The Blinding Light!! SHOWS
FEBRUARY
1999
 Tuesday & Wednesday February 2/3
8:30pm
FAT OF THE LAND
Shot in a scrappy energetic style
consistent with the do-it-yourself impetus of the project, FAT OF THE LAND
follows the journey of five women (all San Fransisco media artists) who took to
the road in an '84 Chevy van powered by used vegetable oil(!). From New York to
San Fransisco, these fry girls careen across the nation stopping at greasy
spoons and hamburger joints asking for leftover fryer fat to fuel their van.
Pitstops include a quick overview of how to make vegetable oil into a diesel
substitute, interviews with practicing biofuel engineers, and a visit to
birthplaces of the petroleum industry and the automobile. (Niki Cousino,
Sarah Lewison, Julie Konop, Florence Dore, Gina Todus, 56 mins, 1995)
 Thursday February 4 8:30pm
THE MARTHA COLBURN
EXPERIENCE
With Martha Colburn in Person!
A radical retrospective of
the one-woman wonder that is Martha Colburn and a rare opportunity for all
thrill-seekers, junky punks, sinful cinephiles and art-trash fanatics to meet
the lady and see her works!
My personality keeps coming out in my work: dark humor mixed with a
bit of punk mixed with dirt and sex and smoking: all the things people enjoy
but are taboo. Things that delight my sense of humor. -Martha Colburn
Based in notorious Baltimore, Martha Colburn has made over twenty-five
mind-altering short films in the four years since she first picked up a camera.
Her psycho spazzumentaries, a hyper-mix of hand-painted collages, manipulated
found footage and lots of people with animal heads having sex, defy easy
description. She works in close collaboration with chaos poet 99 Hooker and
frequently uses soundtracks from Jad Fair and Colburn's now-defunct band, The
Dramatics. Her films have screened in retrospective at many festivals worldwide
as well as at the Museum of Modern Art's recent 8mm retrospective Big As Life,
and Colburn will tour Europe with her films next Spring. She also produces
collages on paper and has made over 3000 individual record covers for the
Megaphone label! We are pleased to have Martha appearing in person to discuss
and screen her works, including: Cholesterol, Evil of Dracula, Hey tiger, What's On?, Asthma, I Can't Keep Up, Persecution in Paradise, Zig Zag, My
Secret Shame, I'm Gonna, A toetally soleful feeture pedsintation, There's a
pervert in our pool, Lift Off, Ode to A Busdriver, ... and more!
plus selections from her collection of rare '60s Euro-pop Scopitones.
Belly dancing, Mother Nature and Father Time (Brook Benton), Goldfinger (Silvie
Vartan). Basin Street Blues (Colleen Magny), Web of Love (Joi Lansing), If I had
a hammer (Les Surss), All the Girls and All the Boys (Francois Hardy).
Friday Saturday & Sunday February 5,6,7 8:30pm (Sunday Matinee at
3pm)
NANCY DREW and the mystery of the haunted body PLUS Lynne Kamm's
SPAG
The Vancouver Premiere of Nancy Drew and the mystery of the haunted
body Subtitled "A Comedy about Incest, Freud, and Recovered Memory" is Marusya
Bosiurkiw's highly stylized rewriting of the squeaky-clean girl mystery-seeker
as an innocent and over-the-top '90s researcher by day/detective by night. With
cameo appearances and technical support by the Western Front "family" (Eric
Metcalfe, Hank Bull, Kate Craig et al.) the film is truly a locally flavoured
and tongue-in-cheek take on the controversy around recovered memory. (45
minutes, 1998) PLUS: Lynne Kamm's dyke ode to the Western, SPAG. The western
genre is transformed with an all-dyke cast in the tale of Hailey, Jo, Spit and
Baby D and their battle against Clit Steele's gang. Unpretentious and charming,
the film features a cast of local heroes including members of GIRL PARTS, TASTE
THIS, and many others
 Tuesday & Wednesday February 9 & 10
8:30pm
INDEPENDENT EXPOSURE An intense, radical series of shorts
from Independent Exposure, Seattle filmmaker and curator Joel Bachar's
super-powered project to bring the cutting edge in underground and independent
work to the world's eyes, with hundreds of screenings of as many works in
