Scenes in the life of Mary Shelley

Filmed in Italy with amateur actors, A Shape of Error is an experimental feature film based on the diaries of Mary Shelley, author of Frankenstein, and her stepsister Claire, two emancipated women for their time. In the form of an imaginary home movie, Abigail Child tells her story, centring particularly on the passionate affair of Mary with Percy Shelley, employing formal strategies developed in earlier works (The Future Is Behind You, Covert Action), such as the shared screen and split images.

A Shape of Error, Abigail Child, United States, 2012, 72 min [16 mm/digital].