Tending Towards the Horizontal (1988): cast, story & where to watch

Released in 1988, Tending Towards the Horizontal is a notable film directed by Barbara Sternberg, running about 33 minutes.

What it’s about. The voice-over text, written and performed by France Daigle, creates three images which recur alternately throughout the film: a bird flapping its wings tirelessly; a figure (man, boy?) who sits on a hay bale, watching the city below; and a woman in a library who reads only what others have left behind. The filmed images are predominantly houses: houses seen in passing along the horizontal; houses reflecting sky and trees in their windows; houses partially hidden by trees or the shadows they cast; houses and office towers simultaneously pictured in stages of demolition and construction. The images dissolve in and out of the flickering light and dark (sunlight and shadow and the emulsion of the film itself). The site of the self is home. A house is a construct and, per Heidegger, language is the house of being.

Where to watch. Streaming options change often. See the full, country-by-country breakdown on our where to watch Tending Towards the Horizontal page.