Before starting work on her Tarot Garden, an acres-vast wonderland of towering, sparkling sculptures in southern Tuscany, Niki de Saint Phalle made her final feature. A Dream Longer Than the Night follows a girl named Camelia into a dreamscape of her imagining, where there are figures from the Major Arcana, an indigo-feathered bird that promises escape, companion dragons, fearsome snakes, and one seductive man in black. Departing from the trauma of Daddy (Saint Phalle’s first feature), A Dream envisions sexual awakening as an excitable, fairytale quest, coloured in with quixotic feminine desire. 

After co-directing with Saint Phalle on Daddy, Peter Whitehead collaborated with her again, composing the original music for this. With her partner, the kinetic artist Jean Tinguely, Saint Phalle designed the sets, and animated her drawings for one magical, mesmerising sequence too. She appears in the film as the seductive madame of ‘a boarding school for girls’, though she hands the lead role to her daughter, Laura Condominas (who previously played Guinevere in Robert Bresson’s 1974 film Lancelot du Lac). 

Now restored in 4K with funds from Dior and under the supervision of Saint Phalle’s niece, Arielle, A Dream was earlier celebrated for reviving the ‘marvellous’ and ‘fantastic’ in the tradition of Jean Cocteau and Georges Meliès; Saint Phalle was heralded by one French critic as the feminine Alejandro Jodorowsky. More recently, Amy Taubin reckoned it a masterpiece of modern surrealist cinema.

This screening is preceded by an introduction from the season co-curator, Laura Staab. 

The ICA's In Focus: Niki de Saint Phalle is curated by Sophia Satchell-Baeza and Laura Staab. The UK premiere of the 4K restoration of Daddy screens on Friday 8 May.