Prague, Budapest, London and across North America. Don't miss this chance to dig
into a tender and juicy slice of films and videos especially assembled for this
Vancouver screening. SEE: Leslie Raymond's RIFE WITH FIRE, an optically printed
experimental documentary based on the pyrotechnic demonstrations of St. Paul
(now of Toronto) artist Stephen Rife. Robert Arnold's MORPHOLOGY OF DESIRE; an
experimental exploration of the commodified representation of gender and desire
in popular culture; Lisa DiLillo's THE COCK FIGHT calls into question the
seductive powers of spectacles that glorify excessive displays of masculinity
and bravado, Lisa McElroy's Job, where minimalized modernity needs no face, no
pulse, no senses...as it must function well; Apichatpong Weerasethakul's
0116643225059: "There was a time when I called home less and less."; Erik
Deutschman's SPLIT, a delirious experimental narrative uses a variety of filmic
techniques to create an intimate, implosive exploration of a man confronting the
nature of his physical existence; Mark Street's hand manipulated erotica BLUE
MOVIE; Mark O'Connell's LOVE GODDESS: fondle suck lick thrust etc....; Jacob
Pander's THE OPERATION (Caution: For Mature Audiences Only!) where a surgeon
clad in a protective suit, goggles and tight rubber gloves demonstrates her
skill before a group of observers. (Shot entirely on infrared video!)
Thursday February 11 8:30pm
MRS. SMIG'S ANIMATION SHOWCASE
A
whole swack of incredible animation - classical, clay and computer-driven, these
pieces take the form and content to the outer limits. Included in the program
are the latest and greatest from the Gulf Islands Film and Television School,
including THE CITY, the slapstick matchsticks FATAL STRIKE, DAWN OF THE COMPUTER
NERD, WHEN FOOD GOES BAD, DEEP SHADOW 3000, GUMMI WARS, YO-YO & more - with
many of the makers in attendance. PLUS Special invited guest RICHARD REEVES will
be screening his award winning LINEAR DREAMS, an awesome feat of cameraless
scratch and paint animation with scratched sound, along with his earlier
scratching feat ZIG ZAG. Also on the bill, fellow Pender Island scratch animator
Scott Clark's metaphysical EXPLOITATION and HEADDRESS. A one night only
extravaganza - don't miss it!
 Friday, Saturday & Sunday February 12, 13,
14 8:30pm (Sunday Matinee at 3pm)
LOVE BITES
In honour of (or
despite!) Valentine's Day, we present an all-over-the-map collection of films
that explore failed relationships, lost loves, and untamed porn in the most
original, strange and gripping ways you can imagine. Included in the program are
Mike Hoolboom's award-winning four-screen ode to a lost lover FRANK'S COCK,
Velcrow Ripper's pixellated panoply of pathetic devotion LEAVE ME ALONE, DON'T
EVER!, the obscure '50s educational film TITLE HERE which entertainingly
examines how to avoid getting into what will inevitably be a doomed
relationship, NOEMA Scott Stark's intensive exploration of the "moments between"
in pornography, SEXY BOURGEOIS, a rare found 8mm peep-show flick preaching
lessons in love at the dining room table with a '60s euro-trash aesthetic, WEB
OF LOVE a rare Scopitone with the young Joy Lansing (Beverly Hillbillies)
singing the title track to scenes of giant spider webs, jungle scenes and more!
Tuesday & Wednesday February 16/17 8:30pm
SPINNING OUT OF
CONTROL: DANCEFILMS
An evening of brilliant and evocative dance films -
all locally made - including Peter Lipskis' DANCE MASKS: THE WORLD OF MARGARET
SEVERN, the gorgeously shot and lovingly rendered story of this dancer's life
including early footage from the LATE '20S '30s of her dancing in New York
gREENWICH vILLAGE fOLLIES, 79 yrs old and exploring an incredible life of dance
with the Ballet Russe de Paris and others, the SOMETHING and others; Heather
Frise's PLAYGROUND, a lyrical and evocative dance/video improvisation where
Shannon McMurchy intimately explores the playground environment with her mix of
SOMETHING and SOMETHING style. PLUS John Price's NINE + 20, "an extremely simple
portrait of one of the most humble and deeply spirited people I have ever known.
