A nice post script to yesterday post about the film The Great Flood.
John Schaefer interviewed filmmaker Bill Morrison today.
WNYC-FM, Podcast for Tuesday, January 7, 2014.
Soundcheck is "WNYC’s on-air and online destination for new music, live performances, and engaging conversations with artists, critics, and tastemakers." Hosted by John Schaefer every weeknight at 9 p.m. on 93.9 FM and WNYC.org.
Jan 7, 2014
p.s. Great Songs About The Great Flood, on WNYC's Soundcheck
Jan 6, 2014
A Great Flood of Film: Theatrical Premiere Jan 8-16
The year 2013 concluded with, among other things, Bill Morrison's film Decasia (2002) being named to the National Film Registry. Now 2014 begins with another achievement in archival film artistry. The Great Flood is Bill Morrison's latest feature-length compilation of extraordinary strips of celluloid, scored with an original engaging music track by guitarist genius Bill Frisell. The film has its theatrical premiere and a week-long run at NYC's IFC Center, January 8 through 16, with four screenings daily (at 11am, 12:45, 4:20, & 8pm).
Go to the evening shows on Thursday, Friday, or Saturday to see/hear the filmmaker speak about this look at the historic Mississippi River floods of 1927.
Judging from the sneak preview clip we saw at NYU Cinema Studies on December 4, 2013, The Great Flood is another visually stunning work. The footage scanned from the original 35mm newsfilm in the University of South Carolina's Moving Image Research Collections is particularly glorious in its resolution. Not all of the scenes are from USC MIRC films, but those that are stand out from the others. Better originals; better digital copying from the Carolina keepers of the Fox newsreel outtakes.
As ever, Mr. Morrison will also be revealing new work [yet untitled] at the 2014 Orphan Film Symposium in Amsterdam (March 30-April 2). So the OFS is happy to point you to this new theatrical run.
Here's the trailer from "friend of the show," Icarus Films (frequent provider of swell doorprizes at symposia past).
from Icarus Films.
(Icarus: Love their unabashed motto: "Serious documentaries are good for you.")
Find the IFC Center at 323 Sixth Avenue at West Third Street
Box office: (212) 924-7771
Dec 18, 2013
about the 2013 National Film Registry, and orphan films
Among the lesser known or neglected (i.e., orphan-ish) titles add today to the National Film Registry are these. The blurbs are (mostly) from the Library of Congress's news release (http://www.loc.gov/today/pr/2013/13-216.html). I've add some Orphan Film Symposium notes.
Decasia (2002)
Bill Morrison created his "found footage" collage from scraps of decades-old decomposing film. With music by composer Michael Gordon, "Decasia" hypnotizes and teases with images that fade and transform themselves right before the viewer’s eyes. Culling footage from archives across the country…. [principally at U of So. Car.]
* Screened at the 2002 Orphan Film Symposium. And the subject of a few blog posts here one year ago.
Men and Dust (1940)
Produced and directed by Lee Dick—a woman pioneer in the field of documentary filmmaking—and written and shot by her husband Sheldon, this labor advocacy film is about diseases plaguing miners in Kansas, Missouri and Oklahoma. Sponsored by the Tri-State Survey Committee, "Men and Dust" is a stylistically innovative documentary and a valuable ecological record of landscapes radically transformed by extractive industry.
* Screened during the 2012 NYU Orphan Film Symposium at the Museum of the Moving Image, as presented by Dan Friedlaender and Adrianne Finelli. This was also part of a session called "Progressive Education and Labor Advocacy: A Lee Dick Retrospective," in which we also screened School: A Film About Progressive Education (1939) with introductions by Craig Kridel, Ivan von Sauer, and original School cast member Eugene Perl.
The whole of the Men and Dust can viewed and downloaded here: http://www.nyu.edu/orphanfilm/orphans8/mov8/Men_and_Dust.mov. +Audio of the talks by all of the above are on the Orphans site too.
