USA

  • Wade Shaw & Stan Vanderbeek – Symmetricks (1972)

    1971-1980AnimationExperimentalStan VanderbeekUSAWade Shaw

    From the DVD notes:
    ”A computer-created animation of high-speed stroboscope mandalas with molecular-like energy. The surprise of this film is the color produced from the strobing black and white symmetrical images. Done with an electronic stylus on a special computer at MIT. This film demonstrates the possible use of the computer interacting with the graphic artist.”

    “Electronic-optical computer finger-painting. Laws of reflective mirror images. An interplay between drawing by hand and computer. Art form of the future – electronic calligraphy.” – S.V., not dated.Read More »

  • Charles Taze Russell – Photo-Drama of Creation (1914)

    1911-1920Charles Taze RussellClassicsDramaUSA

    The Photo-Drama of Creation, or Creation-Drama, was a four-part Christian film (eight hours in total) produced by the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania under the direction of Charles Taze Russell, the founder of the Bible Student movement. The film presented Russell’s beliefs about God’s plan from the creation of the earth through to the end of the 1,000 year reign of Christ.

    Production began in 1912, and the presentation was introduced to audiences in 1914. It was the first major screenplay to incorporate synchronized sound, moving film, and color slides. Russell also published an accompanying book, Scenario of the Photo-Drama of Creation, in various languages.Read More »

  • Jean Negulesco – Humoresque [+Extras] (1946)

    1941-1950ClassicsDramaJean NegulescoUSA

    A moment of personal tragedy prompts concert violinist Paul Boray (John Garfield) to re-evaluate his life. He recalls happier times when, as a small boy, his mother gave him a violin for his birthday. After years of dedicated study, Paul becomes an accomplished violinist, but he finds it impossible to work so he can pay his way. One day, his pianist friend Sid Jeffers (Oscar Levant) takes him along to a party hosted by the wealthy socialite Helen Wright (Joan Crawford). The latter is trapped in a loveless marriage with an older man and finds the headstrong young violin player a tempting proposition. She decides to act as Paul’s patron, financing his debut concert and providing him with a manager. Through Helen’s money and contacts, Paul soon becomes an established musician, and he shows his gratitutde in just the way Helen hoped he might. But just when Helen thinks she has won her man, she realizes that she will never be able to compete with his one true love: his music…Read More »

  • Leslie Stevens – Hero’s Island (1962)

    Drama1961-1970AdventureLeslie StevensUSA

    IMDB:
    In 1718, on a small island off the Carolina coast, a recently freed family of indentured servants plans to settle and homestead there but they run into conflict with a group of fishermen also claiming ownership of the island.Read More »

  • Phil Karlson – The Phenix City Story (1955)

    1951-1960CrimeFilm NoirPhil KarlsonUSA

    Quote:
    I’ve always cited this movie as the best ever made in (Alabama), as well as the most authentic. Maybe that’s in part because watching it is experiencing the apotheosis of Southern sleaze—a bit like festering for hours in the seediest possible Alabama Greyhound depot in August without air conditioning…Though the movie’s politics are liberal, its moral outrage is so intense you may come out of it wanting to join a lynch mob.” – Film critic and Alabama expatriate Jonathan Rosenbaum, writing in his book Essential Cinema.Read More »

  • Sam Peckinpah – Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia (1974)

    1971-1980CrimeDramaSam PeckinpahUSA

    Quote:
    A family scandal causes a wealthy and powerful Mexican rancher to make the pronouncement–‘Bring me the head of Alfredo Garcia!’ Two of the bounty-hunters thus dispatched encounter a local piano-player in their hunt for information. The piano-player does a little investigating on his own and finds out that his girlfriend knows of Garcia’s death and last resting place. Thinking that he can make some easy money and gain financial security for he and his (now) fiancée, they set off on this goal. Of course, this quest only brings him untold misery, in the form of trademark Peckinpah violence.Read More »

  • Sam Peckinpah – The Wild Bunch (1969)

    1961-1970AdventureSam PeckinpahUSAWestern

    Quote:
    An aging group of outlaws look for one last big score as the “traditional” American West is disappearing around them.Read More »

  • Werner Herzog – My Son, My Son, What Have Ye Done (2009)

    2001-2010ArthouseDramaUSAWerner Herzog

    Quote:
    Inspired by a true crime, a man begins to experience mystifying events that lead him to slay his mother with a sword.Read More »

  • Mark Rappaport – Friends (1967)

    1961-1970ArthouseMark RappaportShort FilmUSA

    Autotranslated description:
    Scenes from New York in the 1960s. Four young people, friendship, jealousy, separation. Filmed in black and white, with an agile camera, without dialogue. Mark Rappaport’s early work was shot in 16mm on superimposed film material. Mark Rappaport’s instruction to the light controller in the “Movielab” copier: “Scenes are overexposed. Please try hard to get this to look good.” The camera and optical sound negative was found by Rick Prelinger. The Munich Film Museum has digitized it and redefined it. Sound disturbances at the beginning of the film and image damage at the end of the film are due to water damage.
    (Stefan Drössler)Read More »

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