Trained in Ireland as a welder, Micheal Dolan preferred dancing so he dropped
the torch and put on a tutu to perform in the internationally acclaimed troupe
LA LA LA HUMAN STEPS" (John Price). David Rimmer's SISYPHUS, the intensely
rhythmic and powerful interpretation of the ancient Greek myth considered to be
one of Karen Jamieson's strongest choreographic works and an award winner at the
New York Dance on Camera Film Festival.
 Thursday February
18 8:30pm
BYO8
Dig out that first ever flick, because the
inaugural BRING YOUR OWN FILM night of '99 focuses on first films. Anything
goes: wretched first-time film school failure, your first roll on that old Super
8 camera you just picked up, or your Dad's first home movie - let's see them
all! First come, first serve, with a limit of one film per person under ten
minutes. BRING A FILM AND GET IN FOR $3!
 Friday, Saturday
& Sunday February 19, 20, 21 8:30pm (Sunday Matinee at 3pm)
Erik
Whittaker's AIRPORT IN
Erik Whittaker's crosses Guy Maddin with David
Lynch to create a completely original and truly bizarre first feature straight
outta Vancouver. "Ten years after his partner was killed in a bizarre shoot-out
on the tarmac of the Winnipeg Airport, Lieutenant Kehler is called in to
investigate the girzzly murder of an ultra-sleazy podiatry guru...As Kehler and
his colleugues begin to piece together the information, it becomes apparent that
virtually everyone in the hotel that weekend had both the motive and the
opportunity to do it....AIRPORT IN positively bristles with misanthropic energy.
It is gloriously over-the-top prairie-Gothis, sure to find a place in the
"cult-classic" firmament..." (VIFF)
 Tuesday &
Wednesday February 23/24 8:30pm
AFRICVILLE with Taryn Della in
person
In honour of Black History Month, we are pleased to be presenting
AFRICVILLE, Sheilagh Mackenzie's powerful documentary about the small Black
settlement in Halifax which was destroyed in the '60s with a goal to integrate
and in the name of urban renewal. Former residents and their relatives tell
the story of this painful relocation with archival film and photographs from the
period. This visual document is not just a recycling of history; it is graphic
evidence that history unlearned is history repeated (Charles R. Saunders)
Originally from Halifax, Vancouver black activist, CFRO (CO-OP) radio
host, and comic/poet TARYN DELLA will appear in person to introduce the film,
update us on the aftermath of AFRICVILLE and perform. (Special thanks to Taryn
Della, the National Film Board and Al Parsons for making this event possible.)
Door Prizes will be handed out!
 Thursday February
25 8:30pm
I LIKE TO WATCH
A disturbing collection of short
films exploring voyeurism, eroticism, and pornography. Films include local
poet-turned-filmmaker Michael Turner's "Heirs to a Felt Fortune" which premiered
at VIFF last year. This arresting short video combines found 8mm porn footage
with a detached poetic voice, probing into the why's and where's of the
pornographic experience. Other films include "Striptease," by Kay Armatage, a
short documentary on stripping from the dancers' point of view; and "Mayhem" by
Abigail Child, an erotic send-up of slapstick and film noir which looks at
sexuality and violence in the movies. Special guest speaker: MICHAEL TURNER.
 Friday, Saturday & Sunday February 26, 27, 28 8:30pm (Sunday
Matinee at 3pm)
William E. Jones' FINISHED
Los Angeles
filmmaker William E. Jones' FINISHED is a moody, thoughtful and disturbing
feature documentary about gay porn star Alan Lambert who committed suicide at
age 25 out of the fear that his shelf-life as a flesh commodity was over. Jones
explores Lambert's life through meetings with his associates, a visit to his
native Montreal home and an attempt to dissect an elaborate suicide note. What
he finds is an enigmatic individual who listened to Mozart while turning tricks
in his apartment and had bookshelves filled with Marx. Though his initial
motivation for the project seems to have been to satisfy his own voyeuristic
fantasies, Jones has turned in a cool, accomplished film about the nature of
sexual obsession, the power of the moving image and the marketing of desire as a
commodity. (Time Out) Premiered at the 1997 Sundance Film Festival
and recipient of the award for Best Experimental Independent Film from
the L.A. Film Critics Association, FINISHED is a mesmerizing immersion into
a life tragically cut short.