Cicero March (1966)
During the summer of 1966, the Chicago Freedom Movement, led by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., targeted Chicago in a drive to end de facto segregation in northern cities and ensure better housing, education and job opportunities for African Americans. After violent rioting and a month of demonstrations, the city reached an agreement with King, in part to avoid a threatened march for open housing in the neighboring all-white town of Cicero, Ill., the scene of a riot 15 years earlier when a black couple tried to move into an apartment there. King called off further demonstrations, but other activists marched in Cicero on Sept. 4, an event preserved on film in this eight-minute, cinema-verité piece. Using lightweight, handheld equipment, the Chicago-based Film Group, Inc. filmmakers situated themselves in the midst of confrontations and captured for posterity the viciousness of northern reactions to civil-rights reforms.
During the summer of 1966, the Chicago Freedom Movement, led by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., targeted Chicago in a drive to end de facto segregation in northern cities and ensure better housing, education and job opportunities for African Americans. After violent rioting and a month of demonstrations, the city reached an agreement with King, in part to avoid a threatened march for open housing in the neighboring all-white town of Cicero, Ill., the scene of a riot 15 years earlier when a black couple tried to move into an apartment there. King called off further demonstrations, but other activists marched in Cicero on Sept. 4, an event preserved on film in this eight-minute, cinema-verité piece. Using lightweight, handheld equipment, the Chicago-based Film Group, Inc. filmmakers situated themselves in the midst of confrontations and captured for posterity the viciousness of northern reactions to civil-rights reforms.
*The soundtrack from Cicero March was part of Andy Uhrich's presentation at Orphans Midwest ("The Film Group of Chicago: Advertising Films and Verité Documentary of the 1960s and 70s"). Kudos too to Chicago Film Archives, which houses the Film Group Collection.
Bless Their Little Hearts (1984)
Billy Woodberry's UCLA thesis film. Part of the vibrant New Wave of independent African-American filmmakers to emerge in the 1970s and 1980s, Woodberry became a key figure in the movement known as the L.A. Rebellion.
Billy Woodberry's UCLA thesis film. Part of the vibrant New Wave of independent African-American filmmakers to emerge in the 1970s and 1980s, Woodberry became a key figure in the movement known as the L.A. Rebellion.
UCLA Film & Television Archive notes: "Restored from the original 16mm b/w negative A/B rolls and the original 16mm optical soundtrack."
Brandy in the Wilderness (1969)
This introspective "contrived diary" film features vignettes from the relationship of a real-life couple, in this case the director Stanton Kaye (as Simon Weiss) and his girlfriend [Michaux French as Brandy]. Reminiscent of Jim McBride’s "David Holzman’s Diary"—this simulated autobiography blurs the lines between reality and illusion, moving in non-linear arcs through the ever-evolving and unpredictable interactions.
This introspective "contrived diary" film features vignettes from the relationship of a real-life couple, in this case the director Stanton Kaye (as Simon Weiss) and his girlfriend [Michaux French as Brandy]. Reminiscent of Jim McBride’s "David Holzman’s Diary"—this simulated autobiography blurs the lines between reality and illusion, moving in non-linear arcs through the ever-evolving and unpredictable interactions.
Daughter of Dawn (1920)
A fascinating example of the daringly unexpected topics and scope showcased by the best regional, independent filmmaking during the silent era, "Daughterof Dawn" features an all-Native-American cast of Comanches and Kiowas [including a son and daughter of famed Comanche chief Quanah Parker (son of Cynthia Ann Parker, upon whose captivity experience that little Registry film called The Searchers (John Ford, 1956) was based]. Restored by the Oklahoma Historical Society. NFPF grant. To be released by Milestone Films. Clips here and elswhere:
A fascinating example of the daringly unexpected topics and scope showcased by the best regional, independent filmmaking during the silent era, "Daughterof Dawn" features an all-Native-American cast of Comanches and Kiowas [including a son and daughter of famed Comanche chief Quanah Parker (son of Cynthia Ann Parker, upon whose captivity experience that little Registry film called The Searchers (John Ford, 1956) was based]. Restored by the Oklahoma Historical Society. NFPF grant. To be released by Milestone Films. Clips here and elswhere:
The Hole (1962)
(viewable here)
Animators John and Faith Hubley created "an observation," as the opening title credits put it, a meditation on the possibility of an accidental nuclear catastrophe.
Notes on the Port of St. Francis (1951)
(viewable here)
Frank Stauffacher introduced the Art in Cinema series at the San Francisco Museum of Art in 1947 and made work influencing a generation of West Coast filmmakers.
