DINCA

It would have been a great pleasure to have attended the 2010 International Film Festival of Rotterdam. The esteemed festival has always supported the most vanguard works of world cinema — firstly, if you’re a filmmaker and your work is selected as part of Rotterdam’s program, that’s a landmark achievement — secondly, if you’re a filmmaker and your film walks away with an award, you just entered the pinnacle of your career. Regardless of awards, if your film screens, you are a winner.

Ben Russell, a Chicago-based filmmaker, served as delegate of the Chicago underground film scene at the 2010 Rotterdam Film Festival, and his lengthy ethnographic film Let Each One Go Where He May, a film that was also nominated for a Tiger Award, walked away with the FIPRESCI award, an award that is decided by international film critics (B.R. representing Chi Chi!). Congratulations, Ben Russell.

Deborah Stratman, a Chicago-based filmmaker, was another representative of the Chicago underground film scene, with her short documentary Walking is Dancing screening as part of the Signals- Where is Africa program.

This post serves as a simple rundown of the 2010 tiger award winners, mostly because I could not find a rundown list of award winners on the official Rotterdam Film Festival website.

Continue Reading »

All right, this post is a little off Dincatopic, however, it pertains to subversion, and underground/experimental cinema is relative to subversion.

A few months ago, the anonymous writers over at 30secondsofhell.com happened to stumble upon Dinca Blog, and they asked if I would do the front-end design for their wordpress blog — clearly I accepted — 30 Seconds of Hell is a television commercial review blog, and that is a blog I can stand behind.

Well, the Super Bowl just ended (I had it on in the background), and with all the commercials and all, I decided to see if 30 Seconds of Hell was live-blogging the event. Unfortunately, they did not live blog on the event, but they did post a wanted ad for contributors who hate commercials enough to blog about them, a post wherein a fantastic animated .gif was embedded.

If you’re interested in entering the blogosphere, visit this 30 Seconds of Hell post for more information. All right, carry on!

The Chicago Underground Film Festival is now accepting submissions for their 2010 festival. The deadlines are approaching fast — if you’re interested in submitting, you have about one month.

The renowned underground film festival is a fantastic opportunity for underground, independent, and experimental film/video makers to screen their work in front of an audience of staunch patrons of the avant-garde. Legendary film critic, Roger Ebert, praises the festival as being a hell of a deal, stating “What you get for your money is not just admission to the films but admission to a subculture”, and another Chicago Tribune film critic, Michael Wilmington, regards the festival as being “Defiantly independent and deliberately scandalous.”

In the past, the CUFF has featured the works of Ben Russell, Deborah Stratman, and has presented retrospectives of Kenneth Anger, George Kuchar, John Waters, Larry Cohen, and Alejandro Jodorowsky. And there’s music too — The Ponys, Joan of Arc, Bobby Conn & The Glass Gypsies, Plastic Crimewave Sound, The Cheater Slicks, The Demolition Doll Rods, Califone, Frontier, Red Red Meat, The Handsome Family,The Wesley Willis Fiasco, Maureen Tucker, The Gaza Strippers and the Waco Bros have performed at past festivals. Folks, we’re talking about a party for the arty.

Continue Reading »

2007, 10:05, HDV/mini-DV/DVD. color, stereo sound

Leighton Pierce, an experimental filmmaker from Iowa City, Iowa, created this wondrous work back in 2007, way back when Sundance actually considered true experimental works, rather than just saying they do, and Number One appropriately found acclaim — and acclaim from the big festivals — Sundance, Tribeca, San Francisco International, Hong Kong Film Festival, Montreal Film Festival, the Ann Arbor Film Festival, and it won the First Place Award at the Black Maria Film Festival. Leighton Pierce’s Number One film won Number One film — verily apposite!

Number One represents Pierce as being an eclecticist — and an editor who paints with a soft bush — who blends a wide array of images plucked from nature. Abstractions are the result of frame deconstruction, experiments in frame size and shape, the re-assemblage of the frame, and the juxtaposing movements of on-screen action and hand-held POV camera movements.

