FEBRUARY 2001

TUESDAY & WEDNESDAY FEBRUARY 6/7 8:30pm
POLAR SURVIVAL!
A collection of mostly absurd and over-the-top films about travel and the struggle for survival (and entertainment) in the harshest living conditions in the world. We start off in the far north with the classic HOW TO BUILD AN IGLOO showing how the site is selected and how blocks of snow are used to make a snug shelter in only an hour and a half - all you need is a little snow! Then we move south with a classic episode of Lounge Lizard John Lurie's FISHING WITH JOHN series in which sullen and jaded New York artists are pitted against the forces of nature. This episode features Willem DaFoe running out of cheese crackers and turning his ice-fishing adventure in sub-zero temperatures into a comic version of Jon Krakauer's "Into the Wild." Next is THE STRANGE AND TERRIBLE FATE OF SIR ROBERT SCOTT. Set against the stunning Antarctic landscapes, Seattleite Nicholas Johnson's movie explores the great icons of polar adventure: journals, rocks, ice, and the fateful trip of Sir Robert Scott's 1912 journey for the South Pole, played here with cardboard masks for Scott and his doomed ponies. Witness Scott's desperate courage as he devours the ponies one by one in order to meet the nutritional requirements of his historic goal... Ending things off is AT THE BOTTOM OF THE WORLD, the Canadian Premiere of David Chuss, Jon Joffe and Dave Joffe's document of bringing the modern South Pole its first and only Karaoke machine to ease the boredom and provide an entertainment outlet for a small group of souls freezing their asses off amongst the penguins. Catch all those despised Karaoke tunes - YMCA, Soul Man, I'm So Excited, Total Eclipse of the Heart, Let's Here it For the Boy - and observe the damage these hackneyed classics can undergo by a cabin feverish snowpants-clad motley crew in what looks like the family basement rec room housed in a corrugated tin shelter at the bottom of the world! (Thanks to Nancy Lanthier for helping to assemble this show.)

THURSDAY & FRIDAY FEBRUARY 8/9 8:30pm
GULF WAR FOLLIES: THE 10th ANNIVERSARY
Hussein still holds the power and sanctions remain. How much has really changed since the Gulf War 10 years ago? Featured tonight will be a mix of artifact, history and interpr etation of the Gulf War from three Vancouver-based film and video makers, all pieces made at the time of the war or shortly thereafter and all very much about the American media's presentation of the war. Shawn Chapelle's SERVICING THE TARGET is a rapid-fire montage constructed during the Gulf War Crisis and juxtaposing TV footage of the Gulf War with fashion shows and 'hip' commercials heavily manipulated and altered to point up the simultaneous absurdity and audience appeal of this TV war. Also featured is the award-winning NEW WORLD MURDER by Bruce Spangler, the much acclaimed director of the recent feature PROTECTION. NEW WORLD MURDER exposes the jingoism and pro-war propaganda that guided mainstream U.S. media coverage of the Gulf War. In a loosely structured linear progression, the film chronicles the media's demonization of Saddam Hussein, the marketing and fetishization of U.S. military hardware, the use of abstractions (the destruction of "targets") to censor news about the human casualties involved, and the celebration of super-nationalism in the face of immense suffering by the Iraqi people. (Best Noncommercial Experimental Film, Montana Film Festival; Best Experimental Film, Phila Film Festival). VAMPIRE BLUES is Bill Mullan's (of LSD 49 and THE TRUTH CHANNEL fame) version of one man and his camcorder bearing witness, asking questions, and watching way too much TV. Originally intended to be an ultra low budget fictional feature set against the epic and convenient backdrop of The Gulf War (circa January-February 1991), the reality of what was going down quickly proved far more comic, tragic and strangely compelling than any fiction. WARNING: features a live performance by The Evaporators and much talk of The Apocalypse.

SATURDAY FEBRUARY 10 8:30pm
THE DROSERA ENSEMBLE: PREMIERE CONCERT
Don't miss this one-night only opportunity to experience an intimate and engaging evening of live music by the wholly modern and eclectic DROSERA ENSEMBLE. Rather than digging up tombs of music that have been played into the ground, the Drosera Ensemble offers new music to challenge and intrigue listeners. With a compliment of Violin, Flute, Cello, Clarinet, and Percussion, the concert offers an eclectic array of sounds and textures and will feature an entire show of brand new and never-before publicly performed pieces. Included will be Phil Tomson's Verge, pushing the sound possibilities of the Ensemble's instruments. (Yes, you did just hear a broken furnace...!); Deb Madison's heartwork, "a quirky study of rhythms that get under your skin" which combines Konokol, (Southern Indian vocal lines) with body percussion and violin; and many others. A musical experience that your ears, mind and body will not want to miss! NOTE TICKET PRICES: $5 in advance/$7 at the door. For tickets or information, contact Kimla (255-9739) or Andrea (251-4455).

SUNDAY FEBRUARY 11 EARLY SHOW> 7:30pm
IDERA PRESENTS
IF THE MANGO TREE COULD SPEAK
This documentary by filmmakers Patricia Goudvis and William Turnley intimately portrays ten boys and girls growing up in the midst of war in Guatemala and El Salvador. They talk about war & peace, identity and share their dreams & hopes as well as pain and loss. Awarded the Silver Apple, National Educational Film & Video Festival as well as the Golden Gate Award, San Francisco Intl. Film Festival, this screening will feature speakers from H.I.J.O.S. (Hijos por la Identidad y la Justicia, contra el Olvido y el Silencio - Children for Identity and Justice, against Silence and Oblivion). Call IDERA at 738-8815 for more information.

TUESDAY & WEDNESDAY FEBRUARY 13/14 8:30pm
Canadian Premiere:
Rhonda Collins' WE DON'T LIVE UNDER NORMAL CONDITIONS
We are pleased to present the Canadian premiere of Rhonda Collins' insightful and challenging documentary addressing a Prozac-addled culture bent on Band-Aid solutions. Today's epidemic sweep of clinical depression is generally blamed on genetics or on imbalances of brain chemistry - and treated with drugs. Prozac is the second highest selling medication in America, bringing its maker a billion and a half dollars in sales each year. But what if the causes of depression are not only biological? This impassioned new documentary looks at depression and mental illness as a societal problem, rather than merely individual pathology. It challenges both psychiatric orthodoxy and the pharmaceutical industry, and demands that we focus, as well, on underlying social conditions. Six powerful personalities - five women and one man - share with each other and with the viewer their experiences of isolation, oppression, institutionalization, and attempts at self-annihilation. Their three-day marathon exchange is at times tearful, at times heated, but riveting to the end.
Using an intriguing array of stylistic innovations, the film places their discussion in a broader context of research and economic analysis, to raise complex issues about how our culture deals with mental "disorder." Fundamentally about empowerment and the resilience of the human spirit, this production will challenge viewers' assumptions, and may even change the way they think about what is normal.
"A fascinating, unsettling film...brings edge and insight to the subject. It powerfully suggests that the medical establishment wields mood-changing drugs at the expense of human diversity." -San Francisco Chronicle
"I didn't think I'd ever enjoy a 75-minute documentary about depression, but I did, without pills or popcorn." -The Oakland Tribune

