Storm and Stress

1986, 47:52 min, b&w and color, sound

A line of satellite dishes stretches to the horizon as storm clouds loom overhead. A tornado funnels across a plains landscape at high speed. Through remarkable imagery of majestic natural phenomena, Storm and Stress evokes the beauty, terror and power of the tension between the forces of nature and technology. Hall's sequences are based on natural elements — air, fire, water — and the industrial counterparts that echo them — wind tunnels, Tesla coils, hydroelectric plants. Hall's allusions to Sturm und Drang, the 19th-century Romantic aesthetic of the apocalyptic sublime, and the notion of the Pathetic Fallacy, in which natural upheaval reflects the individual's inner turmoil, are expressed through powerful visual metaphors.

Principle Photography: Jules Backus. Executive Producer: Kathy Rae Huffman. Produced in association with the Contemporary Art Television (CAT) Fund.