"Using the structure of a feature film as its basic format, A First Quarter adopts the principles of nouvelle vague cinema as its role model. Simultaneous realities, altered flashbacks, plays on time and space are all components of the form and content of the film. Because it was originally shot in video and then kinescoped to 16 mm film, A First Quarter has acquired a poetic, soft look. The dialogue consists entirely of the work as it is spoken and read, built, enacted, written and painted by the players. As the scenarios build, they appear as tropes, one after another." —Alice Weiner