MARCH
1999
 Tuesday, Wednesday & Thursday March 2/3/4
8:30pm
RECENT HANDPAINTED FILMS BY STAN BRAKHAGE
Best know for
titles like DOG STAR MAN and MOTHLIGHT, and emerging from the Visionary
movement of the late sixties and early seventies, Stan Brakhage is considered to
be the greatest experimental filmmaker alive today. Still very active and
extremely prolific, many believe his most recent hand-painted films to be his
strongest and most moving work to date. Magical, mysterious, rhythmically
breathtaking and an explosion of colour, these films are a stunning testament to
Brakhage's incredible genius and continuing wonder at the power of the moving
image to move us. We will be presenting these hand-painted works over three days
(program repeats), and encourage you to come back and see them again in this
period for full impact. (Note: descriptions are abbreviated from Brakhage's own
words).
CANNOT EXIST (1994) Hand-painting interrupted by, and interspersed
with, geometrically structured Mask of Death immediately caught-up in threads of
streaming, polarized crystals of Light inhaled and exhaled...
BOULDER BLUES
AND PEARLS (1992) A terrifying ecstasy of (hand-painted) synapting nerve ends
back-firing from thought's grip of life.
THE HARROWING (1993) A hand-painted
film which has been photographically step-printed to create varieties of tempo
in mimic of sparking and molten rock.
TRYST HAUNT (1993) This is a
hand-painted film photographically step-printed so that the thicket-like lines
of paint are played-off against some centered pale-hued areas of paint in such
a way as to suggest a trysting place which flits through the mind like a
ghost.
CHARTRES SERIES (1994) [Seeing] The Chartres Cathedral surely
transformed my aesthetics more than any other single experience, a suite in
homage to Chartres and dedicated to Wendy Jull.
WE HOLD THESE (1995)
...patterns of fish and animal biology, plant and flower shapes, and human
anatomy interwoven with pastel cubes and other geometries...literally etched on
black leader (primarily) and interspersed with very organic painted forms on
white. There is often an intended sense of hair and mucous membrane amidst these
forms and interwoven with the electric x-ray sense of bones.
YGGDRASIL
WHOSE ROOTS ARE STARS IN THE HUMAN MIND (1997) This film, a combination of
handpainting and photography, is a fullsome exposition of the themes of DOG STAR
MAN....rooted in the complex electrical synapses of thought process.
Friday, Saturday & Sunday March 5, 6, 7 8:30pm (Sunday Matinee at
3pm)
HI-FI SCI-FI: THE TIME TRAVELLERS
The largely unheralded
and obscure '60s B-movie THE TIME TRAVELLERS is a cautionary '60s sci-fi tale in
which scientists discover a porthole leading to a post-apocalyptic future,
encountering both mutants and a band of survivors working to escape the now
destitute planet. Encouraged to join these future earthlings, they make
desperate efforts to return to their present. Some great visual effects
(humanoid robot building in a secret underground laboratory) and near
tongue-in-cheek performances by an A list of B actors make this little known
sci-fi treasure a pleasure. Starring Preston Foster, Merry Anders, Phil Carrey
and Joan Woodbury (Dir: Ib Melchoir, 1964)
 Tuesday &
Wednesday March 9/10 8:30pm
ANIMATED WORLDS: TWO DECADES OF PORTLAND
ANIMATION
Experience an evening of world-class animation by a host of
animators hailing from Portland, Oregon. All films are award winners (including
a couple of Oscar winners!), and feature everything from colour-xeroxes, to clay
painting and cameraless animation. In the program: AND SHE WAS, Jim
Blanshfield's suburban collage created for the Talking Heads was voted as one of
the top 100 Best Music Videos by Rolling Stone; Barry Bruce and Will Vinton's
grotesque mutating caricature clay animation GREAT COGNITO; John Callahan's
brutally frank and funny I THINK I WAS AN ALCOHOLIC; Joanna Priestley's
brilliant ode to aging GROWN UP; Mark Gustafson's BRIDE OF RESISTOR, a clever
Mr. Resistor AC-DC sequel; Joan Gratz and Will Vinton's CREATION, the Genesis
story told in clay painting; Chel White's PHOTOCOPY CHA CHA transforms the
animator's body; Rose Bond's CERRIDWEN'S GIFT, a cameraless retelling of an
ancient Celtic myth; Jim Blashfield's SUSPICIOUS CIRCUMSTANCES A perfectly
executed work of animation art. (The New Yorker); and MONA LISA DESCENDING A
STAIRCASE, Joan Gratz' Academy Award winning survey of modern art. (This show
produced by the Northwest Film Center - Portland Art Museum. Thanks to Meagan
Atiyeh.)
