Running May 31-June 7, 2012, the Chicago Underground Film Festival, now in its 19th year, has announced its full program lineup. From the official press release:
The 19th Annual Chicago Underground Film Festival
(CUFF), presented by IFP /Chicago, heats up the summer film festival
circuit with a provocative and entertaining slate of features,
documentaries and short films that redefine the term “underground” and
what it means for a culture in flux. All screenings take place at the
Gene Siskel Film Center of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago,
164 North State Street, May 31 – June 7.For the past 19 years, the Chicago Underground Festival (CUFF) has
provided Chicago audiences with an accessible, viewer-friendly
showcase for Avant-Garde and cult cinema, and established itself as
the premier Midwest venue for emerging independent filmmakers. From
alternative music documentary and political agitprop to high camp and
formal experimentation, CUFF likes films that go beyond expectations
and genre — films made with passion, obsession and drive. A full
schedule can be found at www.cuff.org now.Highlights include:
* The festival kicks off on Thursday, May 31 at 8pm with the Midwest
Premiere of THE FOURTH DIMENSION, Vice Media’s Eddie Moretti and
Harmony Korine bring together a trio of international directors to
explore “the fourth dimension,” each bringing his own singular vision
and interpretation to the concept. What is it? Where is it? What does
it mean to the characters? What does it mean to you? The triptych
opens with Harmony Korine’s “The Lotus Community Workshop,” as
motivational speaker named Val Kilmer (played by Val Kilmer) delivers
a sermon at a roller rink. In Alexsei Fedorchenko’s “Chronoeye,” a
Russian scientist builds a time machine in his apartment. The
quasi-apocalyptic “Fawns” by Polish newcomer Jan Kwiecinski concludes
this triumvirate as four friends stumble upon an abandoned village in
the Polish countryside..* Mixing experimental, documentary, and traditional narratives, the
festival’s acclaimed shorts programming features an impressive
lineup. CUFF will showcase films and videos by 75 artists, Including
new work by Jesse McLean, Charlotte Pryce John Smith, Robert Todd,
Reynold Reynolds, Ben Russell, Ben Rivers, Melika Bass and many
others.* A special screening of Xan Aranda’s ANDREW BIRD: FEVER YEAR. In
2009 Chicago based singer-songwriter Andrew Bird ended an insane 165
show tour feverish and on crutches from an onstage injury. Xan
Aranda’s film captures Bird’s precarious multi-instrumental looping
technique and features live performances at Milwaukee’s Pabst Theater.
It’s a snapshot of a time during which he became “perfectly adapted to
the music hall” – his risk and reward for being an undeniable creative
force.Closing Night will bring the World Premiere of Chicagoan Lindsay
Denniberg’s feature VIDEO DIARY OF A LOST GIRL, an eye-popping debut
in which we meet the immortal Louise and her beloved Charlie.
Unfortunately, due to her supernatural origins, every man Louise
sleeps with must die. What will become of our sarcastic, timeless
lovers? An homage to the 80’s, VHS, punk, and German Expressionism,* The Chicago Underground Film Festival is also known for its
festival parties which allow festival attendees to meet and talk to
visiting artists in casual settings. CUFF was selected as one of the
top ten party festival’s in the world by Chris Gore’s Ultimate Film
Festival Survival Guide, and this year we’re happy to present four
nights of event’s at three of Chicago’s favorite watering holes.Tickets and Locations
Tickets for the 19th Chicago Underground Film Festival will go on sale
June 1 and are priced at $11 for general admission; a $5 discount is
available for all Gene Siskel Film Center and IFP/ Chicago Members.
Tickets are available through Ticketmaster at (800) 982-2787 and
www.ticketmaster.com or at the Gene Siskel Film Center box office.
All film screenings are held at the Gene Siskel Film Center located at
164 North State Street.Festival Passes Available!
$75 gets you into an unlimited number of screenings! This is over a $130 value!
Buy your festival pass at the box office as soon as tickets are
available for the festival.
Plus, once CUFF is over, you can turn in your pass to the box office
at the end of the fest to get a $5 discount on Siskel MembershiCOMPLETE FESTIVAL SCHEDULE
Opening Night Film!
THE FOURTH DIMENSION
8:00 pm Theater One
Thursday May 31THE FOURTH DIMENSION
Alexsei Fedorchenko, Harmony Korine, and Jan Kwiecinski, 106 min.,
Video, 2012, Russia/USA/PolandVice Media’s Eddie Moretti brings together a trio of international
directors to explore “the fourth dimension,” each bringing his own
singular vision and interpretation to the concept. What is it? Where
is it? What does it mean to the characters? What does it mean to you?
Intense, hilarious and poignant, THE FOURTH DIMENSION is an unusual
cinematic experience that you’d be crazy to miss.“Grolsch Film Works and VICE Films present ‘THE FOURTH DIMENSION, a
film that gives us a glimpse of enlightenment through the eyes of
three one-of-a-kind characters. The three filmmakers – Fedorchenko,
Korine and Kwiecinski – have created three unique stories that offer
up their vision of this higher plane of existence, the Fourth
Dimension. Each filmmaker takes his character on a journey that
changes the way they see the world and themselves. And each filmmaker
will offer a different perspective on what the Fourth Dimension is.The film opens with Harmony’s short. Val represents a true maverick
spirit. He doesn’t conform to any of the norms we might expect from a
motivational speaker, but his speech is inspiring because it is the
unadulterated truth. He sets up the central thematic motif of the
film: by broadening your mind and changing your perspective you can
pave your own path to enlightenment. Val’s speech also sets up the
next two films, in which we will see the Polish and Russian characters
ultimately find their personal Fourth Dimensions. First, we travel to
Russia where Grigory believes he has already found the Fourth
Dimension. But despite his convictions, we can see that he is leading
an unfulfilled life. We will see the moment when Grigory questions his
world view and finds a life that is full of the joy and companionship
he has been missing. The film ends with a glimpse of the Fourth
Dimension that lies in Grigory’s future. Next, we travel to Poland
where Pace and his friends are also in search of the Fourth Dimension.