[NFPF Avant-Garde Masters grant. Preserved by Pacific Film Archives.]
+
Martha Graham Early Dance Films (1931-1944)
"Heretic," 1931; "Frontier," 1936; "Lamentation," 1943; "Appalachian Spring," 1944.
Frontier was filmed by storied documentarian Julien Bryan [whose film Siege (1940) is on the Registry] and Jules Bucher.and
Planetbenjamin's YouTube upload says:
Filmed in 1943 at Bennington College by Russian-born sculptor Simon Moselsio. His wife [Herta, by name. -- ed.], who took still photos of the same piece, explained "We used two movie cameras for the motion picture, so we could take the picture from different angles.... I had the still camera around my neck and made the stills at the same time."
The Library of Congress notes for its Herta Moselsio Collection of 11" x 14" photos also indicate Herta shot motion-picture film. At various places official and otherwise Lamentation photos and movie footage are identified as taken in 1935, 1937, 1939, and 1943. Everyone seems to agree, however, that Graham first performed the piece in 1930.
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| Herta Moselsio "Lamentation,"ca. summer 1937 Silver gelatin prints Music Division Purchase, 2001 (233.2, 234.2) |
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Dec 5, 2013
Amsterdam hotels for the March 30-April 2 symposium.
Discount rates end February 27.
For attendees of the Orphan Film Symposium who seek a hotel in Amsterdam, here is a list.Commissioned by EYE, Preferred Hotel Reservations has created blocks of rooms at discounted rates at several hotels close to the Symposium's venue.
https://preferredreservations.nl/9th-orphan-film-symposium
The 9th Orphan Film Symposium
Date of the event: 30 March 2014 - 2 April 2014
@ EYE Film Institute Netherlands, IJpromenade 1
Dec 3, 2013
John Bailey's report on "Orphan Films at the Dunn" and PORTRAIT OF JASON
The great cinematographer and director John Bailey is also active in film preservation issues, serving on the National Film Preservation Board, where he and the also-great Caleb Deschanel (also a supporter of orphan film concerns) represent the American Society of Cinematographers.
I was pleased that Bailey attended the Orphan Film Symposium event that AMPAS hosted May 10-11, 2013, at the Academy Film Archive's Linwood Dunn Theater in Hollywood. We had a short but engaged conversation on the second day, most which was about the revelatory experience of watching the Academy and Milestone's restoration of the 1967 Shirley Clarke film Portrait of Jason.
Today's edition of "John's Bailiwick" blog, entitled "Orphan Films at the Dunn," is his report on that event. Recommended reading!
ds
Nov 28, 2013
Updates on the "Orphans 9" programme
New details in the program(me) -- including the welcome news that filmmaker Paul Cohen (Dutch Film & TV Academy) will join us and contribute new work based on footage shot a third of a century ago and now archived at EYE.
The 9th Orphan Film Symposium (aka "Orphans 9")
The Future of Obsolescence
March 30 - April 2, 2014 at EYE in Amsterdam
The Future of Obsolescence
March 30 - April 2, 2014 at EYE in Amsterdam
Register to attend.
The symposium begins Sunday evening, March 30, with a “film concert” of new preservation work from the EYE collections. Experimental film curator Simona Monizza introduces abstract animated films by Maarten Visser, with new music by Marcel Worms (as well as the NYU Film Scoring Program). Silent film curator Elif Rongen-Kaynakçi presents the world premiere of EYE’s restoration of the feature film East Is West (1922), starring Constance Talmadge.
The symposium begins Sunday evening, March 30, with a “film concert” of new preservation work from the EYE collections. Experimental film curator Simona Monizza introduces abstract animated films by Maarten Visser, with new music by Marcel Worms (as well as the NYU Film Scoring Program). Silent film curator Elif Rongen-Kaynakçi presents the world premiere of EYE’s restoration of the feature film East Is West (1922), starring Constance Talmadge.