 Thursday March 11 8:30pm
BYO8
Tonight
is your night to shine - dust off that videocassette, polish that old 16mm film
cannister and put on your best suit for yet another edition of Bring Your Own
Film! We accept 16mm, Super 8 and VHS, with a limit of one film per person and
10 minutes max (excerpts are OK). Tonight we want your home-made horror flicks
if you've got ëem, but we'll take anything! Remember, it's only $3 if you bring
a film (first come, first serve).
 Friday March 12
8:30pm
BARBED WIRE CDrom / Zine Launch Party, Artshow & Multimedia
Mischief
Vancouver's Barbed Wire, the notorious online "webzine" which
has developed an international cult following for its uncompromising style, its
caustic irony and its photo-essays on excrement, finished its preordained run of
12 issues late last year and returns now in two new formats: print-zine and
CDrom.
All Barbed Wire projects prominently feature illustrations by local
artist Geoff Carter whose "unnecessarily vulgar" works will be on display in the
Blinding Light lobby. Barbed Wire print-zines will be available free to all
attendees who will also be able to sample the Barbed Wire CDrom. The space will
be brimming with low-tech hi-fi snippets, video loops, and various multimedia
mischief. DJ Time Being will provide the aural ambient backdrop which will kick
into high gear as the moon comes out.
This evening is FREE but you must have or buy a membership ($3) to
enter.
 Saturday & Sunday March 13/14 8:30pm
THE
TRUTH CHANNEL PROUDLY PRESENTS:
THE ORGANIZATION MAN (or Space-Dub-Echo-Blast phases 3 &
4)
"Way more fun than the 20th Century." "Finally an apocalypse the
whole family can enjoy."
After stunning the audience with their show last December, THE TRUTH
CHANNEL bring their unique brand of psycho-sonic multi-media freak-out (with
ambient tendencies) back to the Blinding Light. Using the freshest in stolen,
found and original moving IMAGE and live-mix SOUND, each performance of THE
ORGANIZATION MAN show is a different and evolving exploration of all things
wonderful, psychedelic and beneficent. No two evenings are entirely alike.
Special thanks to LSD-49, the GVRD, Creosote Initiatives, Charlton Heston,
Gordon Campbell, Sally Field & Leonardo DiCaprio.
"Everything is in a state of constant vibration: the sun, the earth,
ideas - EVERYTHING. Since all chemical elements are frequencies, it follows that
human beings themselves could be broadcast by radio to any point in the universe
- at 680 million miles per hour." (Ed Martin Sr.)
 Tuesday &
Wednesday March 16/17 8:30pm
PERIPHERAL PRODUCE
experimental and
remodeled media with Portland's own Matt Mccormick in
person!!
readyset>ready> Peripheral Produce is burning up the highway
with no brakes from Portland Oregon USA with a 'Couv special mix of short
experimental film and video: featuring work from Mark Street, Animal Charm,
Miranda July (aka Big Miss Moviola), Vanessa Renwick, RTMark, Danny Plotnick,
Eric Henry, Negativland, and other spontaneous projections. 100% science
action (abstract aesthetics)... not to be confused with the entertainment
industry.