THURSDAY FEBRUARY 15 8:30pm
BYO8 - LOVE SOMEBODY!
On this post-Valentine's BYO8 (phew - the pressure's off) Bring Your Own Film calls upon you to dig out your film and video love stories of falling hard, falling in and falling out of love. Whether you were unceremoniously dumped over Christmas, met the love of your life, or have yet to even glimpse this "love" thing, tell us all about it! And if you just can't dredge those memories up then just bring along something to help you forget. Remember - doors at 8pm, fill out a short form and you're in. VHS, 16mm and Super 8 are the formats, and it's only $3 (plus membership) to get in if you are carrying. Cue those tapes and don't forget - ten minutes max!

FRIDAY & SATURDAY FEBRUARY 16/17 8:30pm
The Wizard of Oz Meets Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon in
DARK SIDE OF THE RAINBOW
Note: Updated and Revised Version!!
"So you think you've seen The Wizard of Oz before? Not like this!" Deep Blue Funk Films proudly returns with this controversial alchemical experiment. Prepare yourself for "the mother of all synchs", pitting a soundless WIZARD OF OZ with the soundtrack of PINK FLOYD'S DARK SIDE OF THE MOON: watch as gold transforms into lead! Did Roger Waters intentionally write his album to be the ultimate complement to Dorothy and Toto? Are the incredible thematic and aural synchronizations a beautifully haphazard coincidence or a strange and wonderful plan? You decide. Don't miss this opportunity to see two old favourites in a very new way. Bizarre and uncanny paradoxes abound as we ride the random wave as Burroughs would have understood it. Fans of the film and the record will both love it and never see them the same way again. NOTE: The actual Oz synch lasts the length of the record (45 minutes), at which point there will be a short INTERMISSION. The film will then continue with more synch experiments featuring a special selection of Floyd tracks. Expect something different and LIVE for each night!

SUNDAY FEBRUARY 18 8:30pm
EYE OF NEWT PLAY LIVE TO
ALEXANDER NEVSKY
Tonight will feature EON creating a live remix soundtrack to this stunning silent film using only Prokofiev's amazing score from the incredible recording performed by the Danish National Orchestra and Choir. ALEXANDER NEVSKY is Sergei Eisenstein's sweeping story of the invasion of Russia in 1241 by the Teutonic Knights of Germany and the defense of the region by Prince Nevsky. Eisenstein's first completed film in 10 years upon its release, it was originally considered an artistic disappointment and seen as pro-war propaganda for the looming conflict with the Nazis. The film has what Eisenstein calls a "symphonic structure" as he collaborated closely with composer Sergei Prokofiev. With the entire Russian army at his disposal creating spectacular battle scenes ALEXANDER NEVSKY is now considered one of the greatest achievements of Soviet and world cinema artistry ... a patriotic pageantry of stirring images and dramatic music not to be missed!

MONDAY & TUESDAY FEBRUARY 20/21 8:30pm
COP TALK 2: POLICE TRAINING ODDITIES
Recently uncovered in our giant archive of Industrial and Educational Film, this show features disturbing and anomalous films and cautionary tales geared toward police officers to prepare them for the worst. Never meant for our fragile civilian eyes, many are "pure" training films strictly for use by police officers being taught to do their job in high risk/action situations, while others work with dramatic scenarios to get their grisly messages across. WARNING: SOME OF THIS MATERIAL IS VERY HARD TO WATCH AND NAUSEA INDUCING. WE ARE NOT KIDDING - BE WARNED! This special second round of COP TALK featured some of the first show favorites plus newly discovered gems. MOB AND RIOT CONTROL was produced in the sixties as a reaction to the increasing number of riot problems in a volatile political era and features the how-tos of smoke screens, riot formation, tactical strategies and more. Also screening are BOMB THREAT!, a short featuring actual footage of officers triggering bombs and losing their lives, DEAD BODY CALLS, an utterly compelling and simultaneously violent short about responding to death on duty featuring full-on splayed bodies, bone cutting, open throat wounds and more. PLUS: THE ALCOHOL BEAT, a drama about the high risks of drinking and driving with plenty of footage to make you reconsider PLUS MANY MORE!

THURSDAY FEBRUARY 22 8:30pm
CINEWORKS PRESENTS
"NEW (CINE) WORKS"
DIRECTORS IN ATTENDANCE!
The latest and greatest short film and video works from members of Cineworks Independent Filmmakers Society, Vancouver's only filmmaker's co-op, and a venerable creative hotbed for new filmmaking talent in this town for over twenty years! Our latest program includes JESABELLE, by Bryn Johns, a stylish drama in which a man stumbles upon a murder in progress and is faced with a terrible dilemma: either escape unnoticed and tell no-one, or report the crime and face the consequences. Tormented by both the host of the victim and her murderer, our anti-hero is forced ultimately to make a difficult choice. Jennifer Baum's poignant drama THE BOY TEST is set in New York City in the 1970s. The film tells the story of a 12-year-old Jewish tomboy who witnesses the death of her father. For solace she turns to her fan-mail correspondence with a famous baseball player - a New York Yankee known as Tom Terrific - to whom she writes endless letters telling about her quest to become a boy and play in the major leagues. THE WORKSHOP JUNKIE is Rob Bruner's hilarious comedy about how an impressionable young man's search for enlightenment quickly becomes an expensive addiction to personal growth workshops. BUSINESS BOY is the result of a collaboration between Cineworks members Kyle Robertson and Jeff Birch. This four-minute short was written and shot in one day - a creative (and fruitful) exercise in quick and dirty filmmaking. And finally, Pieter Stathis' KHAMELION is a dark and moody drama about two estranged sisters who inherit their mother's magic sweater and lure a drifter into a dangerous game of sibling rivalry.

