SUMMER 2007
MAY 25 - 31, Fri- Thurs
NWFF and SEATTLE INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL present
ALTERNATE CINEMA
The Dutch call it exploding cinema; the French the avant-garde; in Seattle we call it Alternate Cinema. A collection of features and shorts, which aim to push the boundaries of traditional film culture, this year’s selections explore unconventional modes of visual, aural and emotional landscapes. Yet when we examine these works, they seem more and more to be in tune with ourselves, with our thoughts, and with the very medium itself. Estaban Sapir’s The Aerial combines expressive elements of the silent era and graphic elements of comic books to comment on the state of our media culture. One11 and 103, the legendary John Cage’s sublime dance of camera, light and sound, makes its Seattle premiere. SIFF Tributee Anthony Hopkins makes his directorial debut with the daring Slipstream, and Jiska Rickels’ 4 Elements presents an evocative meditation on mankind's timeless—and often precarious—connection to the natural world. Esther B. Robinson’s A Walk Into the Sea: Danny Williams and the Warhol Factory documents a man who, while on the surface just another nameless member of the Warhol factory, was himself an editor, filmmaker, light designer, lover and son. The above is just a sampling of these invigorating and exciting selections from some of cinema’s most daring filmmakers.
MAY 25, Fri at 7pm / MAY 28, Mon at 9:30pm
THE AERIAL
(Estaban Sapir Argentina, 2007, 90 min)
In Year X in the City Without a Voice, a fascist media regime keeps the population forcibly silent. Plots and counter-plots ensue in this alluring allegory that, ironically, employs the language of silent film to salute the power of free speech. A stunning amalgam of comic books and ’20s-era science fiction.
MAY 25, Fri at 9:15pm / MAY 26, Sat at 9pm
LIFE IN LOOPS (A MEGACITIES RMX)
(Tino Novotny, Austria, 2006, 80 min)
This award-winning experimental documentary is a mesmerizing remix of the acclaimed 1997 film Megacities, combining its stunning original footage with an excellent new soundtrack by Sofa Surfers. A fiercely imaginative audio-visual journey that finds fragments of hidden urban life in New York, Tokyo, Moscow, Bombay and Mexico City.
MAY 26, Sat at 4:30pm / MAY 30, Wed at 9:30pm
4 ELEMENTS
(Jiska Rickels, Netherlands, 2006, 89 min)
A poetic visual essay about man's uneasy relationship with fire, water, earth and air, as seen through the experiences of firefighters in Siberia, king crab fisherman on the Bering Sea in Alaska, German mineworkers, and Russian cosmonauts preparing a launch to the international space station.
MAY 26, Sat, at 6:30pm / MAY 27, Sun, at 9:15pm
A WALK INTO THE SEA: Danny Williams and the Warhol Factory
(Esther B. Robinson, USA, 2007, 75 min)
Virtually unknown today, Danny Williams shot more than 20 films at the Warhol Factory and designed the Velvet Underground’s groundbreaking light show before mysteriously disappearing in 1966. This intimate documentary unearths his films and explores his love and struggles with both Warhol and his legendarily dysfunctional Factory.
MAY 27, Sun at 4pm / MAY 28, Mon at 7pm
ONE11 AND 103
(John Cage, Henning Lohner, USA/Germany, 1992, 93 min)
John Cage created his only feature-length film in the year of his death. Combining randomly drifting patches of light with one of Cage’s richest musical compositions, this is a sublime, stunning acknowledgment of time from one of the most widely influential artists of the 20th century.
MAY 27, Sun at 6:30pm / MAY 28, Mon at 4:15pm
ON THE ROAD WITH JUDAS
(JJ Lask, USA, 2006, 100 min)
Imagine Charlie Kaufman in a peppy mode and you might get begin to get an inkling of this dazzling metaphysical comedy. Reality, fiction and the notions of storytelling intertwine in this eclectic narrative about a conservative New York businessman (NAPOLEON DYNAMITE’S Aaron Ruell), his night gig as a cutthroat computer thief, and the woman he loves.