It isn’t until they discover someone in the village who is more of an
outcast than they are that their perspective begins to shift. At the
end of the film, we see that they have risen above the us-and-them way
they saw the world and found the higher plane of existence that Val
described.” (Vice Media)_________________________________________________________________________________
THEY LIVE BY NIGHT
6:00 pm Theater One
Friday, June 1CHRIST CHURCH – SAINT JAMES
Stephen Broomer, 7 min., 16mm, 2011, Canada“In the spring of 1998, Christ Church – Saint James, an historic black
church in Toronto’s Little Italy, was destroyed by arson. All that
remained were walls and a pit, and over subsequent years, the site was
overtaken with graffiti. This film has taken on the layered form of
the site itself: the space and its surfaces becoming tangled and
multiple, the grid of a stone-filled window giving geometric form to
simultaneously occurring images of concrete, nature, waste, paint, and
sky.” (SB)SECRET LIFE
Reynold Reynolds, 10 min., Video, 2008, Germany“A woman is trapped in an apartment that becomes alive. Her thoughts
escape from her and come to life growing like plants out into the
space around her, living, searching, overtaking her apartment, wild
threatening her.” (RR)HULL
Tara Nelson, 8 min., 16mm, 2011, USA“A journey between layers of corporal consciousness, Hull explores the
physical memory of trauma, and the psychological repercussions of a
surgical disaster.” (TN)CURIOUS LIGHT
Charlotte Pryce, 4 min., 16mm, 2011, USA“A manuscript illuminated: illustrations retreat into the fiber of the
page: a fleeting light dissolves into the emulsion of the film: an
elusive story is revisited.” (CP)FORMS ARE NOT SELF-SUBSISTENT SUBSTANCES
Samantha Rebello, 23 min., 16mm, 2010, UK“Flesh, stone, milk and meat are the subject of a film which tries to
get inside ‘substance’ through medieval imagery. An attempt to explore
‘what things are’ through juxtaposing bestiary illuminations,
Romanesque carvings, medieval bells and living things, throwing into
relief the strangeness and violence of being.” (SR)WAKING THINGS
Melika Bass, 34 min., 16mm on Video, 2011, USA“In a house in a primeval wood, a mysterious, misfit family prepares a
seasonal feast for a visiting party of outlanders. As they shuffle
through ritualistic preparations, shadows reveal each creature — one
menacing, one wounded, and one worn, stewards of an old tradition,
blood for blood. A short film co-produced by and featuring ensemble
members of every house has a door performance group.” (MB)
_________________________________________________________________________________HEAVY GIRLS
8:00 pm Theater One
Friday, June 1THE NIGHT OF THE MOON HAS MANY HOURS
Mauricio Arango, 12 min., Video, 2011, Colombia/USA“A young man rafts into dark waters to recover the mysteriously dead
bodies of many men.” (MA)HEAVY GIRLS (Dicke Mädchen)
Axel Ranisch, 76 min., Video, 2011, Germany“Sven lives with his mother Edeltraut, she suffers from dementia. They
share their lives, their flat and even the bed. During the day Sven
works at a bank and Daniel looks after his mother. He accompanies her
to the hairdresser, they go shopping or for a walk and Daniel keeps
the flat tidy. One day, Edeltraut locks Sven on the balcony and goes
for a walk into town on her own. Both men desperately start to look
for the old woman. They do not only find her, but also an affection
for each other that creates confusion in their lives.” (AR)“… Maybe in part because of the shooting style, with no crew and a
tiny camera, HEAVY GIRLS locks effortlessly into its
melancholy/bemused mood and consistently captures the delicate
textures of its characters’ individuality in all its strange
contortions. This is an incredibly intimate film, and it would be hard
to overstate just how powerful and accomplished the performances are.