FRIDAY, SATURDAY & SUNDAY FEBRUARY 23-25 8:30pm
CANADIAN PREMIERE OF PORTLAND FILMMAKER ANDREW DICKSON'S
GOOD GRIEF
Director in person FRIDAY ONLY.
For those who spent a little less time in school than out, who may have dabbled in Dungeons & Dragons or even an unnatural amount of coffee, or who moved through high school a bit left of center, this is your coming-of-age GOONIES. A teen adventure film for the rest of us, Dickson's film provides a sharp look at a group of friends and their wild ride through angst, love and the metaphorical power struggles of a fantasy game. (NW Film Festival) A cross between Dungeons & Dragons and Peanuts, the film tells of ultra-nerd Chuck who must come to grips with his fascination for the role-playing game Monsters & Mayhem. His friends are growing out of the game and into the indie punk scene, and Chuck deals with their maturation through a fantasy world of chain mail, dragons, and hit points. With an amazing soundtrack featuring the Fucking Champs, and an acting cameo by rock critic Richard Meltzer, GOOD GRIEF is a unique take on the plight of the supreme loser. "Gray plays the serious, pent-up geek well enough that you will sympathize with him and laugh at his ability to say lines like "I already had my 'just desserts,' thanks" with a straight face...the premise behind Dickson's story is fresh, translating the characters' conflicts into the sad, nerdy world of Monsters and Mayhem (made funnier by a contemporary hair metal soundtrack)...GOOD GRIEF is a well-directed, post-ironic, feel-good movie." (The Mercury)

SHIRKA URECHKO: LIVE MULTIMEDIA DANCE
With rave reviews from the press and a tremendous response from audiences for her past shows here at the Blinding Light!!, Shirka Urechko returns for a three night run of her brand new work entitled BLANK as well as a three night remounting of her acclaimed PineappleHeartOfGoldPeacocks. A total of six intense evenings of cutting edge dance in tandem with audio and visuals. Not to be missed! TICKETS: $7 plus $3 Blinding Light Membership, at the door only (Tickets on sale at 8pm, show 8:30pm).

"...a brave new hybrid of performance styles." -Georgia Straight
"Urechko has wrapped her strong technique in a disguise of wild abandon" -Discorder
"Urechko fuses dance, electronic music, film & video into a hip multimedia-savvy hybrid." Janet Smith, GS

TUESDAY, WEDNESDAY & THURSDAY FEBRUARY 27- MARCH 1 8:30pm
RETURN ENGAGEMENT:
SHIRKA URECHKO'S PineappleHeartOfGoldPeacocks
We are pleased to present this return engagement of Shirka Urechko's PineappleHeartOfGoldPeacocks. A solo multimedia dance performance inspired in part by the philosophy of Anais Nin, in which new dance, sound and visuals - all created/performed by Urechko - are integrated in the portrayal of human metamorphosis. Through love we are refined. Intimate, mesmerizing and highly energetic, PineappleHeartOfGoldPeacocks combines subtlety, overt gesture and fluid movement with brilliant imagery and potent sound. Don't miss this exclusive three-day return engagement followed over the weekend by Urechko's newest work (description follows). Choreography, sound and visuals by Shirka Urechko.

MARCH 2001

FRIDAY, SATURDAY & SUNDAY MARCH 2-4 8:30pm
PREMIERE PERFORMANCE OF SHIRKA URECHKO's
STRONSTER
Wrap you senses in STRONSTER, a vibrant shudder of colour in which new dance, original sounds, textural visuals, taste, touch and scent are combined to create an experience unlike any other. SHIRKA URECHKO, creator of MOTH and PINEAPPLEHEARTOFGOLDPEACOCKS finds the common thread linking your experience as a viewer to the human experience in motion. Special guests include BARBARA BOURGET, co-director of KOKORO DANCE, and NATHAN ISBERG, a gifted mover, composer, and photographer.

Shirka Urechko was born in Sunborn Manitoba and began studying dance at the age of 14. She has trained with the professional divisions of the Royal Winnipeg Ballet, Contemporary Dancers and Maindance Place where she completed an apprenticeship with Kokoro Dance. Shirka has created over fifteen original works as an independent dancer, choreographer, visuals artist and composer, including Kenumbra, Moth and PineappleHeartOfGoldPeacocks. She has been strongly influenced by freestyle, Butoh, ballet and modern dance and finds inspiration in the kinetics of body language, human interactions, insects and city landscapes.

TUESDAY & WEDNESDAY MARCH 6/7 8:30pm
PLANET KRULIK 2000
Originally presented at The American Film Institute in Washington D.C. Planet Krulik 2000 presents a potpourri of bizarre delights from the creator of Ernest Borgnine On Tour and the legendary Heavy Metal Parking Lot. Included in this program:
Obsessed with Jews: Meet suburban DC accountant Neil Keller, who has amassed a remarkable collection of over 7,000 trading cards, photographs, matchbook covers, pins and autographs of prominent Jewish people.The Brady Brunch: Brendan Conway and Paul Starke travel to Hollywood to have a power brunch with Robbie Rist, a.k.a. Cousin Oliver, the legendary lost Brady. King Of Porn 2: The Retirement, Harry Potter Parking Lot (The franchise continues...),Three Hour Cruise: Krulik and Conway stalk the castaways at a Gilligan's Island reunion. As well as encore presentations of underground favorites like Jennifer and Amber Cluck's Pigskin Orgasm, Nick Zedd's Tom Thumb and the Land of the Giants, The Manipilators and more!
Hollywood could use a guy like Krulik...(he demonstrates) a loving eye for American eccentricity.
-Richard Leiby, Washington Post

THURSDAY, FRIDAY & SATURDAY MARCH 8/9/10 8:30pm
CANADIAN THEATRICAL PREMIERE:
Jason Rosette's BOOKWARS, Winner: Best Documentary, NYUFF 2000
+ zine shelVES/250w#2/mini-book launch
Directed by street bookseller and award-winning filmmaker Jason Rosette, and produced by Emmy Award-winning filmmaker Michel Negroponte, BOOKWARS explores the other side of the book tables along the streets of the Village, on the Lower East Side, along 6th avenue, and elsewhere in New York City. Meet Slick Rick Sherman - master of the anti-sell and slight-of-hand magician on the side; Polish Joe - fueled by nervous energy and chicken Wonton soup; and Pete Whitney - accomplished collage artist and avid toad collector. Rosette shows them acquiring their stock by scavenging through dumpsters, bartering with each other, and book-buying pilgrimages to exotic New Jersey, Home of The Ten Cent Book. They pontificate on the best ways to present their stock, entice customers to buy, or store books over the winter.
The booksellers' lifestyle is far less questionable than one might expect - a symbiotic troupe - watching each other's stands when someone goes on a lunch break or to find a public toilet, comparing notes on what's selling, and referring customers to each other more often than Edmund Gwenn in Miracle on 34th Street.
Pretty good, Rosette. And a little bit anarchistic
- Lawrence Ferlinghetti
PLUS: In keeping with the theme of this weekend's show, on Thursday March 8 we will also be launching the second edition of 250w, the Blinding Light's official zine, as well as introducing our new zine shelves where we will be featuring local zines and a handful of cinema books. And don't forget to check out the mini-books in the bubble gallery - a loonie gets you one!