 Thursday March 18 8:30pm
RALPH with Chris Hooper's VIE DE
NUIT
Having recently published the 50th issue of RALPH: COFFEE, JAZZ,
& POETRY, and with three CDs and as well as a book under his belt,
Vancouver's Ralph Alfonso has truly become a local icon known for his near
fanatical passion for all thing beatnik and jazz. Tonight, Ralph and his combo
perform live to the Chris Hooper directed movie VIE DE NUIT. Starring Sandra
Stieir, the film is a fast and loose homage to the cinema of France and Italy in
the '50s and '60s. Stieir plays "an enigmatic woman running wild in the night.
Her lover is a shadow never in focus and almost always behind the wheel. Tres
mysterieux." Combined with Ralph's trademark jazz narration and incredibly tight
band, this evening promises to be mellow, cool and very, very beat, man.
 Friday, Saturday & Sunday March 19, 20, 21 8:30pm (Sunday
Matinee at 3pm)
Penelope Buitenhuis' TROUBLE
Vancouver/Berlin
filmmaker Penelope Buitenhuis' TROUBLE is A street smart blast from the Berlin
Underground...a bulletin from the rock/rap culture barricades of the old/new
capital's long established Kreuzberg scene... (Melbourne Int. Film Festival).
Jonnie (Yvonne Ducksworth) works in a Berlin bar to pay her rent and plays in a
band to fulfill her creative urges, but is constantly contending with taunts
because of her black skin, frustrations with her group's struggle for success
and fears of a rapidly changing Berlin. When Jonnie meets Erik his involvement
with a subversive political group and their mutual desire to save the Kreuzberg
underground draws her in... The film sparkles with its raw energy and
streetwise sass, aided by the urgent reggae and rap-tinged rock of Jonnie's
band. (MIFF). (Starring Yvonne Duscksworth, Jan-Erik Engel. Produced by
Jurgen Bruning. Directed by Penelope Buitenhuis).
 Tuesday &
Wednesday March 23/24 8:30pm
THE FLICKER SHOW
FLICKER is a
bi-monthly film festival in Chapel Hill, North Carolina begun in September of
ë94 by Norwood Cheek (recent invited guest at the Splice This! Festival in
Toronto). The festival has gained an international reputation for presenting
home-made works in a relaxed, open and enthusiastic environment with a
particular fondness for Super 8 and other small gauges. To celebrate their 4
year anniversary (and their 20th festival) Norwood has assembled the first Best
of Flicker show, featuring his own I DREAMED AND BLUEBIRD, Roger Warren Beebe's
SUGGS MUST DIE, Jim Haverkamp's COURTESY CALL, Bo Webb's HAMMERED, Cory Ryan's
IN MY TOWN YOU CAN'T DRIVE NAKED, Norwood Richard Jaimeyfield's SCENE 9 OF 9,
Tom Maxwell's MOONLIGHT IN VERMONT, Rob Koegler's THE SANDWICH, Lesley
McClintock's WHEELS OF LIGHT, and Roby Newton's A LACK OF PROVIDENCE. Also
available will be Norwood's Super 8 ëzine and a limited number of Super 8
conversion plastic rulers!!
 Thursday March 25 8:30pm
Cineworks
presents FANTASTIC VISIONS
Unforgettably strange films about mythical,
surreal and imagined people and places. Films include Jeffrey Erbach's "Under
Chad Valley," a new film from the maker of "Soft Like Me," about two butchers
and two children in a mythical butcher shop buried deep underground; "Odilon
Redon" by Guy Maddin, a work of rare imaginative force commissioned by the BBC
and based on a painting by surrealist painter Redon; and "frostbite" by Wrik
Mead, the strange story of a lonely lighthouse keeper who rescues his fantasy: a
young man frozen in the snow, and enacts a strange and terrifying ritual.
 Friday, Saturday, Sunday March 26, 27, 28 8:30pm (Sunday Matinee at
3pm)
MEDIA BLITZKRIEG
Don't miss this non-stop cinematic
scratch-mix of obscure and diamond-in-the-rough media detritus through the ages,
subtly blended with the latest and greatest of local works obsessing on that
five letter word (media). This rapid-fire McLuhanesque mayhem includes retro
naive '50s TV commercials for products as diverse as cigars, tea, pepto-bismol
and sneakers. PLUS: Jennifer Lau's ALTERING MEDIA, a quick n' dirty study of the
conversion of billboards into sites of subversive messages; Kevin Eastwood's
frenetic collisions and inversions of infotainment reinterpreting the deaths of
Kurt, Di and Theresa in FUNERAL PROCESSION, excerpts from Derrick Beckley's epic
remote control rampage TV CARNAGE; NOEMA, Scott Stark's intensive exploration of
the moments between in pornography and more...