Consistently surprising, full of strange twists and odd behavior, but
always true to life, HEAVY GIRLS demonstrates with extravagant
imagination and clarity of vision how there’s not so queer as folk.” –
Paul Sbrizzi, Hammer To Nail Online
_________________________________________________________________________________JOURNEY TO PLANET X
10:00 pm, Theater One
Friday, June 1
Repeats Wednesday, June 6th, 6pmCHROMATIC REVELRIES
Kerry Laitala, 7min, Video, 2011, USA“Waves of Rotating undulating orbs float through space in this
atmospheric play of color and depth” (KL)JOURNEY TO PLANET X
Josh Koury, 78 min.,Video, 2012, USA
“Eric Swain and Troy Bernier are scientists by day and amateur
filmmakers by night. These two friends have worked together for years
– turning out sci-fi inspired tales of their own creation. Journey to
Planet X follows the filming of Planet X, the duo’s most ambitious
endeavor to date, and sheds light on their own unique brand of ‘movie
magic.’ The new project magnifies a creative divide and their
differing ambitions. Overcoming this obstacle, they recruit the
involvement of everyone they can find – from their own family members,
to co-workers, and local aspiring actors. They shoot on sand dunes,
highway overpasses, and inside an industrial-sized freezer at a local
supermarket. Together with their cast and crew, they form an unlikely
community of like-minded adventurers.” (JK)
“One of the best things about Journey is the actual clips from the
films Eric and Troy make. The acting, dialog, and special effects are
all pretty hilarious, even if they don’t think so. But while it may
seem like a mockery at first (not to say that the pair are actually
being mocked), Journey is really about the love of the game. These
guys put their hearts and souls into their movies, and their
enthusiasm is infectious. It’s a hell of a lot of fun to watch.” –
Joshua Chaplinsky, Twitch.com_________________________________________________________________________________
THE DEAD TALK BACK
1:00 pm Theater Two
Saturday, June 2
Repeats Tuesday, June 5th, 6:00 pmFOR ADOLFAS
Joel Schlemowitz, 6 min., 16mm, 2011, USA“In memory of Adolfas Mekas. 16mm footage shot at a book release party
for ‘The Sayings of St. Tula’ in 1999, and Adolfas’s retirement party
as head of The People’s Film Department at Bard College in 2004.” (JS)ONCE IT STARTED IT COULD NOT END OTHERWISE
Kelly Sears, 8 min., Video, 2011,USA“Once it started it could not end otherwise recounts terrifying and
strange happenings that descend on a 1970s high school. “ (KS)REMOTE
Jesse McLean, 11 min., Video, 2011, USA“There is a presence lingering in the dark woods, just under the
surface of a placid lake and at the end of dreary basement corridor.
It’s not easy to locate because it’s outside but also inside. It
doesn’t just crawl in on your wires because it’s not a thing. It’s a
shocking eruption of electrical energy.” (JM)DEJA VU DE JOUR
Mike Olenick, 2 min., Video, 2012, USA“In this silent film spectacle, an actress — played by Catherine
Deneuve — encounters an unexpected, but familiar destiny. With music
by Clark Wilson.” (MO)WANING
Gina Haraszti, 8 min.,Video, 2011, Canada“A man, a dead woman, a depleted apartment. Not your typical murder
mystery, Waning takes on the visual and temporal deconstruction of a
homicide in a single fractured frame.” (GH)
BOMB SHELTER
Colin Polombi, 3 min., Video, 2012, USA“Bomb Shelter is a poem written by Marc McKee and interpreted through
animation by Colin Palombi. The poem refers to an ambiguous “hot
thing”, which is here portrayed through the accepting and rejecting of
common human interactions and experiences: conversation, love, and
death.” (CP)MAURICE
Patrick Kack-Brice, 18 min., Video, 2011, France/USA“A short documentary portrait of Maurice Laroche, owner and
projectionist of the ‘Beverley’, the last Porno Cinema in Paris (and
possibly Europe, maybe the entire world) still playing 35mm films. The
film depicts a technician holding on to his dying Art, even if it is
against his own better judgment. ‘Maurice’ is an anthropological
document of a man, a subculture, and a physical space that are
slipping towards becoming obsolete.” (PK)RANSOM NOTES
Kelly Egan, 4 min., 35mm, 2011, Canada
“Exploration of the filmmaker’s experience of the hijacking of her
city during the Toronto G20 Summit. A re-appropriation of language and
meaning through the act of collage.” – Rotterdam Film FestivalCOMING ATTRACTIONS
Peter Tscherkassky, 25 min., 35mm, 2010, Austria“COMING ATTRACTIONS addresses Tom Gunning’s concept of a `Cinema of
Attractions’. This term is used to describe a completely different
relation between actor, camera and audience to be found in early
cinema in general, as compared to the `modern cinema’ which developed
after 1910, gradually leading to the narrative technique of
D.W.Griffith. The notion of a `Cinema of Attractions’ touches upon the
exhibitionistic character of early film, the undaunted show and tell
of its creative possibilities, and its direct addressing of the
audience. At some point it occurred to me that another residue of the
cinema of attractions lies within the genre of advertising: Here we
also often encounter a uniquely direct relation between actor, camera
and audience.” (PT)
_________________________________________________________________________________MASTER PLAN
2:00 pm, Theater One
Saturday, June 2CARTOGRAPHY
Sara Mott, 5 min.,16mm on Video, 2011, USA“Following shopping carts out of stores and into the streets,
Cartography charts an alternative landscape of material culture in
American life.” (SM)SING AS WE GO
Marianna Milhorat, 6 min., 16mm on Video, 2011, USASLAB CITY PROM
Jordan Blady, 8 min., Video, 2012, USA“Builder Bill moves to Slab City and builds The Range, setting the
stage for the community’s most important event of the season, Prom.”
(JB)MASTER PLAN
Robert Todd, 62 min., 16mm, 2011,USA“Physical structures reflect concepts of well-being, for ourselves and
for society: they are one component of a social architecture. How are
the needs of a human spirit satisfied within the structures we create?
What are the building blocks of a vibrant society? How do we consider
the role of incarceration as an incidence of ‘managed’ housing in our
social architecture? MASTER PLAN portrays various strata of managed
housing in America, form individual homes to prisons, mixing accounts
of the planners’ rationales for the designs with residents’
testimonials concerning the quality of life within these structures.”
(RT)
_________________________________________________________________________________GIRL MODEL
4:00 pm Theater One
Saturday, June 2STRONG IS BEAUTIFUL
Dewey Nicks, 4 min.Video, 2012, USA“40 of the biggest names in the women’s tennis are documented in
Nicks’s dramatic film. Shot with a 600-frames-per-second Phantom EFX
camera, in temperatures over 100 degrees, the stars were captured
fresh from battle in between rounds at tournaments across the US.
