*GASP*

I'm back.

call me fucked.

to come...

Camden Rambles

C'mon, it's just that good

Back

Clogged

Ahoj.

Played two DJ gigs this week here in Prague (BIG MOUTH)

So naturally, I enduce paranoia by watching a film about a DJ gone deaf:

IT'S ALL GONE, PETE TONG
{Michael Dowse, 2005}

(special treat: my father is the Afrika Bambaata of Skype)

Ain't it wonderful?

Juke Joint Jezebel

MORTAL KOMBAT
{Paul W. Scott Anderson, 1995}

just to bring the 90's havoc full circle...

(plus it has that Halcyon+On+On song that's also in Hackers)

Get over here.

(Note: My favorite part of this clip is how casually Sub-Zero saunters down the stairs into the fight...like it's getting the mail or something. Hysterical)

HOLGER CZUKAY

For DC Tung

Collage College Collage

MAYHEN
{Abigail Child, 1989}

(IF VIDEO DOES NOT APPEAR, FOLLOW THIS LINK)

My cousin, Aeros, graduated from the Boston Museum School some years ago. She took a good number of film classes while she was studying various mediums (primarily installation and horticultural art) while she was seeing a film student (and now accomplished artist and professor) Cliff Evans. Many of these fantastic classes were taught by filmmaker Abigail Child, who's work I fell in love with while interning at the Filmmaker's Co-Operative in NYC. Aeros was kind enough to pass along some of the course reader's she had kept from her classes with Abigail, right before I left for Prague.

These readers are comprised of seminal texts from situationists, futurists, sound-theoreticians, marginalized feminists, towering film theorists and post-modern critics, creating a sort of penultimate discourse that is of course fucking painfully tautological, seemingly incongruent, wildly erratic in style, and only culminates in that sort of "french argument" system wherein one must tarry a wide loop before finally reaching an understandable thesis.

But, take my word for it, the loop is undoubtedly well worth it. Jeepers, I would have loved to have taken these classes myself. The same style of argument she uses to assemble her syllabi is what, in my opinion, makes her filmmaking such a brilliant example of cinema as disputation. The complexity of her sprawling structural montage of found-footage is as rich as each of these readers I was lucky to get from my lovely cousin to take with me to Prague...

Bloodshot CPUs + Leopard Cutoffs + Acid Burn

TONS of throwbacks the past couple of days.
The best logical selection following an early punk cinema revival that involves Suburbia and Ladies & Gentleman has to be a fresh, stimulating dose of mid-90's computer-punk magic.

So much offered in these:

❖ Patrick Stewart with a perfect moustache.

❖ The internet painted as an explorable, massive, 8-Bit glowing city within an endless digital vacuum.

❖ Early commentary on the dangers of electronically controlled markets and infrastructures
(blogging this...ironic?)

❖ Gameboy-shell laptops thicker than Little Caesar boxes

❖ Macintosh as a company. Apple as a company. Separate.

❖ Vincent Kartheiser cast playing the role of a savant (antithetical)

❖ Matthew Lilliard with eyeliner. (not really antithetical)

❖ Jonny Lee Miller attempting smeared yankee colloquialisms.

❖ Angelina Jolie in the period of her life where she still ate food.

❖ ...and, the biggest prize, triple XL tee-shirts with Audio company logos and every variation of fishnet ever dreamt up dominating the youth's low-fashion with a fierce tenacity.


Kinda brings you back don't it?

HACKERS
{Iain Softley, 1995}

MASTERMINDS
{Roger Christian, 1997}

A Figure of Speech

SYNECDOCHE, NEW YORK

{Charlie Kaufman, 2008}

...staggering, frustrating, humanizing.

...like a brilliant, voluminous headache of "ism's"...

definitely a re-read.

Nineteen Eighteen Nineteen Eightie

Double feature yesterday here in the Prague pad...

One punk classic that I love (with Flea!):

SUBURBIA
{Penelope Spheeris, 1984}

and the second, a pre-riot grrl masterpiece featuring an amazing sixteen-year old Diane Lane:

(recommended by E. Davidove)

LADIES & GENTLEMEN, THE FABULOUS STAINS
{Lou Adler, 1981}

Keep Yr Eyes Open.