Continue Reading »

BIO (from ilovepresets.net): Rpb246YWJzb2×1dGU7IHdpZHRoOjcwNXB4OyBoZWlnaHQ6NDRweDsgei1pbmRleDoxMDE7IGxl ZnQ6MHB4OyB0b3A6NDY5cHg7IGJhY2tncm91bmQtY29sb3I6IzAwMDAwMDsgdmlzaWJpbGl0eTp2 aXNpYmxlOyI+PC9kaXY+PGRpdiBpZD0id2hvMSIgc3R5bGU9InBvc2l0aW9uOmFic29sdXRlOyB3 aWR0aDo3MDVweDsgaGVpZ2h0OjQycHg7IHotaW5kZXg6MTAyOyBsZWZ0OjBweDsgdG9wOjQ3MHB4 OyBiYWNrZ3JvdW5kLWNvbG9yOiNGRjMzMzM7IHZpc2liaWxpdHk6dmlzaWJsZTsiPjwvZGl2Pjxk aXYgaWQ9IndobzIiIHN0eWxlPSJwb3NpdGlvbjphYnNvbHV0ZTsgd2lkdGg6NzA1cHg7IGhlaWdo dDo0MHB4OyB6LWluZGV4OjEwMzsgbGVmdDowcHg7IHRvcDo0NzFweDsgYmFja2dyb3VuZC1jb2xv cjojMDAwMDAwOyB2aXNpYmlsaXR5OnZpc2libGU7Ij48c3BhbiBjbGFzcz0icHBwIj4mZ3Q7IEkg Jmx0OzMgUHJlc2V0czogSm9uIFNhdHJvbSAuIFJvYiBSYXkgLiBKYXNvbiBTb2xpZGF5IDxicj4g ICZndDs8L3NwYW4+PC9kaXY+PGRpdiBpZD0ibWVudSIgc3R5bGU9InBvc2l0aW9uOmFic29sdXRl OyB3aWR0aDo5NXB4OyBoZWlnaHQ6YXV0bzsgei1pbmRleDoxMDQ7IGxlZnQ6NzA2cHg7IHRvcDow cHg7IGJhY2tncm91bmQtY29sb3I6IzAwMDAwMDsgdmlzaWJpbGl0eTp2aXNpYmxlOyI+ICA8dGFi bGUgd2lkdGg9IjEwMCUiICBib3JkZXI9IjAiIGNlbGxzcGFjaW5nPSIyIj4gICAgPHRyPiAgICAg IDx0ZCBiZ2NvbG9yPSIjRkYwMDAwIiBjbGFzcz0iY21lbnUiPiZndDs8YSBjbGFzcz0iY21lbnUi IGhyZWY9ImluZGV4LnBocCIgdGFyZ2V0PSJfc2VsZiI+IEhISCA8L2E+PC90ZD4gICAgPC90cj4g ICAgPHRyPiAgICAgIDx0ZCBiZ2NvbG9yPSIjRkYzMzAwIiBjbGFzcz0iY21lbnUiPiZndDs8YSBj bGFzcz0iY21lbnUiIGhyZWY9Im5ubi5odG1sIiB0YXJnZXQ9Il9zZWxmIj4gbm5uIDwvYT48L3Rk Continue Reading »

Guy Maddin’s The Heart of the World (2000)

In the world of cinema, the early career of a filmmaker typically is that of the short film. During this momentous filmmaking period, the filmmaker normally produces 5, 10, sometimes 15 shorts films; the work of this period may bring success, failure, or a little of both, but these are trivial matters; the experimenting of this period is what takes precedence; the filmmaker logs invaluable time in experimentation, and in these experiments, the filmmaker starts to chase a certain aesthetic, a certain vision, certain motifs, and certain peculiarities; the filmmaker will continue to chase these ideas throughout his or her entire career, and this is the chase that will define the filmmaker’s career. In other words, short films are important.

In regards to the short film, Guy Maddin is a unique case — he often produces a handful of short-films between the release of his feature-length films; most directors say adiós to the short-film after they become a feature-length film director; however, a large chunk of Maddin’s prolific filmmaking career is composed of short films — Maddin’s short and feature-length films rarely differ in greatness.