Seeking to champion each player’s unique strengths, Nicks highlighted
their signature strokes in slow motion” (DN)GIRL MODEL
Ashley Sabin and David Redmon, 78 min., Video, 2011, USA“Despite a lack of obvious similarities between Siberia and Tokyo, a
thriving model industry connects these distant regions. GIRL MODEL
follows two protagonists involved in this industry: Ashley, a deeply
ambivalent model scout who scours the Siberian countryside looking for
fresh faces to send to the Japanese market, and one of her
discoveries, Nadya, a thirteen year-old plucked from the Siberian
countryside and dropped into the center of Tokyo with promises of a
profitable career. After Ashley’s initial discovery of Nadya, the two
rarely meet again, but their stories are inextricably bound. As
Nadya’s optimism about rescuing her family from their financial
difficulties grows, her dreams contrast against Ashley’s more jaded
outlook about the industry’s corrosive influence.” (AS/DR)
_________________________________________________________________________________HEAVEN + EARTH + JOE DAVIS
5:00 pm Theater Two
Saturday, June 2HEAVEN + EARTH + JOE DAVIS
Peter Sasowsky, 85 min., Video, 2011, USA“Almost thirty years ago, a peg-legged artist and motorcycle mechanic
from Mississippi walked into MITs Center for Advanced Visual Studies
and demanded a meeting with the Director. Forty-five minutes later,
after trashing the receptionist’s desk and holding off the Cambridge
police, Joe Davis walked out with an academic appointment at MIT. His
status there has provided him with resources for much of his work –
including sending vaginal contractions into space to communicate with
aliens, poetry encoded into DNA, and a language to write the world
beneath the world. It’s a great life for a man driven by his
imagination, except when it’s not. His gig at MIT is unpaid. He gets
evicted from several apartments and loses his lab space to science.
But perhaps his greatest obstacle is that people refuse to understand
him. He is claimed by neither the Art nor Scientific communities. His
uncompromising approach to art and life spawns conflicts in his
personal life and hinders his ability to address the everyday world’s
banal requirements. To Joe, it’s more important to try to discover
man’s place in the cosmos. Working with home movies, drawings, and
vérité and interview footage, HEAVEN + EARTH + JOE DAVIS takes the
viewer with Joe around the world and into the visual and philosophical
landscape of his art. It is a story of self-discovery, sacrifice, and
the complexity of human endeavor, constructed around a theme central
to his work; that everything is connected, often in the most
unexpected ways.” (PS)
_________________________________________________________________________________OK, GOOD
6:00 pm Theater One
Saturday June 2THE GHOST OF FATTY ARBUCKLE
Melissa Friedling, 10 min., Video, 2012, USA“Take a tour of a historic Brooklyn, NY film and TV studio before and
after the final taping of the second-longest continuously run American
daytime soap, “As The World Turns”, and awaken haunting spirits of
productions past.” (MF)OK, GOOD
Daniel Martinico, 79 min., Video, 2012, USA“Paul Kaplan seems like your typical actor in Los Angeles. He goes to
auditions, takes movement class, sends out headshots, and listens to
motivational tapes in his car. However, as Paul struggles through a
series of demoralizing setbacks, he is pushed ever closer to the edge.
With a compelling mix of vérité technique and confining formalism, OK,
GOOD is a wildly unusual meditation on performance, identity, anxiety,
and one man’s personal apocalypse.” (DM)“In depicting the downward spiral of its subject, played by Hugo
Armstong with all the skill and flare his character lacks as a
performer, Martinico employs a tone that is reminiscent of Lodge
Kerrigan’s films. This clearly limited and unhinged Los Angeles actor
struggles through audition after audition, haggling with a local
printer over the cost and timeliness of producing his head shots and,
most memorably, attending an acting workshop that most closely
resembled a cult of the deranged and mentally disabled.” – Brandon
Harris, Filmmaker Magazine
_________________________________________________________________________________HOLLYWOOD BURN
8:00 pm Theater One
Saturday June 2WHY IS THE NO VIDEO SIGNAL BLUE?