MAY 29, Tues at 7pm / MAY 31, Thurs at 9:15pm
GHOSTS OF CITÉ SOLEIL
(Asger Leth, Denmark/USA, 2006, 88 min)
This provocative documentary gives an unprecedented close-up look at the chimères (ghosts), gangs of gun-toting, doped up, nothing-to-lose thugs in Haiti’s ultra-violent slum Cité Soleil, designated by the United Nations as the most dangerous place in the world. A tough, shocking film, but also a hauntingly intimate and truthful one.
MAY 29, Tues at 9:45pm (Harvard Exit) / JUNE 2, Sat at 4:30pm (SIFF Cinema)
I DON'T WANT TO SLEEP ALONE
(Tsai Ming-Liang, Taiwan/France/Austria, 2006, 115min)
Shooting in Malaysia for the first time, Tsai Ming-Liang adds an emotional glow to his usual mixture of humour and horror. The homeless Hsiao Kang is beaten up and left to die on the streets of Kuala Lumpur; rescued and nursed by an immigrant labourer, he revives to find himself at the apex of a romantic triangle...
MAY 29, Tues at 7pm (SIFF Cinema) / MAY 30, Weds at 4.30pm (Egyptian)
SLIPSTREAM
(Anthony Hopkins, USA, 2007, 110 min)
An inventive, multilayered journey into the mind of an aging screenwriter whose fictional universe begins to invade his real life. This bold and experimental directorial debut from famed actor Anthony Hopkins plays with the nature of cinema and pokes a little fun at the movie business in the process.
MAY 29, Tues at 9pm
I DOT THE EYE
(Various)
Remembrances of things past highlight this exploration of the concept of memory. With works depicting messages of friendship, records of love, historical disconnects and explorations of that all too elusive place called creativity, you’ll find yourself amused, bemused and occasionally befuddled.
- The Magician’s House
(Deborah Stratman USA, 2006, 6 min, 16mm)
Sometimes the supernatural lingers plainly in the most ordinary places, secret only in as much as its trace goes unnoticed. Both a letter to an alchemist-filmmaker friend and a quiet tribute to the vanishing art of celluloid, this film is full of ghosts. - Der GruB von Meiner Mutter [The Greeting from my Mother]
(Katja Straub, 2006, USA/Germany 13min, Video)
This film traces the sublime and almost invisible bonds of motherhood and daughterhood over "one hundred years and two world wars". - I Remember Now, We Never Danced, I Miss You Goodbye
(Diane Bodner, 2006, USA, 16mm)
Sometimes the ordinary moments make for the most spectacular; such is the case in this dance of memory and loss. - I'm Keith Hernandez
(Rob Perri, 2006, USA 19min, Video)
The satirical film traces the rise of baseball player Keith Hernandez from the Eddie Money concert where he first tried cocaine, through the 1982 World Series, through Herzog's thanking Mex for his contributions by sending him to the cellar-dwelling Mets (just think a player being traded for doing drugs!), and heavy-drinker Davey Johnson's embrace. - Dear Bill Gates
(Sarah J. Christman, 2006, USA, 17min, Video)
A simple correspondence evolves into a poetic visual essay that draws unexpected connections among mining, memory and Microsoft. - The Ontological Cowboy
(Marie Losier, 2005, USA, 10min, 16mm)
“The theater is about sex.” At least according to Richard Foreman, the father of the Ontological Hysterical Theater. The Ontological Cowboy documents Foreman’s invocation of the “manifest destiny” of the avant-garde theater, King Cowboy Rufus strolling down off San Juan Hill with a sigh, waving his handkerchief. Foreman plays himself, and the cast pantomimes his preoccupations.
MAY 30, Weds at 7pm
REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE
(Various)
This amusing and enlightening program features pop-art collages to filmic archeology, including film sequences and images lifted from the safety of their original reels and contexts, only to be reborn in unexpected landscapes.
- For a Blonde... For a Brunette... For Someone... For Her... For You...
