The premise, as stated at the outset, is that to be able to understand what goes on in a painter's mind, you need only follow his hand. What you are allowed to follow here, however, is not exactly his hand, or even his utensils, but rather the strokes themselves. Henri-Georges Clouzot (Les Diaboliques, etc.) has set up his designated painter, the mysterious Picasso, behind a translucent screen, with special inks, so that the chronology of an artwork can be recorded line by line, blot by blot, smear by smear (albeit with all of these things flipflopped, as in a mirror, and with some of these things speeded up by tricks of photography and cutting). This collaboration of artist and filmmaker is at the very least an unparalleled novelty (the more so because of the stature of each man), and for this very special occasion Picasso has transformed himself into something nearer an animator than a traditional painter. (There are strong affinities to the stop-motion techniques of Will Vinton's "Claymation," Caroline Leaf's shifting sands, etc.) What gives the movie a firm toehold in the annals of animation perhaps weakens its claims as a document of Picasso's normal work methods, much less as a key to any mystery. But details of performance aside, the essential nature of art as a kind of decision-making process, with infinite possibilities for working and reworking (or scrapping the damn thing and starting all over again), is educationally and entertainingly portrayed. And the emphasis here, as we are almost uninterruptedly reminded, is on the unfoldment itself and not on any sort of "end result," on the journey and not on the destination -- or, to put it another way, on cinema and not on paintings. (1955) — Duncan Shepherd