Andrew Norman Wilson, 10 min., Video, 2011, USA“The video starts by asking why the no video signal is blue. At first
it presents a futile attempt to deconstruct the meaning of the color
blue, then reaches beyond standard rhetorical and semiotic models
through the philosophy of Brian Massumi, William James, and Ludwig
Wittgenstein, interactions with Sony customer support, and the
compositions of Walter de Maria and Alice DeeJay.” (AW)MIGRATION
Douglas Urbank, 4 min., 16mm , 2012, USA“An adolescent girl’s daydream of transmutation.” (DU)
UNUSUAL RED CARDIGAN
John Smith, 13 min., Video, 2011, UK“The discovery of a familiar item for sale on eBay triggers obsessive
speculation about the seller’s identity.” -LUXRHYTHMUS 21st CENTURY (STRAIGHT)
Eric Fleischauer, 3 min., Video, 2012, USA“A remake of Hans Richter’s seminal film from 1921 RHYTHMUS 21
(re)made with fame–accurate precision using sophisticated animation
software. This cultural artifact is not simply preserved or even
recycled, but reinvented. Instead of the clarity and directness of
citation, RHYTHMUS 21st CENTURY draws attention to the unreliability
of the archive where even the exact trace of an original can accrue
meaning and be transformed through newly created associations. This
process raises important questions about the role of materiality in
the digital age, the various ways art history’s archive might be used,
and the complicated roles they play shaping a collective cultural
memory. (EF)A.G.O.D. 2012
Thorne Brandt, 5 min., Video, 2012, USA“This video consists of 1,000 hand drawn animations, completed in less
than a day, and splattered onto the frame.” (TB)HOLLYWOOD BURN
Soda_Jerk, 52 min., Video, 2011, Australia“HOLLYWOOD BURN is a free-culture call to arms. Mimicking the
hyperbolic rhetoric of today’s copyright cops, the project pits a
righteous league of video pirates against the evil tyrant Moses and
his Copyright Commandments. Determined to alter the present by
changing the past, the pirates travel back to 1955 to construct the
ultimate weapon: an Elvis Presley video-clone. Sampled from hundreds
of sources, this anti-copyright epic adopts the tactical responses of
the parasite, feeding off the body of Hollywood and inhabiting its
cinematic structures and codes. Its all-star cast includes Elvis
Presley, Monkey Magic, Batman & Robin, Moses, Jesus, The Hulk, The
Hoff, & The Ghostbusters.” (Soda_Jerk)
_________________________________________________________________________________WILD REBELS
10 pm Theater One
Saturday June 2FANFARE for MARCHING BAND
Danièle Wilmouth,16 min., 16mm on Video, 2012, USA“Saturated colors, euphoric music, and ecstatic dance choreography
fail to engage an immobilized public. FANFARE for MARCHING BAND
follows the antics of a ragtag musical militia, as they embark on an
inept invasion through a parallel universe where their exuberant music
is out of sync and unheard. Reflecting on today’s lean economic times,
this music and dance film features the circus punk marching band Mucca
Pazza, as they stage musical ACTIONS for JOY at various inappropriate
locations around the city of Chicago.” (DW)DAMAGE CONTROL (AKA-BULLWINKLE FILM)
Adam Paradis, 4 min., 16mm, 2010, USA“This film began as an experimental restoration of a hypothetical
parody; Jay Wards’ Bullwinkle does Peter Kubelka. Carved from a larger
reel containing only credit sequences from The Bullwinkle Show, that
was proclaimed ‘junk’ by one collector, but later declared ‘damage
control’ by another. In other words, this was not simply a reel of
scraps, but material used at one time to maintain print quality for
broadcast. The challenge of balancing the creative process with the
efforts to produce a viewable and projectable print deeply inflected
the making of this film, and is a reflection of the ongoing efforts of
both archivists and filmmakers to keep works alive. Re-spliced and
rebuilt several times, at times becoming more of a restoration process
than a creative one.” (AP)WALT DISNEY’S TAXI DRIVER
Bryan Boyce, 5 min., Video, 2012, USA“Walt Disney’s re-imagineering of Martin Scorsese’s classic film TAXI
DRIVER follows Mickey Mouse-obsessed Travis Bickle as he looks for
love in a rapidly transforming New York City.” (BB)THE LIFE AND FREAKY TIMES OF UNCLE LUKE
Jillian Mayer, 12 min., Video, 2011, USA“A modern Miami adaptation of the 1962 French short film ‘La Jetee’,
the film recounts Luke’s (Uncle Luke, legendary rapper from the
hip-hop group 2 Live Crew) rise to fame as he changes the face of
hip-hop and fights for first amendment rights- and later as he ushers
Miami into a golden era of peace and prosperity as Mayor. Everything
changes when a nuclear meltdown at Turkey Point Power Plant turns
Miami into a radioactive wasteland filled with mutants, and Luke is
the only survivor left unscathed” (JM)
THE ROOM WITH NO CORNERS
Jenna Caravello, 5 min., Video, 2011, USA“Maxime’s weird house is surrounded by people. She must learn to be
happy, but is it better to be outside or in?” (JC)BEGINNINGS (ALPHA & OMEGA)
Roger Beebe, 5 min., Video, 2010, USA“A lazy man’s Biblical concordance. A new start for the start. A
mechanical re-scrambling of a(n all-too) familiar audio text that
produces concrete poetry and an ideological unveiling.” (RB)THE WHITE COAT PHENOMENON
Kristin Reeves, 3 min., Video, 2012, USA“Finding sex in an unexpected location requires some examination.” (KR)
BY FOOT-CANDLE LIGHT
Mary Helena Clark, 9 min., Video, 2011, USA“Scenes from the proscenium wings. A film imagined and recounted by
foot-candle light. You close your eyes and, suddenly, it is dark.”
(MC)NATURE’S VOICE
Peter Jessien Laugesen, 8 min., Video, 2011, UK“An observational portrait of human alterations of nature- The film
depicts usual phenomena in an unusual way. We see images of normal
suburban gardens, parks, woodlands and majestic mountains. Some
inhabitants include a capitulating squirrel, a pack of hungry dogs and
a singing gnome. It’s a rare glimpse into wild life under control and
the domesticated running wild.” (PJ)
FLEXING MUSCLES
Charles Fairbanks, 21 min., Video, 2012, Mexico“A wrestling movie about postmodern consumption and production:
physical work and embodied culture for the digital age. It is also an
immersive, participatory, experimental ethnography on Mexico’s
spectacular masked wrestling – Lucha Libre – for which the filmmaker
resumed his career fighting as The One-Eyed Cat (El Gato Tuerto), this
time with a camera built into his mask..” (CF)_________________________________________________________________________________
ZERO KILLED
1:00 pm Theater Two
Saturday, June 3
Repeats Wednesday, June 6, 8 pmELKO
Alexander Yan, 14min,Video, 2011, USA“An internet-obsessed boy in rural Nevada takes advantage of a
stranger’s online request that somebody murder her.” (AY)ZERO KILLED
Michael Kosakowski, 81min., Video, 2011, Austria“Since 1996 film director Michal Kosakowski has been asking people
with different backgrounds about their murder fantasies. He offered
them the chance to stage their fantasies as short films. The only
condition was that they had to act in these films themselves, either
as victims or perpetrators. More than a decade later, Kosakowski met
these people again to ask them about their emotions during their acts
of murder or victimization, and interviewed them about current social
topics such as revenge, torture, war, terrorism, media, domestic
violence, the death penalty, suicide etc. If someone murdered a person
you love, how would you feel about it? Should torture be legalized?