SUNDAY MARCH 11 EARLY SHOW> 7:30pm
IDERA PRESENTS DOLLS & DUST
This video presents analyses and testimonies from women workers and activists in Sri Lanka, Thailand and South Korea on the impact of industrial restructuring, globalization, and male development on their lives, communities and the environment. Shot by WAYANG between August 1996 and June 1998, DOLLS & DUST is perhaps the first video documentary to present the other faces and voices of women workers in Free Trade Zones in relation to the ongoing currency and economic crisis in these regions. This video won an award in 1998 at the 4th International Video Olympiad in South Africa. Co-sponsored by Oxfam Canada, with speakers from Oxfam Canada. Call IDERA at 738-8115 for more info!

TUESDAY & WEDNESDAY MARCH 13/14 8:30pm
PLUNDER!
When Godard said let the images flow faster than the money, he might have been talking about these five flicks. This high-octane quintet is part essay, part rap DJ on speed. Micro-looped, morphed and bleeding, PLUNDER features five artists-as-thieves, robbing image graves, pillaging with adrenaline charged abandon from the treasures of the analog world, and then re-mixing. Plunder kicks off with Judith Doyle's ANIMAL MOVIES (FOX PAST), a vid essay on animals in urban settings, dishing up equal doses of Disney and Edweard Muybridge to show how techno-vision has staged beasts within and without. Jubal Brown's THE BLOB is a rock ën roll fantasia, joining 50s horror flicks, swamp guitar and rave beats in a juiced up look at the roots of TV. Robert Lee's AK47 (there are 47 shots in this flick, all of them featuring Egoyan dream girl ArsineÈ Khanjian) is a lounge trek through fandom, and the many lives that might inhabit a face. Gunilla Josephson takes on her father, celebrated prince of despair Ingmar Bergman, by storming through a host of papa's filmwork, in search of herself in HELLO INGMAR. Plunder closes shop with Istvan Kantor's in-your-face mega-montaged ode to Totalitaria ACCUMULATION. Soviet tanks, glowing children and electro-shock victims are overlaid with floating text fragments and an editing style that makes movie trailers look slow. (notes by Mike Hoolboom, Images 2000 Festival)
PLUS: LIVE FILM MIX! Alex Mackenzie and Brad Poulsen scratch it up both nights with live film mixes exclusively incorporating two found films and their accompanying soundtracks to build a jarring and unruly collage of 16mm mayhem.

THURSDAY MARCH 15 8:30pm
BYO8
Come on down with your best, worst and strangest films and videos for Vancouver's only monthly moving image free-for-all. If you've never seen it on the big screen then it is high time you did! Bring a film and it's only $3 (plus membership) to get in. Invite your family and tell them it's the grad show for the school you haven't told them you dropped out of. Better yet, plan an award ceremony at a nearby restaurant and wine and dine your way to pseudo celluloid fame and fortune. And if nothing else, wear something green for St. Patrick and get a buck off admission! VHS, 16mm and Super 8 are the formats ñ please cue tapes!

FRIDAY, SATURDAY & SUNDAY MARCH 16/17/18 8:30pm
CANADIAN PREMIERE OF JAMES FOTOPOULOS'
MIGRATING FORMS
PLUS: FOTOPOULOS SHORTS
BEST FEATURE, NYUFF 2000
MADE IN CHICAGO AWARD, CUFF 2000
...Migrating Forms has a formal purity and obsessive power that's all too rare these days. It's not a film you'd ever find at Sundance (Blair Witch is a party by comparison).
-Amy Taubin, The Village Voice

Migrating Forms tells the stripped-down tale of a worn-out man and a slatternly woman engaging in a tense, tawdry affair beneath the all-seeing gaze of the man's silent cat. Told with unhurried long takes, shot in thick and shadowy black-and-white, it feels like a mysterious, low-rent visitor from another era of cinema, a cryptic mood organ played to the tune of grimy walls and cheap furniture, enigmatic cysts and disfigured bodies, science-fiction paranoia and overpowering emotional detachment. It speaks a visual language that is both immediately familiar and almost psychotically unknowable. This cryptic interior epic from 24-year old Chicago director James Fotopoulos marks the arrival of a new and unique vision. Unclassifiable as genre, it suggests elements of the abstract avant-garde, the horror film, 60s soft-core sleazies and 70s psychodrama. Some might glimpse echoes of influences as diverse as Chantal Ackerman or Joe Sarno, but the film never succumbs to today's typically asinine film-school trendiness, and is always beautifully cheap in every good sense of the word. (NYUFF)
Reminiscent of early Lynch and Scorsese escapades, Fotopoulos's exquisitely minimalist black-and-white experiment is a surprising treat that leaves us holding a messy array of enigmas in our laps. -Walker Art Center
Fotopoulos is the most important new director I've seen in many years, creating distinctive visions seething with ontological unease. Ed Halter, Top 10 List NY Press

TUESDAY & WEDNESDAY MARCH 20/21 8:30pm
EPHEMERAL DEVIANCE
Don't miss these classic '50s educational films all on 16mm film and fixated upon moral judgements and the hazards of deviating from the norm, featuring everything from drugs to psychological trauma and mismatched couplings. Drug Addiction, the classically styled drug-scare '50s youth film about getting into marijuana and more, this flick tracks one kid as he gets in deeper and deeper and finally learns his lesson by doing time in a recovery program. Your Psychological Turmoil is a beautifully shot study of a woman's depression and its family sources, going back over her childhood, younger sister syndrome, and more- utterly engaging and strangely contemporary in its analysis. Dick Smith: Drug Addict is an original Canadian drug film about heroin addiction beginning with our dead hero and flashing back through his slow disintegration into a junkie. Poetic, convincing, and with a cameo by Beachcombers star Bruno Gerussi in his youthful years! Doomed to Fail is the amazing guidance film about being sure the mate you choose is the right one, using a doomed to fail relationship as an example. The bonus in this piece is the inventive subplot of the husband's job as academic researcher into early american folk music. Guaranteed to make you question the viability of your current relationship!!