 Tuesday &
Wednesday March 30/31
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 ontage 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)
Don't miss this rare opportunity to see a film that may actually change your
understanding of the world.
APRIL
1999
 Thursday April 1 8:30pm
CARTOON
PARTY
Ladies and gentlemen! Presenting the CARTOON PARTY
Featuring
live scratch animation with the Light Fantastic! Classic shorts with keyboard
accompaniment by George Hiloby of the Jades! Obscure animated cartoons including
He Shoots He Scores, an obscure mid '70s Russian animated film, The Burnaby Cult
hit live-action ZOMBIE BOY and much more! This one sold out last time so come
early! Presented by Cosmopolis (on the Drive - check it out!)
 Friday,
Saturday, Sunday April 2, 3, 4 8:30pm (Sunday Matinee at 3pm)
YOUR
PLEASURE GUARANTEED:
Taking off our clothes and experimenting with gender
including active voyeurs.
Pendra the Sex Astrologer curates an
interactive video show of libido chaos in these three distinct evenings. The
audience is invited to actively direct the remote control and drive the night's
boy/girl striptease. YOU choose the programming of gender free soap operas and
stolen porn from over 50 new film titles of gender-fuck shorts and identity-swap
dramas (all under 20 minutes) that range from comedic celebrations to depth
psychology parodies of boy/girl sexuality. Squeezed in between will be choices
of polymorphic porn segments (taken from Pendra's private collection of
Aesthetic Het/Woman Made couple Porn/Avant-guarde and the coolest of Queer
mixes. All this for the evil purposes of encouraging turn ons that transcend the
normative. Most of these "sex-outlaw" works have never been shown in Canada
before. "We are going to fail at the struggles of nature against control.
Invoking pre-society desires multiple pleasuring the discontents." Remember -
each night is a different show according to the synergy of diverse audience
tastes, creating a historical science lab of sexual chaos theory. SCREAM OUT
YOUR PLEASURES AND LEAVE WITH A SATISFIED SMILE AND A RUMPLED MIND!
 Tuesday
& Wednesday April 6/7 8:30pm
PETER LIPSKIS' CRAZY EIGHT
SIDESHOW
"Prolifically obscure" local underground filmmaker, recorder of
Vancouver histories, and "man about town" Peter Lipskis presents two nights of
experimental, over-the-top and obsessive cinematic treats, spanning over 20
years of image making, and moving smoothly from Super 8 to Hi-8 in the process
(with a little 16mm thrown in for good measure).
TUESDAY's show, entitled EXPERIMENTAL RHYTHMS focusses in on Lipskis'
artistic explorations of home-movies and found-footage between 1975 and 1977.
The Art School Trilogy features GOOD FRIDAY, EYE DENTIFIED IMAGE and PROCESSED
GELLO. Also on the bill are SPARE PARTS, a film which adapts William Burroughs'
cut-up writing technique and John Cage's modern-music composition to film
structure; TRANCE AMERICAN IMPRESSIONS condenses a two-week Greyhound Bus trip
around the US with a radio soundtrack. PLUS A special DOUBLESCREEN
positive/negative presentation of HOME MOVIE.
On WEDNESDAY, Peter will present BLUE LIZARD AND BEYOND, featuring
local-lounge scene personalities, many captured in the Polynesian rooms of
Vancouver's Waldorf Hotel. Highlights include former rock-star turned lounge
diva LEE AARON in two stylized music videos, a Hallowe'en costume party with The
Molestics, photogrpaher Lincoln Clarkes in THE EXTRAS FILES, and Blue Lizard
Mistress of Ceremonies Maxine Von Minx in eight glamorous outfits!
