black angel). Of course, looking for any kind of meaning in a film like this is basically pointless; just give your soul over to it and hopefully you will find Cocteau's soul gazing back at you.