THURSDAY MARCH 22 8:30pm
EYE OF NEWT PLAY LIVE TO
HUNCHBACK OF NOTRE DAME
The first film version of Victor Hugo's classic about the tortured hunchback bellringer of Notre Dame Cathedral features the inimitable Lon Chaney Sr. as the doomed Quasimodo who provides sanctuary to a beautiful young gypsy woman accused by church officials of being a witch. Produced by Universal Studios at the then-phenomenal cost of $1.25 million, the film was a huge gamble for the studio given that the central character was far from the standard charming romantic ideal. Chaney was not merely horrific, he was exactly what the hunchback ought to be...Exactly what he was in the Victor Hugo novel...And with all that makeup glued onto him and limping under that hump, there's still a performance...a huge performance, entirely satisfactory in its own terms. (Orson Welles) Don't miss EON taking on this classic silent film and transforming it with their incredible live accompaniment.

FRIDAY MARCH 23 8:30pm
David Yonge presents SMELL-O-VISION
In an effort to combine video collage and corresponding odours, visual artist and local impresario-at-large David Yonge presents Smell-O-Vision. In 1960, we saw the debut of Smell-O-Vision in the film Scent of Mystery. During screenings of the movie, various odorsócoffee, garlic, and pine-forest smell were piped into the theatre at appropriate moments. Aromarama, scentovision, and smellorama debuted, intending to capitalize on what everybody assumed would be the next big movie craze. Unfortunately the gimmick never took off. Tonight we pay our respects in an assemblage of videos that will unite imagery with corresponding smells ranging from the sweet perfume of a local brewery to the memories of a 1970's stadium rock concert. PLUS Special Musical Guests(stay tuned for more info). We guarantee the very best in Scentertainment.

SATURDAY & SUNDAY MARCH 24/25 8:30pm
CANADIAN PREMIERE: FUCKED IN THE FACE
CHICAGO DIRECTOR SHAWN DURR IN PERSON!
We are honoured to have over-the-top and utterly in-your-face DV filmmaker Shawn Durr here in person to present his first feature FUCKED IN THE FACE, winner of the AUDIENCE FAVORITE AWARD at the CHICAGO UNDERGROUND FILM FESTIVAL.
...a dozen times more offensive in its present moment as Pink Flamingos was in its time...Ludicrous and brutal, and often brutally funny, I'm still trying to forget I saw this. (Ray Pride, New City)
A cinematic melding of gay serial killer slasher flicks, FUCKED IN THE FACE is the story of Henry Normal, a young gay man who is not having a good week. First, his abusive boyfriend kicks him out of his apartment leaving him homeless, penniless and without a single ounce of crank. As if all that weren't bad enough, a gang of fag-hating, cock-loathing lesbians is hot on his trail, stalking and taunting him without mercy. At the end of his rope, Henry begins to believe his only hope for salvation lies in finding the man of his dreams- a cute, blond gay serial killer on the run from the FBI. Brace yourself- this edgy, rude, hilarious and ultimately horrific bent film will slap you with gay sex acts, brutal killings, lots of penis and piles of crystal meth. What more could you ask from queer cinema?? Like a chocolate dipped in tarantula venom, this lusciously evil hard candy offers a much-needed kink in the straight and narrow path. (CUFF)

TUESDAY & WEDNESDAY MARCH 27/28 8:30pm
EARLY WORKS: JEM COHEN
Best known for his Fugazi concert film INSTRUMENT and the more recent BENJAMIN SMOKE, Jem Cohen is the respected and highly original New York-based film/video maker known for his ability to blur the distinctions between documentary, narrative and experimental genres. We are pleased to present three earlier films by Jem Cohen: DRINK DEEP is a pastoral about friendship, hidden desires and the beauty of water. THIS IS A HISTORY OF NEW YORK is a chronicling of the seven ages of civilization from Prehistory to the Space Age using the five boroughs of New York City as his inspiration...stray dogs patrol the streets while the homeless forage for food...crazed street preachers pace frantically before ominous gothic architecture - an accumulation of humanity's failures, as well as its greatness. BURIED IN LIGHT: EASTERN EUROPE IN PASSING is a meditation on history, memory, and change in Central and Eastern Europe, BURIED IN LIGHT is a non-narrative journey, a cinematic collage. Cohen's images are neither the tourist's roster of picturesque vistas and monuments, nor the mass media's definitive catalogue of dramatic moments. Instead, he focuses on details, ordinary objects, and forgotten places, filming daily life as seen on the street.

THURSDAY MARCH 29 8:30pm
CINEWORKS PRESENTS SALT
ALL-AGES SHOW ON YOUTH CULTURE FEATURING MEDIA WORKS FROM THE STUDENT FILMMAKERS OF G.I.F.T.S. LOCAL DIRECTORS IN ATTENDANCE!
Made by four 17-year-old directors with help from a professional crew, SALT is an innovative four-part filmzine: four films, four flavours, four very different windows into youth culture today. Amber Goodwyn, Morgan Gage, Karen Shamy-Smith and Beverly Brown are 17-year-old high-school students from a public high school in Montreal called MIND (Moving in New Directions) which encourages students to take control of their own education. In this, the girls' first documentary, Morgan explores the world of independent music, while Amber takes a critical look at the education system. Karen tries to understand why some young people mutilate themselves, and Beverly attempts to define the punk phenomenon. Each segment includes images of the filming and, together, the four films help us to better understand youth culture, urban life and conventional education. PLUS: a selection of works by young filmmakers from the Gulf Islands Film and Television School. (Please note that a Blinding Light membership is not required for this event - this is an all-ages program.)

FRIDAY, SATURDAY & SUNDAY MARCH 30/31 & APRIL 1 8:30pm
BACK BY POPULAR DEMAND
From the archives of SF collector Karl Cohen
ANTIQUE SMUT! GRANDFATHER'S FAVOURITE MOVIES
These X-rated 16mm treasures date from 1915 to about 1950, and were found in the attic of a deceased politician who was known for his puritanical views. A rare collection of outstanding sleazy classics full of silly plots, corny titles, crude acting, absurd positions and shoddy lab work. Nameless stars often wear wigs, grease-paint sideburns and fake mustaches to disguise themselves. This slice of cinema's dirty secret history were once the hit of stag parties for men and even collected by the FBI for private screenings by the boss. Now they are so campy and dated it is hard to believe they were once thought to be the cutting edge of smut. The Program includes FREE RIDE (c.1915), believed to be the oldest surviving stag film - directed by A. Wise Guy and photographed by Will B Hard(!). Also included: ON THE BEACH (OR GETTING HIS GOAT), BROADWAY INTERLUDE, THE CASTING COUCH, CAREER GIRL: THE ART OF LANDING A JOB and PETE THE TRAMP. PLUS: Hollywood models show off their bodies in static poses, a woman doing a hula who shakes so hard er grass skirt falls off, and more! WARNING: Last time we showed these films some folks were expecting something quite innocent. While they are funny, be warned that they are EXTREMELY EXPLICIT as well!