Then, March 31 • April 1 • April 2: Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, from morning through the evening, sessions are scheduled to include these (and others):
Thomas Elsaesser On Obsolescence
Mary Huelsbeck (Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research) and Dennis Doros (Milestone Films) outtakes and ‘lost’ films of director Shirley Clarke
Grover Crisp (Sony Pictures Entertainment) How Death of a Salesman (1951) became an orphan work; screening of the never-released Columbia Short Subject Career of a Salesman (1951)
Bill Morrison premieres a new work derived from his collection of Super 8 films
Evan Meaney (U of South Carolina) Archival Encryption, Encoding, and Error as Narrative: de_ca/sia.py (work in progress)
May Haduong (Academy Film Archive) restored films by Aloha Wanderwell
May Haduong (Academy Film Archive) restored films by Aloha Wanderwell
Doug Goodwin (Cal Arts) on Serios (Rebecca Baron, forthcoming), an experimental documentary about the “thoughtographic” films & photos attributed to Ted Serios (1918-2006).
Ron Magliozzi and Peter Williamson (MoMA New York) rushes from the unreleased Darktown Troubles (Biograph, ca. 1914), starring comedy legend Bert Williams
Ned Thanhouser introduces the newly-preserved Clarence Cheats at Croquet (Thanhouser Co., 1915) for the National Film Preservation Foundation.
Susan Aasman et al. (U of Groningen) reconstructing historical practices of home movie making
The Albanian Cinema Project: with Thomas Logoreci (Marubi Academy of Film, Tirana) and others; screenings include the ethnochoreographic KF-16 [Albanian dances from northwest and north regions] (Ramazan Bogdani, 1972), preserved in 16mm by BB Optics with NYU Moving Image Archiving and Preservation students. Also excerpts from new restorations, including: Nëntori i dytë (The Second November) (Viktor Gjika, 1982).
Frank Scheffer and Paul Cohen premiere a new work made from their never-released 1980 documentary footage of American Zoetrope people (Francis Ford Coppola, Walter Murch, Wim Wenders, Scott Bartlett, Tom Waits, et al.)
Giovanna Fossati (EYE) Restoring the Colors of Early Cinema
Andrea Krämer (HTW Berlin) and Martin Koerber (Deutsche Kinemathek) Restoring Gasparcolor
Franziska Latell (Academy of Arts, Berlin) on the work of filmmaker and collector Werner
Werner Nekes on optical toys and precinema objects
Dan Streible (NYU) restoring Edison Kinetoscopic Record of a Sneeze (1894) at LOC
Charles Musser (Yale U) presents Industry’s Disinherited (Unions Films, 1949)
Maria Vinogradova (NYU) amateur film in the Soviet Union, including Na odnoi zemle / On the Same Earth (People's Film Studio of DK Proftekhobrazovania, 1977)
Chris Wahl (HFF Potsdam) work from Betriebsfilmstudio GDR
Jiří Horníček (Czech National Film Archive) Czech amateur auteurs
Ralf Forster (Filmmuseum Potsdam) East German amateur films
Monika Supruniuk (Akademia Sztuk Pięknych) OKO: Polish amateur movie camera (1914)
Elżbieta Wysocka (Filmoteka Narodowa) Unused Polish newsreel footage (ca. 1946-1990)
Heidi Rae Cooley (U of South Carolina) outtakes from The Augustas (Scott Nixon, ca. 1950s) -- including newfound footage shot in Augusta, Sicily.
Ramesh Kumar (NYU) policy vs. practice of national film archives in the digital era
Karen Cariani (WGBH Archive), Mark G. Cooper (U of South Carolina), and Mark J. Williams (Dartmouth) on newsfilm collections and the Media Ecology Project
Reto Kromer (reto.ch) CBS EVR version of The 8mm Film: Its Emerging Role in Education (1966)
Yvonne Zimmermann (Philipps-Universität Marburg) Hans Richter’s Die Eroberung des Himmels (Conquest of the Sky) (1938) restored by Cinémathèque suisse
Juana Suárez (NYU MIAP preservation exchange with Fundación Patrimonio Fílmico Colombiano) Outtakes from Gloria Triana's series Yuruparí (FOCINE-Audiovisuales, 1983-86), documenting Colombian music, holidays, and popular traditions from Afrodescendant and indigenous communities
Andrés Levinson and Paula Félix-Didier (Museo del Cine de Buenos Aires) two Argentine family versions of Little Red Riding Hood: Jorge Mendez Delfino’s 16mm black-and-white Caperucita Roja (1933) and his daughter’s Super 8 color remake (196?). Plus a film about dogs parachuting into Antarctica[!]