Thursday April 8 8:30pm
THE MULTIPLEX GRAND
The Multiplex
returns to the Blinding Light with added grandeur. Witness 5T-3V3 sing
the body electric with scientific soundscapes; Zero Squared pay homage to
white trash speed freaks through "imparimental dumb & base" and loscil
digitally decompose the muzak message. Added to the regular roster are
guests Freaky DNA with modern electronic music straight out of the mail
from Munich, the schematic sonograms of Time Being mixed to visuals by
Paul Levine and a splitscreen projector performance by Phosphene.
It's a one-nighter - get to it!
Forget the Planetarium, bring open minds to
the Multiplex for quality mood enhancement.
 Friday, Saturday
& Sunday April 9/10/11 8:30pm
THE INCREDIBLE PANORAM
In
1939 a "visual jukebox" called the Panoram was introduced in America, playing
eight three-minute musical shorts and functioning much like a conventional
jukebox but loaded with 16mm films rather than 45 rpm records. Though the later
Scopitone (a smiliar device) was introduced in the '60s, by 1946 the Panoram had
gone the way of the dinosaur. In this short period hundreds - if not thousands -
of films were produced specifically for use with the Panoram, spawning what
might be called the first "music videos". We are pleased to be presenting an
incredible and very rare collection of these films culled from the personal
archive of Baltimore artist and filmmaker Martha Colburn (who appeared here in
person in February). Among those films to be presented are HARMONICATS,
featuring an incredible array of oversized, double sized and odd-sized
harmonicas; Billy Mitchell, a cartoon Little Alice, Betty Page, Hollywood
Beauties
 Tuesday & Wednesday April 13/14 8:30pm
AN
OCCURENCE AT OWL CREEK BRIDGE and
TWO MEN AND A WARDROBE
A rare
screening of two classics of surrealism and the absurd. An Occurence at Owl
Creek Bridge AND Roman Polanski's Two Men and a Wardrobe Robert Enrico's AN
OCCURENCE AT OWL CREEK BRIDGE is a brilliant adaption of Ambrose Bierce's short
story of the same name in which a man escapes hanging only to find that his
freedom takes on a more and more eerily beautiful quality that may or may not be
real. Interestingly, this short was presented on "The Twilight Zone" in 1963.
Polanski's TWO MEN AND A WARDROBE was completed while still a student at the
Polish Film Institute and addresses modern man's inability to achieve privacy,
opening with two men emerging from the sea carrying a large wooden
wardrobe...come see Polanski's earliest work!
 Thursday April 15
8:30pm
LIVE: ERIC OSTROWSKI and NOGGIN
We are very pleased to
have in person Vancouver (Washington) film artist and musician Eric Ostrowski
with NOGGIN. This evening of hyper-visual stimulation will feature multiple
projections of 16mm hand painted footage and hand drawn optical soundtracks
along with NOGGIN performing live tracks. Ostrowski's work is an intensive
collage of layering and texture performed live with all original elements. No
prints of his painted work are made and the performance incorporates the
scratches and decay from past shows with added renderings of paint and
abstractions, making each show wholly original and by its very nature ephemeral.
Also on the bill will be Ostrowski's Super 8 VENEZUELA, largely shot in the
Canyonlands area of Utah and incorporating video feedback and handpainting;
ASILAH 4 a.m, incorporating found footage and sound that has been reworked with
drawing and scratching on both sound and picture; and AH-GOO, a hand drawn sound
and picture film inspired by the first utterances of Ostrowski's son, Ian.
Friday & Saturday April 16/17 8:30pm
SCI-FI HI-FI: ROBOT
MONSTER A ludicrous cheapie (also known as MONSTERS FROM THE MOON) features
an inept alien decked out in a shabby gorilla suit and diving helmet conspiring
to - you guessed it - take over the Earth. The film's strange flair for the
juvenile is somehow justified by the fact that the film is in fact little
Johnnie's dream when he gets knocked out playing in a cave (the alien's lair).
Featuring an amazing Elmer Bernstein musical score, a strange seduction scene,
some brilliant props and many strange stock footage montages, there's a reason
they call this one the best of the bad films. (Starring George Nader, Claudia
Barrett, Dir: Phil Tucker 1953)
NOTE: THE REST OF APRIL IS BOOKED
FOR A PLAY, SO WE'LL SEE YOU IN MAY!
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