APRIL 2001

TUESDAY & WEDNESDAY APRIL 3/4 8:30pm
WESTERN CANADIAN PREMIERE: DANNY PLOTNICK's
SWINGER'S SERENADE
PLUS: OTHER SEXY SHORTS!
We are pleased to present a raucous and raunchy grouping of recent shorts from the US and Canada that tend toward the tawdry. First up is Danny King of Super 8 Plotnick's SWINGER'S SERENADE A tawdry tale of suburban sexual malaise plus a lesson in arcane film history rolled into one sin-tillating package! A rendering of an amatuer movie-making script entitled Swingers' Serenade and published in the July/August 1960 issue of Better Movie Making. Replete with lurid sexual dynamics, hints of loose sexual mores, swinging couples, lecherous Fuller Brush salesmen, voyeuristic suburbanites and more.
PLUS: WAVES OF LOVE, an oscilloscopophilic visual waveform reading of a fuck film with the groans and heavy breathing audio track intact. Porn could never look this good; HI I'M STEVE, Robert Kennedy's take on a boyfriendless everyman whose outlook devolves from dating to desperation to dolphins through increasingly trans-species trials and tribulations; MORPHOLOGY OF DESIRE, Robert Arnold's morphing romance novel cover extravaganza, and more!

THURSDAY APRIL 5 8:30pm
MOODY BROOD: THE FILMS OF LULU KEATING
We are very pleased to have Halifax filmmaker Lulu Keating here in person to present her latest collection of films. A stunning group of works, Keating mixes cut-out and computer animation, Super 8 and digital formats to smartly meld old and new technologies all in her trademark personal, humorous and intelligent style. Screening tonight will be Keating's latest short entitled LADIES IN WAITING, a gorgeous blending of brilliant Kodachrome and rich hand processed black and white Super 8 footage which explores the lives of a group of diverse and fascinating women who seek partners in life but struggle to find and keep the right ones. THE MOODY BROOD traces the lives of the filmmaker's own ten siblings from their childhood in the forties in a small community in Nova Scotia to the present day. A stunning and eclectic cast of characters is presented ñ all the more intriguing as they are brothers and sisters! Produced with the extraordinary talents of Halifax animator Helen Hill and a beautifully rendered soundtrack by Helen Bredin and composer Sandy Moore, THE MOODY BROOD explores universal family themes ñ morality, religion, sex, and the impact of early childhood experiences on the shaping of our lives. PLUS: A handful of Keating's earlier shorts including FUNNY THINGS PEOPLE CAN DO TO THEMSELVES, and the animated LULU'S BACK IN TOWN.

FRIDAY, SATURDAY & SUNDAY APRIL 6/7/8 8:30pm
CANADIAN PREMIERE of TODD VEROW'S
ONCE AND FUTURE QUEEN
Underground filmmaking at its best. - REEL.COM
...outstanding - a video-vÈritÈ punk fable.
-THE BOSTON PHOENIX
From the prolific director of such DV underground hits as LITTLE SHOTS OF HAPPINESS and shucking the curve comes ONCE AND FUTURE QUEEN. Anti-Matter (Philly) is the queen of nothing, the ruler of nowhere, the monarch of cyphers. Drifting through the Lower East Side like the death rattle echoes of rock and roll, she's on a desperate, desolate mission to get her band together and finally conquer something, anything. Philly actually started a band for the making of this film and ended in touring with them across the continent as the film was shot over the course of a year. Her manic manipulations and chaotic philosophies never seem to gel in the present- she's either a step behind or two steps ahead- but never where she really sees herself to be. Her therapist can't help her, and she just wants to get drunk with her AA buddy. Old friends don't want anything to do with her and new friends simply don't know what to do with her. Bored with the dangling fly-strip-tease of fame that has eluded her throughout her whole life, she's nevertheless only alive on stage, dreaming of a place where no one will unplug that amp, threaten her life or shovel her out the door in the morning. Of course her rampant drug and alcohol use, her frequent homelessness, the fact that she isn't getting any younger and that she's been married more times than Liz Taylor doesn't help any. As her connections to reality slip away in the haze of her traveling sideshow lifestyle, the inferno of celebrity and self-destruction seductively beckon....

BARBIE X 3!! (over three nights)
TUESDAY APRIL 10 8:30pm
BARBIE: AN AMERICAN BIOGRAPHY
In this breezy and truly campy plastic doll road movie director Lara Johnston imagines the life Barbie might have led as a struggling singer in her upstart (and very cheesy) band Barbie and Les Rockers. Building an innocent relationship with Ken (who is, unbeknownst to her, actually gay) and getting her first gig at a bar called Studs, Barbie and her band begin their journey across America seeking fame and fortune. Filmed entirely on Super 8 and actually shot in the real all-American locations the band visits, the film owes its humour and pathos in no small part to Todd Haynes' classic Superstar as well as a sprinkling of Paul Verhoeven's Showgirls. From San Francisco all the way to NYC with stopovers in Vegas with Elvis, Nashville with Dolly Parton, and visits with James Dean, Micheal Jackson, Judy Garland and plenty of others camp-friendly glitterati in the form of thoroughly convincing plastic action figures, the film plays upon the price of fame and the loss of innocence. With plenty of unauthorized tunes including songs by the Partridge Family, Donny & Marie, and Hole, the film tracks Barbie's descent into inflated egomania, drugs, alcohol and unhappiness.

WEDNESDAY APRIL 11 8:30pm
BARBIE NATION: AN UNAUTHORIZED TOUR
BARBIE NATION: AN UNAUTHORISED TOUR is Susan Stern's meticulously researched and wide-ranging examination of the social and personal impact of one of the world's most recognizable icons: the Barbie Doll. BARBIE NATION examines the lives and motivations of those obsessed with the doll ranging from adult obsessive collectors to sex fetishists who pose their Barbies in an intriguing range of set-ups in custom built dungeons! Barbie conventions, Barbie look-alike contests, entire Barbie worlds and anti-Barbie protesters...they're all here. Through interviews with founder of the giant Mattel Corporation Ruth Handler (who named Ken and Barbie after her children), BARBIE NATION traces the changing social consciousness of a generation and steps well away from the easy exploitation angle. In fact, one of the film's most fascinating elements is finding out what Ruth Handler pursued after being fired by Mattel...a fascinating study of American culture and its reflection on the most popular mass-marketed doll ever sold. PLUS: BITCH & BUTCH, the pixelvision short featuring plastic dolls in a lesbian fantasy fresh out of their store packaging!