Maddin, a renowned filmmaker from Canada, is best know for his feverish hyper-expressionist films, namely, My Winnipeg (2007), Careful (1992), The Heart of the World (2000), The Saddest Music in the World (2003), and Brand Upon the Brain! (2006). These are films that draw influence from — and pay homage to —  the surrealist films of the 1920s and ’30s and the German-expressionist films of the 1920s and ’30s, and Maddin often pay tribute to the silent film; sometimes Maddin films are black and white, some are a mix of black and write with dashes of color, and if his films do have sound, Maddin, to varying extents, pursues a low fidelity sound, i.e. that of the early talky films, the ’50s Fredrico Fellini film, and so forth.

Continue Reading »

Impressive work. Hiroshi Kondo works with After Effects and Inferno. The “Second to None” and “1 one” inter-titles are interesting. See the previous posts Live Material 001 by Hiroshi Kondo and Live Material 002 by Hiroshi Kondo.

Hiroshi Kondo reel 2010
stnw.org

Harry Smith, Still from Film #11: Mirror Animations, ca. 1957, 3 min, 16 mm, color, sound. © Harry Smith Archives. From Harry Smith, Getty Publications.

Harry Smith was many things psychedelic — he made psychedelic films and art that dealt with the occult, he was a shaman in residence at the Naropa institute — and while living in San Francisco, Smith began to build a reputation as “one of the leading American experimental filmmakers.” Here are some obscure film stills and artwork of Harry Smith, originally posted here at the Harry Smith Archives and Flavorwire.

Continue Reading »

Video Clip of Takeshi Murata’s Melter 02, 4 minutes, 2003

As previously posted, Takeshi Murata and collaborator Robert Beatty will perform a live audio-visual performance on 4 March 2010, 6pm, at the Gene Siskel Film Center of Chicago, as part of the Conversations at the Edge 2010 film program. Click here for the entire 2010 CATE program.

Continue Reading »

Cone Eater (2004) by Takeshi Murata

The Indian Boundry Line (2010) by Thomas Comerford

Conversations at the Edge, a Chicago-based underground film program, organized in collaboration by the School of the Art Institute of Chicago’s Department of Film/Video, the Video Data Bank, and the Gene Siskel Film Center, will roll out its impressive 2010 film schedule on 4 Febuary 2009, beginning with a world premiere of Thomas Comerford’s feature-length documentary film, The Indian Boundry Line (2010). Comerford, a Chicago musician and filmmaker, shot the film on DigiBeta video and 16mm, and describes the film as being, “a road very close to my home in Chicago, Rogers Avenue,” tracing the 1816 Treaty of St. Louis boundary between the United States and “Indian Territory.”

Also, we should highlight that on 4 March 2010 glitch-vid duo Takeshi Murata and Robert Beatty will be in attendance to screen their work and perform a live audio-visual performance exclusively tailored for this CATE event.

Click here for the entire 2010 Conversations at the Edge schedule.

Samantha Morton in Lynne Ramsay’s Morvern Callar (2002)

Indiewire, an active blog that follows independent film, invited a 100 or so film critics and bloggers to weigh in on the best movies of the decade.

The votes have been tallied; the films are organized by numbered rankings according to votes tallied. I’m quite pleased with the number one selection and it’s pleasant to find some unexpected films on this list. Anyone care to post their top five films of the decade? See below.

Continue Reading »

Chartres Series (1994)

It’s 2010 … image attachments have been added to Dinca comments … let us usher in a new era. Attach any image, except .tiffs, to your comment; attach any image, regardless if it’s relevant or irrelevant. See comment below for a example.

Party time!

Synopsis: Mi primer videojuego programado. Es injugable

Worldosboind XD is an interesting exercise in low-bit, and low-fi, techni-colored, 2D animation. The use of the rainbow-roll gradient normally results in failure, however this is a rare instance of success. Does anyone interpret an existential metaphor in this animation? Anyone interested in discussing the rainbow gradient?

