Female Human Animal

“She didn’t accept the world she was giv­en as a woman,” observes Chloe Arid­jis of artist Leono­ra Car­ring­ton at the start of Female Human Ani­mal. ​“She didn’t accept the world as it super­fi­cial­ly appeared.” A state­ment that could also apply to the cre­ation of this genre defy­ing doc­u­men­tary. Direc­tor Josh Appig­nane­si refus­es to accept the usu­al tropes of the fact seek­ing genre – ditch­ing the famil­iar talk­ing heads and trans­par­ent film­ing process – to dive down a rab­bit hole where real­i­ty becomes indis­tin­guish­able from surreality.

On the sur­face, the premise of Female Human Ani­mal is very sim­ple: nov­el­ist Chloe Arid­jis is co-curat­ing an exhi­bi­tion at Tate Liv­er­pool of sur­re­al­ist artist Leono­ra Car­ring­ton. Although Car­ring­ton was British she spent much of her life in Mex­i­co, where Arid­jis grew to know her per­son­al­ly. Appig­nane­si fol­lows Arid­jis in the months lead­ing up to the show launch as she jug­gles curat­ing with writ­ing and social­is­ing. This is pret­ty much where the dis­tin­guish­able facts begin and end – and even that is a bit hazy. Many of her acquain­tances are played by actors, so whether she actu­al­ly attend­ed a masked avant-garde par­ty or has a father that can pre­dict rain­fall will remain a mystery.

Instead of tak­ing his cues from the some­what spe­cial­ist and rather alien­at­ing process of curat­ing an exhi­bi­tion, Appig­nane­si is direct­ed by the sur­re­al­ist spir­it of Carrington’s work. Even the name of the film comes from Carrington’s belief in ani­mal famil­iars. Her mys­ti­cal paint­ings appear on screen sud­den­ly, accom­pa­nied by sin­is­ter chimes or dra­mat­ic blasts of brass. Arid­jis’ life mir­rors the artist’s fan­tas­ti­cal scenes; her cat’s eyes reflect those of Max Ernst in Carrington’s por­trait of him from 1939, and after Arid­jis encoun­ters a curi­ous man we see his seri­ous expres­sion in Quería ser pájaro (I want­ed to be a bird).

In true sur­re­al­ist form, Appig­nane­si opens the film with a dream sequence. Arid­jis is haunt­ed by Carrington’s inaudi­ble voice, an unde­fin­able crea­ture in a paint­ing, and a shad­ow of a man. She bat­tles through a sheet of plas­tic that suf­fo­cates her. Under­stand­ably, on wak­ing Arid­jis looks dis­turbed but these themes con­tin­ue into her every day. Plas­tic blocks her route from one gallery to the next in the Tate, blur­ring her vision and forc­ing her to push through it to see clear­ly. While the shady man – who may or may not be a crim­i­nal – becomes a love interest.

Rem­nants of Luis Buñuel and Sal­vador Dali’s ground-break­ing sur­re­al­ist film Un Chien Andalou can be found all over the place. Both films are vio­lent and grotesque, full of eyes and faces, with char­ac­ters watch­ing from win­dows or stuck behind doors. There is no clear or con­clu­sive nar­ra­tive in either, but both are cap­ti­vat­ing, pon­der­ing on the trau­ma of exis­tence. Even in scenes where there could be a sto­ry, Appig­nane­si dis­rupts it by cut­ting or focus­ing sole­ly on Arid­jis instead. When she hosts a gen­uine Q&A with author Juli­et Jacques about her book Trans we hear very lit­tle of the actu­al inter­view and see clips of Arid­jis stum­bling over her words and look­ing uneasy.

It is the uni­ty of Appignanesi’s bril­liant cin­e­mat­ic vision and Arid­jis’ com­pelling and vul­ner­a­ble per­for­mance that makes Female Human Ani­mal res­onate. Shoot­ing on a 1986 Pana­son­ic AG-450 video cam­era, Appig­nane­si is able to depict a world with soft edges and vibrant colours, very much like Carrington’s paint­ings. In fact, the whole film – with its ani­mals, unde­ci­pher­able faces, dream-like motifs and off-kil­ter con­ver­sa­tions – is very much like a Car­ring­ton work come to life.