Expert: Mel - 7/23/2004

Question
I don't know if you can help me or not...I am desperately trying to find the name of an old movie (1960's maybe)...at least I was in college in 1966-1970 when I saw it. It is a non-dialogue movie that has a camera zoom in on a fisherman on a lake in a boat, and a mosquito biting him and zooms slowly on and on and on deeper into the blood, down to cells and atoms and then zooms out quickly as if being withdrawn past the mosquito, the fisherman the lake, the sky, the clouds, the universe into blackness as I remember. It was SOOO powerful; I've not forgotten the effect or effects, but have never seen it since. I don't even know if it were some educational or philosophical instructional movie. It was so wonderful and would love to use it in my school...if you can help me find it,I truly would be sooooooooooooooo grateful.
Thank you,
Maggie Greene


Answer
Hellp again Maggie,

I may have been a little hasty with my previous answer, although that short film does sound interesting.

I have located another 8-minute short film from 1968 that better fits your description. It was called "COSMIC ZOOM" and consisted of a slow animated zoom from a boy in a lake on the west coast of North America, out over the solar system and back again.

It was produced by the National Film Board of Canada and directed by Eva Szasz from Kees Boeke's book "Cosmic View".

That sounds more like your film, doesn't it?

Glad to be of help. Cheers.....Mel.











Hello Maggie,

I think what you may have seen was an educational  documentary from 1968 called "Rough Sketch of a Proposed Film Dealing with the Powers of Ten and the Relative Size of Things in the Universe". It had a running time of 8 minutes.

The writers/directors, Charles and Ray Eames, took the idea a little further in 1977 with "Powers Of Ten". Here is a viewer's review of the 9 minute short:

"This is a really interesting film about how large the universe is and how powers of ten become so drastically distant.

It starts out by showing a couple at a picnic in Chicago. It then shows an overhead shot a meter up of the man lying down on the picnic blanket. It then proceeds to zoom out by increasing the distance by a power of ten every ten seconds; 10 to the first meters, 10 to the second meters, 10 to the third meters, and so on.

Before long the viewer is above the earth, then the solar system, then the galaxy, then much of the visible universe. The viewer is projected back forward by decreasing the powers of ten every two seconds.

After a while the picnic scene is displayed again, but it doesn't stop there. The view returns to the regular speed and goes into the negative powers; ten to the negative first meter, ten to the negative second meter, and so on. The viewer is zoomed into the man's hand, and ends up zooming into a single proton in an atom.

I first saw this at an observatory, and I recently saw it again in Chemistry class. I recommend it to anyone."


Unfortunately, I can't find anywhere that this film is available to purchase. Possibly you could locate it through your school.

Glad to be of help. Cheers.........Mel.