Are soldiers murderers? How to define good and evil? Their replies are
juxtaposed with the short films based on these “non-criminal”
fantasies made accessible to viewers. Simultaneously, the
participants’ respective replies help viewers to get better acquainted
with them and their highly diverse social and professional
backgrounds. It is the banality of their acts that frightens us so
badly, their stabbing of innocent people, their orgiastic throttling
of marriage partners or their random shooting of unsuspecting visitors
to exhibitions. ZERO KILLED takes the issue one step further: the film
deciphers common clichés and patterns of visual violence with the aid
of the protagonists’ immediate and direct comments. The result is an
unconventional hybrid of feature film and documentary that makes
viewers question their personal and social positions concerning
ethical and moral values and taboos.” (MK)
_________________________________________________________________________________AS ABOVE SO BELOW
2:00 pm, Theater One
Sunday, June 3FIRST LAW: QUAIL CT.
Mike Gibisser, 23 min., 16mm, 2011, USA“The first of a four part series. The first law of thermodynamics
suggests energy can neither be created nor destroyed; the film a
meditation on this axiom. The lines between religion, science, morning
exercise, and breakfast cereal blur as an old man carries on with
diurnal routines after his wife has passed.” (MG)SCENE BOX
Sheri Wills, 5 min., Video, 2011, USA“The visual equivalent of a dusty box of aged, foil-covered
chocolates, SCENE BOX presents a barely overheard promise of mystery –
seductive, but not necessarily pleasant. A veiled diorama of
uncertainty.” (SW)AS ABOVE SO BELOW
Sarah J Christman, 60 min., 16mm, 2012, USA“For thousands of years, alchemists toiled to synthesize rare
substances and universal cures, to manipulate the speed of natural
processes. Today, my mother has her husband’s ashes transformed into a
memorial diamond. Precious metals are extracted from obsolete
electronics. What was once the world’s largest landfill– now also the
final resting place of the World Trade Center’s remains– is being
converted into a public park. The film intimately examines various
transmutations, both microscopic and massive, that reshape matter and
its meanings. What separates the permanent from the impermanent, the
things we discard from those we preserve?” (SC)_________________________________________________________________________________
ATTACK OF THE EYE CREATURES
4:00 pm Theater One
Sunday, June 3FEBRUARY 2008 & JUNE1967
Mark Toscano, 7 min., 16mm, 2010, USA“An experiment in bringing together two field observations of two
completely different activities from two disparate times and places. I
joined these twin moments (one captured, one found) as a way of trying
to understand what the experience of the one would do to the
experiencing of the other in the linear time of a darkened film
theater.” (MT)CRUSTS
Alexander Stewart, 12min., 16mm on Video, 2011, USA“CRUSTS is a minimalist psychedelic film that combines a searing drone
soundtrack with footage of mysterious architectural and natural
artifacts. Using a visual composition of objects rotating in a void,
the film evolves from meditations on concrete physical textures to a
complete stroboscopic transfiguration of the image. The objects are
accompanied by a crushing, hypnotic onslaught of guitar and electronic
noise. A geologic horror film.” (AS)KERATIN RESERVE
Joshua Solondz, 3 min.,16mm, 2009, USA“Six hundred seventy-three fingernails glued to destroyed film.
Optically printed.” (JS)(K)NOW (T)HERE
Hey-Yeun Jang, 9 min.,16mm on Video, 2011, USA“A film diary about series of journeys of summer 2009 that was simply
to be ‘on the road’.” (HJ)THIS MUST BE THE PLACE
Luis Arnías, 6 min., 16mm, 2011, USA“Live each season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink,
taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influences of each.”
-Henry David ThoureauPERIL OF THE ANTILLES
Fern Silva, 5 min., 16mm, 2011, USA“Peril of the Antilles was filmed at the beginning of November 2010
while visiting a friend in Haiti. At this specific time, the cholera
epidemic was on its way to Port-au-Prince, Hurricane Tomas was on the
horizon, presidential elections were in a couple weeks and the first
Gede (day of the dead) took place since the January quakes. Along the
way I acquired a very curious copy of a music video of Michel “Sweet
Micky” Martelly (Haiti’s newest president and once bad boy of Compas),
from his early Nineties heyday… shot in a familiar location… rajé
gain´ zoreille…” (FS)TRACES 1-6
Scott Stark, 7 min., 35mm, 2012, USA“A series of short 35mm films generated from digital still images and
printed onto movie film. The top and bottom half of each image
alternate in the projector gate, and the images are arranged in a
dizzying array of rhythms and patterns. The images also bleed onto the
optical soundtrack area of the film, generating their own peculiar
sounds.” (SS)UNDERGROWTH
Rob Todd, 11 min., 16mm, 2011, USA“A blind predator dreams through its prey’s eyes.” (RT)
JUBILATION
Tommy Heffron, 14 min., Video, 2011, USA“Hover. Cover. Rock. Sit. Pop. Stand. Focus. Rumble. Purr. Listen.
