Experimental

  • Maya Deren – Ensemble for Somnambulists (1951)

    Maya Deren1951-1960ExperimentalPerformanceUSA
    Ensemble for Somnambulists (1951)
    Ensemble for Somnambulists (1951)

    “Created by Maya Deren as part of a Toronto Film Society workshop, this unpublished film ‘poem’ is a luminous work of nighttime choreography. It was also a trial run for her later film, The Very Eye of Night” — from the dvdRead More »

  • George Griffin – Head (1975)

    1971-1980AnimationExperimentalGeorge GriffinUSA
    Head (1975)
    Head (1975)

    Quote:
    The animator, as actor, lives through his drawings which in turn become actors who influence his own self-image. A trick-film meditation on portraiture.Read More »

  • Su Friedrich – The Head of a Pin (2004)

    Su Friedrich2001-2010ExperimentalUSA
    The Head of a Pin (2004)
    The Head of a Pin (2004)

    Quote:
    The Head of a Pin reveals the awkward ruminations of the filmmaker and her friends as they attempt to learn about nature. Starting out as an examination of the differences between urban and rural life, between the daily grind and summer vacations, the film turns unexpectedly into a portrait of what happens when city dwellers encounter a country spider.Read More »

  • Bruce Baillie – All My Life (1966)

    USA1961-1970Bruce BaillieExperimental
    All My Life (1966)
    All My Life (1966)

    Quote:
    The film is made up of one single take. The camera pans to the left, focusing on a delapitated fence in a rural field, as Ella Fitzgerald’s “All My Life” plays on the soundtrack. At the end of the 3 minute film, the camera tilts up to the blue sky just as the song ends.Read More »

  • Sohn Koo-Yong – Night Walk (2023)

    2021-2030DocumentaryExperimentalSohn Koo-YongSouth Korea
    Night Walk (2023)
    Night Walk (2023)

    Small nightly monochrome silent landscapes to observe and enter another time to feel how everyday transforms through the gaze.

    This gorgeous landscape film is an invitation to the magical wonders of the night. Sohn Koo-yong’s second feature is a soothing, silent caress for our senses. Composed of a series of deliciously framed still shots and abstract drawings made by the filmmaker himself, superimposed onto the filmed images, it will enthral you with an enchanting ambience and unique lyricism. Without any sound or music, it speaks in a selection of poems by the Seonbi of the Joseon Dynasty that melts into the nightscape.Read More »

  • Su Friedrich – The Head of a Pin (2004)

    2001-2010ExperimentalSu FriedrichUSA
    The Head of a Pin (2004)
    The Head of a Pin (2004)

    The Head of a Pin reveals the awkward ruminations of the filmmaker and her friends as they attempt to learn about nature. Starting out as an examination of the differences between urban and rural life, between the daily grind and summer vacations, the film turns unexpectedly into a portrait of what happens when city dwellers encounter a country spider.Read More »

  • Su Friedrich – The Odds of Recovery (2002)

    USA2001-2010DocumentaryExperimentalSu Friedrich
    The Odds of Recovery (2002)
    The Odds of Recovery (2002)

    Quote:
    After a twenty year period of multiple illnesses and injuries, the filmmaker turns the camera on herself as a way to analyze her chances for a happier, healthier life. In the process, she captures the frustration, tedium and petty annoyances of a revolving-door relationship with the medical establishment, while portraying the complicated web of emotions that accompany any medical problem. With humor and honesty, The Odds of Recovery uses the filmmaker’s medical history as a means to address a perennial human problem: the desire to avoid conflict and deny the need for radical change.Read More »

  • Joe Ambrose – Destroy All Rational Thought (1998)

    Documentary1991-2000ExperimentalIrelandJoe Ambrose
    Destroy All Rational Thought (1998)
    Destroy All Rational Thought (1998)

    blurb sez: In Sept./Oct. 1992 a mini festival took place in the Temple Bar Area of Dublin. Called ‘The Here To Go Show’, it celebrated William Burroughs and Brion Gysin and was located at The Gallery of Photography, The Project Arts Centre, and a number of Private locations. Organised by English writer Terry Wilson, Irish rock singer Frank Rynne, and writer Joe Ambrose. The show was documented in guerilla fashion by the organisers the results of which have been distilled into ‘Destroy all Rational Thought’.Read More »

  • Jean Epstein – La glace à trois faces AKA The Three-Sided Mirror (1927)

    Jean Epstein1921-1930ExperimentalFranceSilent
    La glace à trois faces (1927)
    La glace à trois faces (1927)

    Psychological narrative avantgarde film about a wealthy young businessman who consecutively falls in love with a classy English woman (Pearl), a Russian sculptress (Athalia), and a naive working-class girl (Lucie). Overpowered by weakness, the coward sidesteps the obligations that love affairs impose: rather than living up to his dates he takes his sports-car from an ultra-modern garage and speeds to the fashionable beaches of Deauville. On his way, he is fatally hit by a descending swallow. The film is divided into three segments each of which consists of events the woman experienced. These sequences are embedded in scenes in which each of the three women is telling and casting her mind back to her own love affair. Thus, present, future and past merge and cannot be distinguished clearly. The intertwinement of several layers of time experience, recollection, telling and showing have been regarded as a source of inspiration of Alain Resnais and this film prefigures his “L’Année dernière à Mariënbad” to a certain extent.Read More »

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