Benedict Olgado (NFA Philippines) and Bill Brand (BB Optics) restoration of On My Way to India Consciousness, I Reached China (Henry Francia, 1968)
Rob Byrne (San Francisco Silent Film Festival) Restoring The Last Edition (Emory Johnson, 1925)
Julia Noordegraaf (U of Amsterdam) and Simona Monizza, challenges of restoring the Bart Vegter collection (floppy disks, Super 8s, hard drives, etc. etc. etc.)
Eef Masson (U of Amsterdam) on pedagogy and the obsolescence of archival knowledge
Alexandra Schneider and Wanda Strauven (U of Amsterdam) Children as Media Archaeologists
Nicola Mazzanti (Cinémathèque Royale de Belgique), Géraldine Vooren (EYE legal counsel), and Thomas Christensen (Danish Film Institute) on the EU Directive for an Audiovisual Orphan Works Registry; moderated by Howard Besser (NYU)
Additional contributions from students in the master's program at NYU (Moving Image Archiving and Preservation, aka MIAP) and the UvA (Preservation and Presentation of the Moving Image, aka P&P)
and screenings from the University of South Carolina Moving Image Research Collectons:
• a 35mm restoration of A Frontier Post (Fox Varieties, 1925) a never-released documentary about the "buffalo soldiers" of the U.S. 10th Cavalry Regiment
• MVTN 2-50 Egyptian (Whirling Dervishes) Dancers (Fox Movietone News, 1928)
• silent outtakes from Josephine Baker Visit Volendam (Fox Movietone News, 1928), filmed by Dutch film pioneer Mac Djorski [George Debels]. Preview here.
 |
| Viewable on the USC MIRC DVR http://mirc.sc.edu |
Nov 23, 2013
Some (but not all) of the presentations expected at "Orphans 9"
Some (but not all) of the presentations expected at "Orphans 9" -- The Future of Obsolescence, March 30 through April 2, 2014, in Amsterdam.
The symposium begins Sunday evening, March 30, 2014, with a “film concert” of new preservation work from the EYE collections. Experimental film curator Simona Monizza introduces abstract animated films by Maarten Visser, with new music by Marcel Worms as well as the NYU Film Scoring Program. Silent film curator Elif Rongen-Kaynakçi presents the world premiere of EYE’s restoration of the feature film East Is West (1922), starring Constance Talmadge.
Then, March 31 • April 1 • April 2:
Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, from morning through the evening, sessions are scheduled to include these (and others):
Thomas Elsaesser On Obsolescence
Bill Morrison premieres a new work derived from his collection of Super 8 films
Evan Meaney (U of South Carolina) Archival Encryption, Encoding, and Error as Narrative: de_ca/sia.py (work in progress)
Doug Goodwin (Cal Arts) on Serios (Rebecca Baron, forthcoming), an experimental documentary about the “thoughtographic” films & photos attributed to Ted Serios (1918-2006). Sneak preview screening, with Rebecca Baron.
Grover Crisp (Sony Pictures Entertainment) How Death of a Salesman (1951) became an orphan work; screening of the never-released Columbia Short Subject Career of a Salesman (1951)
Ron Magliozzi and Peter Williamson (MoMA New York) rushes from the unreleased Darktown Troubles (Biograph, ca. 1914), starring comedy legend Bert Williams
Ned Thanhouser introduces the newly-preserved Clarence Cheats at Croquet (Thanhouser Co., 1915) for the National Film Preservation Foundation.
Susan Aasman et al. (U of Groningen) reconstructing historical practices of home movie making
Albanian Cinema Project: with Thomas Logoreci (Marubi Academy of Film, Tirana) and others; screenings include KF-16 [Albanian dances from northwest and north regions] (Ramazan Bogdani, U of Tirana Folklore Institute, 1972), preserved in 16mm by BB Optics with NYU Moving Image Archiving and Preservation students. Also excerpts from new restorations: Nëntori i dytë (The Second November) (Viktor Gjika, 1982) and Tomka and His Friends (Xhanfise Keko, 1977)
Frank Scheffer premieres a new work made from his never-released 1980 documentary footage of American Zoetrope people (Francis Ford Coppola, Wim Wenders, Scott Bartlett, Tom Waits, et al.)