- H.P.

Everything I would love to be

Hear Yeee, Here Yiii, Heuhr yehhh...

From hen's-fourth this blog will be updated much more, and stretch to include more than just film criticism, and I will be posting what I am watching with stills (a style Matthew Lax has perfected that I most humbly borrow) so that this blog is more than just academic writing and long, impossible paragraphs. It's all gonna change. Starting with the beauty of a piece above.

Ahoj,

H. P. Willis

Whitney Bros.

This piece was created with a special animation desk that was rigged out of a second-hand bought submachine gun.

That gun made mandalas. I'm in love.

Peter Jackson

In lieu of me actually finishing the post below...

Teaser from jawshpw on Vimeo.

THE HAMMER & ŠIKL

TWO NEW IDOLS OF FILM DISCIPLINE

JAN ŠIKL

(a.k.a. The Slick Mistah Šikl!)

"Czechoslovakia's twentieth century is a history of constant assault on human identity. Whether we talk about both of the World Wars, and then the communist system—, there were many regime changes throughout the century. Even the communist era had different chapters, some harsher than others and people had to adjust to the reality of the time. I think that all of this history is typically viewed only through the lens of power-politics, and the individual histories of people get lost."

(Šikl, Radio Praha, June 13, 2006)

***

As you may or may not know, my latest film (most likely my Senior Thesis at Syracuse) will be almost entirely comprised of a selection from hours and hours of archival footage of my family, magnificently shot by my great-grandmother in color 8-mm. The film will focus on my relationship with my father primarily, as well as discuss the unique disposition of him and his siblings (all five of whom have turned out either homosexual or bisexual). Obviously the personal nature of this type of project will make it very hard to produce.

Here in Prague, I recently had the opportunity to meet Czech filmmaker and FAMU alumni Jan Šikl after a screening of one of his works. My advisor (who is a filmmaker and fellow FAMU graduate from Bratislava, Slovakia) suggested I seek his advice about my own project because of his experience with archival footage. I am happy to say that he has agreed to meet to screen and discuss my footage, which I am absolutely ecstatic about.

Šikl is mainly an experimental documentarian, but recently, he has completed an eight-part series of individual films, each containing the private stories of various Czech families throughout the century. The work is entirely made from donated archival 9 1/2-mm (!) footage given by many willing families around the Czech Republic, entitled "Private Century: I-VIII."

The Individual films are:

KING OF VELICHOVKY

DADDY AND LILI MARLENE

STATUARY OF GRANDDAD VINDA

SEE YOU IN DENVER

A STROKE OF BUTTERFLY WINGS

WITH KISSES FROM YOUR LOVE

SMALL RUSSIAN CLOUDS OF SMOKE

A LOW-LEVEL FLIGHT

Each piece explores intimately the private lives + family lives of different members of Czech society throughout the 20th century, from the 1920's to about the late 70's, early 80's (the hayday of video). Šikl devoted himself to selecting and editing (with a dramaturgic eye) the unique footage of each donor family, in a way that both accurately retells their experiences textually and visually, and touches upon their inherent subtextual elements that form a commentary about Czech society through the ages and its relationship to the world and the constantly shifting political climate of our last century.

The only film I have seen of the series is the second episode, "Daddy and Lili Marlene" which is only one half of a family's story that is so rich, Šikl chose to stretch it over two episodes (the other being "King of Velichovky"). To save breath, for a summary of the episode, click here

"This series of films gives us the rare chance to enter and perhaps better understand particular moments in history—through the story of someone's intimate life. So the people are in the foreground, but it's always the case that events of 20th century Czechoslovak political history enter each and every one of these lives, quite often in a dramatic way, changing them forever."

(Šikl, Radio Praha, June 13, 2006)

This film in the series is remarkably powerful, painting the tenuous, closed-lip stoicism of a withering upper-class marriage and the dynamic home life of a well off German/Czech family. Seen from the artful perspective of their daughter, Eva, the narration meanders between dozens of affectionate memories expressing a cherished love now lost and longed for, and the more linear and historical progression of her personal experience. I am amazed at how acutely it psychologically details the dissolution of her parent's relationship and its affect on her life after their separation amidst the chaos of the 1940's and 50's in Europe...