THURSDAY APRIL 12 8:30pm
SUPERSTAR THE KAREN CARPENTER STORY
PLUS: BARBIE COMMERCIALS THROUGH THE AGES.
The return of this long-banned underground classic from the director of Poison, Safe and Velvet Goldmine, Todd Hayne's Superstar chronicles Karen Carpenter's rise to stardom and untimely death from a heart attack due to anorexia and bulimia using Barbie dolls as characters. Video footage played through television backgrounds and brilliant collisions of documentary and fiction lend to the layered meanings of this film. Haynes juxtaposes this American dream gone wrong with the bubble gum soundtrack of the Carpenter's pop music. While this sing-along audio resonates in the viewer's mind, it ultimately led to litigation by the Carpenter family, preventing this film from ever being released. The film will be preceded by early commercials from the sixties and seventies for Mattel's Barbie doll - dig those styles! NOTE: This is a superior underground dub to the one we used to screen!

FRIDAY APRIL 13 8:30pm
PENDRA PRESENTS:
YOUR PLEASURE GUARANTEED
After many requests we are pleased to finally present the return of PENDRA!
Gypsies lips travel across the overly mapped naked body sending you into new unmapped geographies. Tonight, Pendra the Dominatrix gives you the power of the remote control to drive the girl/boy libido chaos. If the nature of desire is not to be satisfied YOUR PLEASURE GUARANTEED is a night of multiple promiscuous satiations. You the spectator choose the video inter-active from a two-sided menu of more than 90 video titles. One side of the Carte du jour is comprised of gender-free soap operas, the other a dynamic collection of hard to find woman made alternative flicks, art porn and a few beloved stolen X-rated porn cliches. There is however a price to getting your porn hungers satisfied. With each order comes a request for that audience member to take off some clothes...
CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS! By April 5th bring your homemade porn down to the Blinding Light!! for previewing and get in free the night of the show if your work is curated in the show! (VHS only please, mark it c/o PENDRA PRESENTS and include your name and phone #). Absolutely NO late entries.

SATURDAY & SUNDAY APRIL 14/15 8:30pm
DEEP BLUE FUNK FILMS PRESENTS
SYNCHRO-SHORTS!
From the folks who brought you DARK SIDE OF THE RAINBOW comes SYNCHRO-SHORTS! Deep Blue Funk Films presents an evening of synchro-shorts to tantalize and tease you! Shorts and sections of features drip with alchemical goo as we once again plunge into the union of film and music. Watch Felix the Cat trip around underwater with the mercenary tunes of The Herbalizer, or Jacob's Ladder hell as filtered through the decayed sounds of Ween. Laugh at the sight of John Travolta Saturday Night Fever dancing to the tune of Michael Jackson and experience the ultimate trip of 2001's final odyssey to the meddle of Pink Floyd's Echoes PLUS many more! Note: program is subject to changes, tweaks and enhancements! Bring a hard hat, some imagination and a sense of humour.

TUESDAY APRIL 17 8:30pm
GUY DEBORD'S
SOCIETY OF THE SPECTACLE
Withdrawn from circulation in 1984 and never before subtitled, legendary Situationist Guy Debord's long-impossible to see film, SOCIETY OF THE SPECTACLE (1973, 87 min.), returns by request! SOCIETY OF THE SPECTACLE is an intense and densely packed montage assembled out of detourned images from feature films, pornography, commercials and news footage. Few groups have had as profound an impact on French culture as the Situationist Internationale with its unparalleled interrogation of political and cultural relations. While the writing of leading Situationist Guy Debord has become the cornerstone of postmodernism, his paintings, artist books, and films remain unknown. (Keith Sanborn, translator/subtitles) Debord's analysis of a society suspended inside the free space of the commodity infiltrates every frame. (Steve Seid, PFA)

WEDNESDAY APRIL 18 8:30pm
BYO8
Swing on by with your master opus (under 10 minutes). Bring your 16mm, VHS or Super 8 down and we'll make you a star for a night. Big Screen, Big Sound, Big Dreams ñ all here! Remember, cue those tapes and it's only $3 (plus membership) if you've got a film!

THURSDAY APRIL 19 8:30pm
EYE OF NEWT COLLECTIVE:
MIND LIKE A FLOATING CLOUD
EYE OF NEWT take the stage with an incredible arsenal of big-screen midi-generated experimental image creations seamlessly blended with their hypnotic and ambient-fused avant-garde audiocollage MIND LIKE A FLOATING CLOUD will dive deep into the textures of an undulating swamp or a melding of machinery, seamlessly interacting with live instrumentation. Triggering images, movies and various visual effects while creating spontaneous audio and visuals on the fly, this show will entrance and mesmerize. Join EON for a spin on the edge. This unique collaboration with local visual artists and dancers is interdisciplinary arts at its best. Featuring Odette LeBlanc, Chris Moore, Jocelyne Andrews, Jason Toal and others!

FRIDAY APRIL 20 8:30pm
THE MULTIPLEX GRAND: PHASE 9.0
The Multiplex Users Group returns with its latest and freshest futurist interpretations of the Multiplex tactical plan. New relationships will unfold, by strategy and chance between the ever-misunderstood marriage of sound and light. Impairamentalist expert ZERO SQUARED will blast and bless samples and pixels in a foray of digital madness; engineering consultant 5T-3V3 will cross signals with triggers to dazzle and surprise and systems specialist LOSCIL will digitally unite ambience and algorithms in efforts to hypnotize. In keeping with the Multiplex tradition, new collaborators and innovators will appear with unique interpretations of the Multiplex aesthetic; the tactical and sometimes fortuitous use/misuse of audio-visual technologies.

SATURDAY APRIL 21 8:30pm
abstract media exposition w/ projector interference
matt mccormick and johnne eschleman
(aka the distance formula) in person
Matt McCormick and Johnne Eschelman roll into town to grace us with their latest works of found footage, live projector performance and abstract media with aims to create mass distraction from the corporate media monopoly. This one-of-a-kind show will feature the Canadian Premiere of McCormick's latest the subconscious art of graffiti removal, an experimental documentary (narrated by Miranda July) that uncovers a subconscious conspiracy to promote abstract expression through the funding of anti-graffiti campaigns, as well as two of Matt's recent award winning shorts: the vyrotonin decision (Best Experimental the 2000 New York and Chicago Underground Film Fests) A disaster epic featuring thirty-six appropriated television commercials from 1971...mocks the formula of current Hollywood blockbusters while re-inventing some of television's most embarrassing moments, sincerely, joe p. bear (Best Experimental at Baltimore's Microcinefest) a tale of Polar bears, ice queens, lost love, and rejection. Also featured will be a one-of-a-kind hand-made performancefilm by Johnne Eschleman (aka the distance formula) with a live accompanied soundtrack, plus surprise live collaborations between McCormick and Eschelman!