Hector Llanquin on vimeo

Their site has been inactive for some time now, but when active, Video Home System posts golden videos. The above is one of my favorites from Video Home System and the video is supposedly a universal (and generic) video greeting card called a Cardsette. The video features a flawless cover of “Celebration” by Kool and the Gang; fantastic dancing and dialogue included. In the ’80s, if your grandson were to graduate high school, you would send him this VHS video to congratulate him on the hard work, and he would be overwhelmed with feelings of joy and pride. The video greeting was directed with intentions to place you in the video — this is your party — everyone at this fantastic party is here to support you, and they want to show you a fantastic time.  What if an eight-year-old received this Cardsette; would he understand it; would he care? I imagine an eight-year-old would prefer partying with babies, rather than this wacky group of 30-70 year-olds who hit balloons whenever they speak. Continue Reading »

2009 forever is forever marked by the US –> Global economic recession; 2009, in my opinion, also marks the overlooked recession of the Hollywood and the corporately-funded independent film. More than ever, films are uninspired, boring, and unoriginal. Seemingly, there is no end in sight for the comic book film, the sequel to the comic book film, the comic book film prequel, the comic book film trilogy, and, of course, the comic book film franchise, which stretches far and wide, deep and high. Think Twilight and its Burger King and flavor-blasted zesty hot Fritos merchandise. Think of the doody in your toilet.

Then we have the producers, writers, and directors that perpetuate their shameless romp of the Hollywood remake film; my pants were blown off when I first heard the news of the upcoming Red Dawn (2010) and Robocop (2011) remakes. Remaking Red Dawn (1984) is absolutely absurd — Red Dawn is an anti-communist film — let Red Dawn and its star Patrick Swayze rest in peace … eternally in the ’80s … where they belong.

Unfortunately, nothing is sacred in the eyes of the Hollywood producer, for if he had any sort of sentimental thought, he would lose money. Instead, he swaps the premise of the WWIII Russian invasion with a WWIII Chinese invasion.

Futhermore, Daron Aronofsky cannot remake Paul Verhoeven’s Robocop (1987). Making a Robocop film without Peter Weller is a grand crime. Paul Verhoeven will always remain a better director the Aronosky. If anyone wants to argue this, be my guest.

Continue Reading »

Dithered

Julien Ducourthial studied audiovisual media at the Esba, France, graduating from there in 2006. The project Ilbm.info | Interleaved Bitmap | in reference to the amiga computer picture format, was created with artworks inspired by low-tech, graffiti & abstraction.

Continue Reading »

Jack Kentala’s Three Most-Favorite Films of 2009

2009, like most other years, saw me going to the theater probably less than a dozen times. Chalk it up to insane ticket prices, or obnoxious other-viewers, or the slimming release window between the theater and DVD, or my daily binge of a movie per day via Netflix, or, hell, I can be my usual curmudgeony self and say that it’s rare when ten good films come out in any given year. This fine online establishment has hosted my lukewarm reviews of Avatar and Where The Wild Things Are, to the downright-mauling of Inglorious Basterds and, to a lesser extent, Drag Me To Hell.

That said, I expect I’ll catch up on 2009 films early next year ‘round the Academy Awards, when most of these hit DVD. If nothing else, I expect good things from Up In The Air, if only because of director Jason Reitman (though I honestly don’t like Thank You For Smoking) and George Clooney. Considering that I just watched the 2000 film Tigerland, which criminally played in a scant five theaters, and now have placed next to Traffic as my favorite of the year, I figure I’ll run into some 2009 films that slipped through the cracks for the rest of my film-watching years.

Continue Reading »

Warning: Vegans and vegetarians may find this disturbing. These videos pick up where Food Inc. left off.

Seven or Eight years ago, a good friend threw me a Cold Steel disc, and that really heated up my house and my appetite for sharp knives. Actually, I don’t care about knives at all, but I do care about these videos. It brings a smile to my face to see a dude in a bowling shirt aggressively slash hanging meat. Cinder blocks, reed bundles, larger pieces of meat — the Cold Steel cutters up the ante every time.

Continue Reading »

Here’s a revised version of some artwork I designed for fun. Back in November, I submitted this to Adbusters Magazine for their end-of-the-year issue, Big Ideas of 2010. Once the magazine hit the news stands, I visited the Barnes and Noble on State St. to see if my design made the cut; It didn’t make the cut, but I was fine with it, because after skimming the mag, I realized that the design didn’t fit the theme of the issue anyway.

Continue Reading »