(Mike Olenick, USA 2006, 6 min, video)
For a Blonde... is a karaoke style video that re-enacts a scene from Hitchcock’s film Vertigo. The artist plays the role of John Ferguson at the moment where he re-discovers his Madeleine. "Karaoke" subtitles allow the viewer to perform Kim Novak’s part and complete the scene. - A Man's Gotta Do What A Man's Gotta Do
(Harald Schleicher, Germany, 2006, 9 min. Video)
Wondering what it takes to be a man? Feeling conflicted and confused? Don't despair. Look no further than the silver screen. A tongue-in-cheek ode to masculinity as chronicled by a legion of classic and contemporary Hollywood icons. - Sunbeam Hunter
(Jonathan Schwartz, USA, 2006, 3min, 16mm)
Poetic impression of a journey in pursuit of shadows using pages from a boy scout manual. - Waschdrang Mama
(Martha Colburn , USA, 2006, 2min, Video)
Martha Colburn has amped up the political content of her stylistically raw and frenetic animations, this time concentrating on Male Pin-ups set to the dynamic music of Felix Kubin and Coolhaven. Sex and death are never far away, under the surface of the blushing bare chests and the celluloid. - Asmahan
(Hisham Bizri, USA/Egypt, 2005, 21min, Video)
Asmahan is beautiful visual and cinematic meditation with an avant-garde motif. Based on Asmahan’s (the Syrian/Egyptian singer 1912 -1944) last film Gharam Wa Intiqam (Passion and Revenge) 1944, the film’s cinematic meditations merge her songs with plot and actions to reveal an insight into the relationship between the star’s tragic life, colonial Egypt, and the nature of cinema. - Life and Times of Robert Kennedy Starring Gary Cooper
(Aaron Valdez, USA, 2006, 8min, Video)
Overlayed newsreel footage of Robert Kennedy and images from the classic Hollywood western High Noon blur the line between truth and fiction. - Review
(Jenny Perlin, USA, 2004, 3min, 16mm)
A combination of refinement and simplicity that raises the receipt to an intriguing document of historic interest and reduces the newspaper headline to trivial statement. In the country at war, everything gets a different meaning. - The Mendi
(Steve Reinke, Canada, 2006, 9min, Video)
Over found footage from The Mendi--an ethnographic documentary made for the CBC's Man Alive television show in the 1970s--the narrator tells of his summer as a teenage assistant to the filmmakers. In the tradition of Bunuel's Land Without Bread. - The Astrum Argentium
(Jon Behrens ,USA, 2006, 6min, 16mm)
The third film in the director’s Anomalies cycle series of films. This film is made entirely from hand painted and hand manipulated images all created on film with an optical printer. - Double Lives
(Salise Hughes, USA, 2007, 4min, Video)
Manipulated footage from classic black and white films is interspersed with images of dolphins in DOUBLE LIVES to emphasize both the disconnect between the natural and artificial worlds and the restrictive nature of society in general.
MAY 31, Thurs at 7pm / JUNE 1, Fri at 7:15pm (SIFF Cinema)
STRANGE CULTURE
(Lynn Herschman Leeson, USA, 2006, 75min)
When conceptual artist Steve Kurtz’s wife died of heart failure, suspicion fell on materials that Kurtz was using for an art exhibition. Within hours, he was detained as a suspected bio-terrorist. Lynn Herschman Leeson’s brilliant documentary, STRANGE CULTURE, uses unconventional techniques to tell this story of domestic tragedy turned Kafkaesque nightmare.
JUNE 4, Mon at 9:45pm (SIFF Cinema) / JUNE 7, Thurs at 4:30pm (SIFF Cinema)
SYNDROMES AND A CENTURY
(Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thailand/France/Austria, 2006, 104 min)
Following up TROPICAL MALADY, director Apichatpong Weerasethakul confirms his innovative talent with a seductively mysterious film of self-reflecting halves. Beginning with two doctors in different hospitals, the fluid narrative travels across time and space to invoke the changing times of the filmmaker’s native Thailand.
JUNE 1, Fri at 10PM
ALTERNATE CINEMA PARTY!
Join NWFF and SIFF for a celebration of ALTERNATE CINEMA! With Studio 66’s DJ Chrispo spinning 60's mod & psychedelic rock, vintage soul, Brit-Pop, acid jazz and international pop sounds plus the fabulous Go-Go stylings of the Tangerine Tonic! More info on Studio 66 can be found at www.myspace.com/studio66.