I am inspired by Šikl's ability to condense and yet reinforce the universality of this story simply by controlling the editing and its accompanying sound and narration.

I hope that I can learn from him to apply a similar power of selection, in order to construct my own footage as its own commentary on both the epical nature of world politics, and the troubled evolution of civilized society and the human condition.

The entirety of these eight works are currently being screened in an exhibition at the MOMA in NYC, and have won numerous festival awards (click here to read more).

**********************************************************************************

ALEXANDER HACKENSCHMIED

(a.k.a. Alexander Hammid)

(also not really known by the nickname I just gave him:

Alex The Hammer)

(POST IN PROGRESS...)

(SORRY FOR THE WAIT...)

Internship Shangri-La

Danila and I are trying to get an internship with Chris Handtke, the producer for Will Ferrell & John C. Riley. He is also the founder of funnyordie.com which is what we will most likely be working on (sidenote: Danila and I have our small comic short film "Mansound" up on funnyordie. Click the link (the word "Mansound") and tell us what you think! Please Vote.

Absolute Films & The heart-breaking mind-fuck!

My Avant-garde teacher is amazing. His name is Martin Cihak, and he looks like a mix from the short french fellow from The Science of Sleep and Golem from the LOTR trilogy. And that is with absolutely no exaggeration.

This week we reviewed German Avant-garde Film from the 1920's. This consisted of viewing screenings by four artists. The first three are extremely influential in terms of avant-garde as a larger movement, but the fourth and last is my new absolute obsession...



1) Walther Rutmann:

-Opus 1,2,3,& 4 {1921-25}

-Das Wunder (The Wonder) {1922}

- Falkentraum (The Dream of the Falcon) {1923 silent}



2) Viking Eggeling:

-Diagonal Sinfonie (Diagonal Symphony) {1923-25}



3) Hans Richter:

- Rhythmus 21 (Film is Rhythm) {1923-25 silent}

-Filmstudie {1926 silent}

- Vormittagsspuk (Ghosts Before Breakfast) {1927-28 silent}

-Zweigroschenzauber (Two-Pence Magic) {1928-29}

-Inflation {1928}

AND MY NEW HERO:



4) Oskar Fischinger:

-Seelische Konstruktionen (Spiritual Constructions) {1930}

-Studie 7 {1930-1931. Music = Brahms Hungarian Dance No. 5}

-Kreise (Circles) {1933. Music = Richard Wagner, Edvard Grieg}

-Muratti greift ein (Here Comes Muratti) {1934. Gasparcolor}

-Muratti Privat {1935}

-Komposition in Blau (Composition in Blue) {1935. Music = Otto Nikolai, overture from "The Merry Wivesof Windsor." Gasparcolor}

-Motion Painting No. 1 {1947. Music = Bach, Bradenburg Concerto No. 3}

While studying this spring at FAMU in Prague, I am getting the opportunity to take both practice and theory classes from some of the best artists in contemporary Czech Cinema. Not only will I be learning the art and extreme difficulty of the 35mm format (an experience only myself and the other 5 students from Syracuse accompanying me are afforded, out of our bigger group of about 40 other students) as well as sponge up a more in-depth understanding of European Cinema, especially within the camps of Surrealism and the Avant-Garde.

I'm going to try to write as much criticism of the works we view as I can, which for the most part, I imagine, will turn more into unadulterated praise (because honestly, its all been that good thus far).

Currently we are learning about the basic films of the Czech New Wave in a special screening series (made specifically for international students). This includes the following films:

- The Joke
- Larks On A String
- Closely Watched Trains
- Shop On The Main Square
- Daisies
- Loves of a Blonde

(also, privately, I watched "Little Otik", another film we were recommended to see, on my newfound netflix "instant view" which I've figured out how to use in Europe.)

Each of these films deserves its own post, but would require a second viewing. Perhaps later.

The rest of the work that we've been learning about in our electives deserves a separate post each as well, so I'll save those for later.

Basically, sorry for the delay in posts! Back to work for me!

Na Shledanou!

-H