SUNDAY APRIL 22 >EARLY SHOW 7:30pm
IDERA PRESENTS DEADLY EMBRACE
DEADLY EMBRACE describes the current neo-liberal economic order as it embraces Nicaragua. The video combines outstanding footage of people's lives and their struggle to survive with a text-book clear analysis of structural adjustment, the debt crisis and free trade that applies to most Third World countries. The new (1990s) economic order has again placed Nicaragua at the mercy of its historical nemesis, the United States.
A powerful and entertaining documentary that effectively humanises critical economic issues. -Boston Globe
Guest Speaker for tonight's screening will be Mayra Cimaco who has been working for aboriginal people's struggles both in Nicaragua and in North America.
Call IDERA at 738-8815 for more information.

TUESDAY & WEDNESDAY APRIL 24/25 8:30pm
Return Engagement: THE AD AND THE EGO
PLUS NEGATIVLAND VIDEOS!
The Ad and the Ego is the first comprehensive documentary on the cultural impact of advertising in America, says Neil Postman, NYU author of AMUSING OURSELVES TO DEATH. It should be required viewing for every consumer - which means all of us. Tracing advertising's development from its largely descriptive 19th century origins through today's ads which eschew rational arguments for symbols and imagery playing directly to our emotions THE AD & THE EGO artfully intercuts clips from hundreds of familiar television ads with insights from Stuart Ewen, Jean Kilbourne, Richard Pollay, Sut Jhally, Bernard McGrane and other noted critics. The film performs a cultural psychoanalysis of late 20th century America and its principal inhabitants: Consumer Man and Woman. Featuring a smart soundtrack by NEGATIVLAND, THE AD AND THE EGO brilliantly dismantles one of the ego's most comforting self-flatteries: that we are immune to advertising. Consider this your first real inoculation. (Leslie Savan)
PLUS: NEGATIVLAND VIDEOS!

THURSDAY APRIL 26 8:30pm
CINEWORKS PRESENTS PRAIRIE TALES:
THE ALL-ALBERTA FILM AND VIDEO TOUR
SPECIAL GUEST DIRECTOR IN ATTENDANCE!
A rare and valuable insight into the Prairie psyche, the thirteen films on this brand new program make up a diverse and far-reaching collection, including a record number of animated pieces. THE MONKEY AND THE CROW, explores the situation that develops when a crow becomes trapped in the monkey's cage. Don Filipchuk's VACUUM SIV is about a travelling vacuum-cleaner salesman and a loose cat; Kevin Kurytnik and Carol Beecher's THE WIND BETWEEN MY EARS explores the continual dumbing down of popular entertainment; PLUS: IN RESPONSE TO THE DUMBEST QUESTION OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY, TRANSIT, 237 plus much more!

NEW JAPANESE INDEPENDENTS!
FRIDAY & SATURDAY APRIL 27/28 8:30pm
BODY DROP ASPHALT
IN PERSON from JAPAN: DIRECTOR JUNKO WADA!
We are thrilled to be able to present Junko Wada's astounding DROP BODY ASPHALT with the filmmaker in attendance all the way from Japan for this exclusive Vancouver screening. Enter the soft cream world of Junko Wada. BODY DROP ASPHALT is among the freshest, freest, most eccentric low-budget features to emerge so far from the d.v. revolution. Directed by Junko Wada as a rebuke to love stories that end with happily ever after, BODY DROP ASPHALT has its eye on more than just the romantic fantasies promoted to girls in Japan (and everywhere else): with a fearless wit, she takes on the literary intelligentsia, karaoke, Japanese hip-hop wannabes, the difficulty of making a date in Toyko, with its incredibly complicated system of street addresses, and household shoe-and-slipper customs ­ not to mention God and the atom bomb. The story of a lonely young womanπs sudden rise to fame with the publication of her novel Soft Cream Love, and her increasingly complicated and phantasmagorical life, BODY DROP ASPHALT is marked by a series of drastic and unexpected stylistic shifts and a witty deployment of terrific digital effects. Parallel narratives, whispered internal monologues, fictions nested within fictions, crazed torrents of clichÈ, musical numbers ­ BODY DROP ASPHALT has it all. (dir: Junko Wada, Japan, 96 minutes 2000 Cast: Sayuri Oyamada, Makoto Ogi) Notes by Chris Gehman. (Thanks to Chris Gehman, Images 2001 and the Japanese Consulate for making this screening possible.)

SUNDAY APRIL 29 8:30pm
JAPANESE INDEPENDENT/SUPER 8
Curated by Chris Gehman
One night only of the cutting edge of Super 8 in Japan today.These Japanese film and video artists are true independents: there are no grants or other forms of support available to artists doing this kind of work in Japan. Most shoot on 8mm film, which in Japan tends to be seen as a standard medium for artists' film. Included in the program: SEVENTEENTH SUMMER (Yasuko Miyata) is a delicate film-poem to an aging cat; DANNKI (Yoshio Fukuma) uses extremely long exposures to create a strange and ghostly image of the passage of trains through a subway tunnel; and THE STONE STEPS WITH THE BLUE HANDRAIL (Tomohiro Nishimura) uses elaborate in-camera mattes to fragment a simple city scene filmed with a moving camera into brilliant graphic shards, simultaneously suggesting the continuum between abstraction and representation, and creating a tension between real time, filmed time and screen time. Itaru Kato's SPARKLING offers a moving and imaginative response to the Gulf War, while Takashi Ishida's GESTALT (which picked up an Award for Excellence at the 1999 Vancouver International Film Festival), is an animated tour de force of shifting perceptual space that plays with conventions of perspective and effects of spatial cognition. Takashi Ito's ZONE, reminiscent in tone of the work of the Brothers Quay, creates a cryptic and subtly menacing world. Shiho Kano's exquisite and refined ROCKING CHAIR sustains a mood of contemplation and suspension with images of an interior space, and subtle shifts in exposure and natural light. Hajime Kawaguchi's PHASES OF THE REAL appears to begin as a simple portrait of the relationships among a group of students and their teachers which eventually collapses into the realm of the absurd. (Thanks to Chris Gehman, Images 2001 and the Japanese Consulate for making this screening possible.)