Giovanna Fossati (EYE) Restoring the Colors of Early Cinema
Andrea Krämer (HTW Berlin) and Martin Koerber (Deutsche Kinemathek) Restoring Gasparcolor
Franziska Latell (Academy of Arts, Berlin) on the work of filmmaker and collector Werner
Werner Nekes on optical toys and precinema objects
Dan Streible (NYU) restoring Edison Kinetoscopic Record of a Sneeze (1894) at LOC
Mary Huelsbeck (Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research) and Dennis Doros (Milestone Films) outtakes and ‘lost’ films of director Shirley Clarke
Charles Musser (Yale U) presents Industry’s Disinherited (Unions Films, 1949)
Maria Vinogradova (NYU) amateur film in the Soviet Union, including Na odnoi zemle / On the Same Earth (People's Film Studio of DK Proftekhobrazovania, 1977)
Chris Wahl (HFF Potsdam) work from Betriebsfilmstudio GDR
Jiří Horníček (Czech National Film Archive) Czech amateur auteurs
Ralf Forster (Filmmuseum Potsdam) East German amateur films
Monika Supruniuk (Akademia Sztuk Pięknych) OKO: Polish amateur movie camera (1914)
Elżbieta Wysocka (Filmoteka Narodowa) Unused Polish newsreel footage (ca. 1946-1990)
Heidi Rae Cooley (U of South Carolina) outtakes from The Augustas (Scott Nixon, ca. 1950s) -- including newfound footage shot in Augusta, Sicily.
Ramesh Kumar (NYU) policy vs. practice of national film archives in the digital era
Karen Cariani (WGBH Archive), Mark G. Cooper (U of South Carolina), and Mark J. Williams (Dartmouth) on newsfilm collections and the Media Ecology Project
Reto Kromer (reto.ch) CBS EVR version of The 8mm Film: Its Emerging Role in Education (1966)
Yvonne Zimmermann (Philipps-Universität Marburg) Hans Richter’s Die Eroberung des Himmels (Conquest of the Sky) (1938) restored by Cinémathèque suisse
Juana Suárez (NYU MIAP preservation exchange with Fundación Patrimonio Fílmico Colombiano) Outtakes from Gloria Triana's series Yuruparí (FOCINE-Audiovisuales, 1983-86), documenting Colombian music, holidays, and popular traditions from Afrodescendant and indigenous communities
Andrés Levinson and Paula Félix-Didier (Museo del Cine de Buenos Aires) two Argentine family versions of Little Red Riding Hood: Jorge Mendez Delfino’s 16mm black-and-white Caperucita Roja (1933) and his daughter’s Super 8 color remake (196?). Plus a film about dogs parachuting into Antarctica[!]
Benedict Olgado (NFA Philippines) and Bill Brand (BB Optics) restoration of On My Way to India Consciousness, I Reached China (Henry Francia, 1968)
Rob Byrne (San Francisco Silent Film Festival) Restoring The Last Edition (Emory Johnson, 1925)
Julia Noordegraaf (U of Amsterdam) and Simona Monizza, restoring the Bart Vegter collection
Eef Masson (U of Amsterdam) on pedagogy and the obsolescence of archival knowledge
Alexandra Schneider and Wanda Strauven (U of Amsterdam) Children as Media Archaeologists
Nicola Mazzanti (Cinémathèque Royale de Belgique), Géraldine Vooren (EYE legal counsel), and Thomas Christensen (Danish Film Institute) on FORWARD: the EU Directive for an Audiovisual Orphan Works Registry; moderated by Howard Besser (NYU)
and from the University of South Carolina Moving Image Research Collectons:
• a 35mm restoration of A Frontier Post (Fox Varieties, 1925) a never-released documentary about the "buffalo soldiers" of the U.S. 10th Cavalry Regiment
• MVTN 2-50 Egyptian (Whirling Dervishes) Dancers (Fox Movietone News, 1928)
• silent outtakes from Josephine Baker Visit Volendam (Fox Movietone News, 1928), filmed by Dutch film pioneer Mac Djorski [George Debels]
|
| Viewable on the USC MIRC DVR http://mirc.sc.edu/islandora/object/usc%3A1750 |
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