Stretch. Walk. Stop. Float. Chop. Turn. Burn. Appear. Approach.
Hoist.” (TH)FLASH ART (CIRCLES AND RECTANGLES)
Scott Wolniak, 5 min., Video, 2010, USA“Decidedly low-tech, this optical abstraction begins with a shot of an
aluminum reflector inside a lamp; a lightbulb in the shot’s center
flicks on and off. As the video plays on, nearly identical shots are
superimposed, but at a steadily decreasing scale, resulting in an
array of nested rectangles. The rhythmic blinking of intense light-
accompanied by audible clicks from the plastic light switch- presents
the viewer with a swift progression of blinding geometries, (with)
dizzying effects.”
– Michelle Grabner, Artforum, May 2010RIVER RITES
Ben Russell, 11 min., 16mm on Video, 2011, USA/Suriname“A trance dance water implosion, a newer line drawn between secular
possession and religious phenomena. Filmed in one shot at a sacred
site on the Upper Suriname River, the minor secrets of a Saramaccan
animist everyday are revealed as time itself is undone. Rites are the
new trypps; embodiment is our eternal everything.” (BR)
_________________________________________________________________________________PALACES OF PITY
6:00 pm, Theater One, Sunday, June 3LEAFLESS
Nazl? Dinçel, 8 min, 16mm, 2011“LEAFLESS is an experiment of expansion in time, a hand processed love
poem of textures about becoming familiar with a significant other’s
body in reservation with its landscape. ‘But the sun is also fierce;
neither graceful athlete nor geometrician’s dummy will embody Apollo,
the idol of light.’ – Kenneth Clark,The Nude: a study in ideal form
(1956)” (ND)THE EVIL EYES
Bobby Abate, 20 min., Video, 2011, USA“Set in the 1960’s, THE EVIL EYES is the story of a grandmother faced
with her mortality, a mother in mid-life crisis, and a son realizing
his sexuality – a dysfunctional family whose unspoken angst manifests
in the latest episode of their beloved supernatural soap opera, Before
Dawn.” (BA)PALACES OF PITY (Palácios de pena)
Daniel Schmidt & Gabriel Abrantes, 59 min., Video, 2001, Portugal“Haunted by their own directionless lives, two pre-adolescent girls
reunite while visiting their ailing grandmother. In the midst of her
fantasies of a medieval past – one consumed by fear and desire – the
two girls are transformed and confront a legacy of oppression.
Palácios de pena is about a culturally inherited fear in Portugal,
linked to political and social oppression during the Inquisition and
Fascism. It revolves around two uppermiddle class adolescent
Portuguese girls, juxtaposing their budding identities to a trial
condemning two Moorish homosexuals to burn at the stake. Their ailing
grandmother gives them an awareness of their heritage through the
mechanism of desire, describing a dream where she is a judge of the
Inquisition. The grandmother’s and the girls’ guilt is complicated by
their relationship, that of family and love. As they love each other,
so does what they represent: ignorance and the will to violently
oppress.” (GA/DS)
_________________________________________________________________________________I HAVE ALWAYS BEEN A DREAMER
8:00 pm, Theater Two, Sunday, June 3
Repeats Tuesday, June 5, 8:00 pmCENTURY
Kevin Jerome Everson, 7 min., 16mm on Video, 2011, USA“The second in a series of films of automobiles being compacted for
disposal, CENTURY refers not only to the Buick destroyed in the film
but the rise and fall of the auto industry in the north eastern states
and provinces over the last 100 years.” (KE)I HAVE ALWAYS BEEN A DREAMER
Sabine Gruffat, 78 min., 16mm on Video, 2012, USA/United Arab Emirates“A documentary travelogue and film portrait of two cities in
contrasting states of development: Dubai, UAE and Detroit, U.S.A.
Within the context of a boom and bust economy, the film questions the
collective ideologies that shape the physical landscape and impact
local communities. Though these cities represent two different
economic eras (Fordist and Post-Fordist), both cities vividly
illustrate the effects of economic monocultures and the arbitrary
consequences of geopolitical advantage. The film serves as a visual
documentation of these two cities as indexes of political, cultural
and economic change while tracing the ways each city’s development is
tied to technologies of communication, production, labor, and
consumption. The portion of the film concerning Dubai depicts a
postmodern city in a continual process of being built, and posits
Dubai as virtual in the sense that it is artificial, performed and
shaped by an increasingly service-based economy driven by tourism. By
contrast, the portion of the film depicting Detroit reveals a once
shining example of a Fordist city presently in ruins and in the
process of being vacated, beleaguered by a failing industrial-based economy vacillating between ideologies of self-preservation and destruction. The film was shot in Detroit, MI and Dubai, UAE, exploring their landscape through various modes of transport, and includes interviews with local historians, scholars, and artists. The film was produced between 2007 and 2011.” (SG)
_________________________________________________________________________________CLOSING FILM!
WORLD PREMIERE!
