Jean Epstein's numerous writings, many of which have not been translated into English, testify to a paradoxical conceptualization of movement. Early on, Epstein was aware that the film medium entails immobility insofar as it relies upon photographic recording. In his 1923 talk, “On Some Conditions of Photogénie,” Epstein points out that photogénie is possible only with the successive mobilization of these photographic images, and that this mobilization alone allows for the revelation of movement: “[T]he mechanism of cinema constructs movement by multiplying successive stoppages of celluloid exposed to a ray of light, thus creating mobility through immobility, decisively demonstrating how correct the false reasoning of Zeno of Elea was.” By drawing on Zeno's famous paradox, Epstein acknowledges the role of immobility from a technical perspective: it is the discontinuous succession of motionless frames which eventually conveys the impression of continuity and movement, the basic ontological problem of cinema to which Epstein would return throughout the remainder of his career, as exemplified in L’Intelligence d’une machine (1946):

From a stylistic perspective, however, the art of cinema clearly relies on movement. Acknowledging the central role that immobility plays in the cinematic apparatus, Epstein nonetheless discards it when it comes to devising a conception of photogénie. He states in 1923 that “only the mobile and personal aspects of things, beings and souls may be photogenic.” Indeed, Epstein makes the case for the primacy of movement throughout his career as a filmmaker and theorist: in an article published in Les Temps modernes in 1950 (three years before his death), he posits that “still life is abominable on screen: it commits a sin against the very nature of cinema, it is a barbarism.”