VIDEO DIARY OF A LOST GIRL8:00 pm, Theater One, Sunday, June 3
Repeats Thursday, June 7, 6:00 pmDERIVATION
Hyun-Suk Seo, 7min., Video, 2011, South Korea“Derivation is a re-assemblage of sensually charged moments from Korean horror films of the 2000’s. Recycled as found footage, such derivative motifs as false surprises, quick head turns, sudden awakenings, and screams are repeated to form musical patterns. The rhythmic and rhymic structure creates a pure ‘cinematic shock.’” (HS)
VIDEO DIARY OF A LOST GIRL
Lindsay Denniberg, 90min., Video, 2012, USA“Lilith was made from the dust like Adam, and therefore considered herself his equal. Adam did not agree, so Lilith escaped from the Garden of Eden, and copulated with hundreds of demons near the red sea, giving birth to the Lilin. The Lilin still exist today, and new Lilin are born as fully grown women (once every hundred years, a new Lilin rises from the dust of the earth). They are immortal, and must have sex with a man every full moon instead of menstruating, or else they will bleed to death! The catch is though, every man who sleeps with them, dies! Now present day, our main character Louise has been around since the 1920’s. She is starting to see the reincarnation of the only man she ever loved, Charlie. (Louise accidentally killed Charlie before realizing she was a Lilin). Now Louise must struggle with staying away from the love of her life, or risk losing him a second time!” (LD)
_________________________________________________________________________________TWO YEARS AT SEA
6:00 pm Theater Two
Monday, June 4TEAR IT UP, SON!
Ross Nugent, 9min., Video, 2011, USA“Backwoods ballyhoo straddling the Ahiah/Pennsyltucky border, sanctioned by $10 and a sign-yer-life-away waiver. Attended by up to 10,000 motherlovers some Fridays, this is Yankee Lake Truck Night. Yours truly was able to slip into the muck with a camera and nary a ‘whatcha shooting?’. Yes, a simple thumbs-up for mud- slinging hot-dawgers passing by my rig, or my own intonation, ‘where ya from?’ (to wit: OH, PA, NY, TN, KY, WV, MI) was enough to keep me rolling…” (RN)
TWO YEARS AT SEA
Ben Rivers, 86 min., 35mm, 2011, UK“A man called Jake lives in the middle of the forest. He goes for walks in whatever the weather, and takes naps in the misty fields and woods. He builds a raft to spend time sitting in a loch. He sleeps in a caravan that floats up a tree. He is seen in all seasons, surviving frugally, passing the time with strange projects, living the radical dream he had as a younger man, a dream he spent two years working at sea to realise.
I made a short film about Jake five years ago, and as time has passed and other films have been made, I have had a continual feeling that I should go back—to make another film where I, and then the audience, can spend more time hanging around Jake’s place in the forest. I want the film to embrace the different perception of time that Jake and his environment have, which is much more patient and relaxed than my own urban living. The film will have at its core the relationship between a person and the place they have chosen to live out their life, and the deep connection there is between them.” (BR)
_________________________________________________________________________________
HEADLOCK
8:00 pm, Theater Two, Monday, June 4AND I WILL RISE IF ONLY TO HOLD YOU DOWN
Jennifer Reeder, 23 min., Video, 2011, USA“A couple (an amateur magician and a modern dance instructor) discusses their impending and badly-hatched plan to break up, while in a nearby room, their teenager daughter and her bff prepare for the high school dance. The couple’s actions away from each other suggest that they are still deeply in love but hilariously unable to communicate or emote successfully. Their daughter and her friend awkwardly discuss an encounter with the friend’s biological mother earlier in the day. In the end, multiple secret crushes are revealed. This is a story about loving, being loved, a glow in the dark tee shirt and slow jams.” (JR)
HEADLOCK
Johan Carlsen, 63min., 35mm, 2011, Germany“As the highly pregnant Susanne crashes through the doors of the hospital emergency entrance, thoroughly unprepared for the birth ahead, she begins to panic. In a fit of hysteria – the contractions are just setting in – she has an vision: she need not worry, this child is predestined. Twelve years later, Susanne is looking forward to a fresh start. After years of abstention, she is hoping for a steady relationship. But her son, whom she since the vision believes to be a genius, is writing unreadable essays in school and his teacher wants to put him in special ed. Susanne and Jonathan wrestle for their life.The film is a collaboration between the director Johan Carlsen and Cornelia and Christopher Kwanka, a mother and son living in Berlin-Lichtenberg. Conny and Christopher act out scenes from Johan?s childhood and their own experience. They play Johnny and Susanne, a mother and son fighting for recognition and balance.” (JC)
_________________________________________________________________________________Special presentation!
ANDREW BIRD: FEVER YEAR
Thursday, June 7, 8:00 pmANDREW BIRD: FEVER YEAR
Xan Aranda, 80 min., Video, 2011, USA“Summer of 2009, Andrew and I were sitting on his porch and he asked me to make a concert film capturing the 165th (and final) show of the year with his beloved band-members, knowing their tight onstage bubble would disperse soon after. He’d spent nearly five years carefully assembling the band, and was loathe to leave its only visual record to short TV appearances and internet videos. Andrew was in the middle of an insane touring year – the apex of over a decade of hard work. He’d been suffering from perpetual fever, a common topic of our late night post-show phone calls from wherever he was in the world. I’d joke that he was a frog in hot water, temperature rising to meet the rigor. We’d previously collaborated on three projects (live-show projections, two music videos) and for years I’d had an opinion of how a feature-film about him should be made. Just as Andrew is often praised, criticized, or cornered for creating “unclassifiable” music, I strongly believed that a ‘rockumentary’ or ‘concert capture’ approach would not adequately honor his work. FEVER YEAR isn’t a document of Andrew’s intimate details or an assay of his sweat. It’s a snapshot of a time during which he became ‘perfectly adapted to the music hall’ – his risk and reward for being an undeniable creative force.” (XA)
