Exploring Your Inner Demons

A programme compiled by Jack Stevenson. Viewed at Cinema Orion, 28 Feb 2009. 16mm
The programme note with comments.

EXPLORING YOUR INNER DEMONS: A SAMPLING OF AMERICAN UNDERGROUND CINEMA
Presented by Jack Stevenson
"American author and print collector Jack Stevenson has complied an entertaining and thought-provoking program that spans American Underground cinema from the Mid-60’s to the modern day and captures the essence of what personal (aka ‘underground’) filmmaking is all about."
In order of play:
BEHIND EVERY GOOD MAN - 1966, 9 min., by Nikolai Ursin. Home movie style docu-drama about a day in the life of a negro transvestite living in mid-60's Los Angeles. / AA: recovered by Jack from an unmarked cardboard box
HOLD ME WHILE I'M NAKED - 1966, 15 min., color, by George Kuchar. One of the best loved films of the 60s underground, a playful satire of motion picture making: the fantasy of Hollywood glamour collides with the reality of loneliness in the Bronx. /AA: colour ok in GK's most famous film, exploring his own feelings in a mode now familiar from webcams, the diarist format, 0 budget
THE CRAVEN SLUCK, 1967, 23 min. b/w, directed by Mike Kuchar. This film concerns itself with the sordid domestic routines of a typical Bronx married couple, Adel and her goofy salaryman husband, Brunswick, played by Bob. Adel - played with verve by Floraine Connors - seeks escape in the arms of a secret lover, Morton, played by George Kuchar. To complicate matters, Morton is married, to a rotund, pill-popping frump called Florence, played by Bob in a cheap wig. Yet all these complications of the flesh are suddenly rendered inconsequential by a squadron of attacking UFOs that vaporize the leading lady and bring the plot to an unexpected and gloriously implausible halt. The skillful use of music in the Hollywood tradition makes the story come alive. / AA: the fascination with glamour, living in the most unglamourous Bronx, the mixture of horror, melodrama, scifi, 0 budget
ROCKFLOW: 1968, 9 min. color, directed by Bob Cowan. This 9 minute film is constructed largely of footage Bob shot at The Electric Circus (in NYC) in connection with the opening of a boutique there at which the Chambers Brothers rock band played. Mod fashions are on display as folks pack the dance floor, including Donna Kerness (in trademark antenna headgear) and Hopeton Morris (their outfits designed by Hope). But what appears to be a straightforward if experimental fashion/dance/rock document changes mid-point into a psychedelic nightmare as eerie music creates an ominous mood, the images grow more hallucinatory and the editing more rapid-fire. Donna now reappears in a solitary setting in close-up, swinging giant earrings and staring at the camera as if she's casting a spell. The effect is sinister and trance-like as special effects bombard the screen. / AA: a fascinating psychedelic discovery, a fine example of rock music and dance film, a great sense of rhythm
LOVE IT / LEAVE IT: 1970, 15 min., color. This second film by Tom Palazzolo more fluidly weaves sound and image together to create an hallucinatory montage of urban America at the height of anti-war demonstrations. Equal parts totalitarian nightmare and candy-coated consumer fun fair, it is like most of his work: devoid of overt editorial comment and full of ambiguity – a searching to capture the spirit and times and people without imposing the filmmaker’s own political agenda. /AA: a nudist movie juxtaposing militarism and nudism, with a fine musique concrète score
SIAMESE TWIN PINHEADS - 1972, 4 min., b&w, Kurt McDowell and Mark Ellinger do their perverse ‘siamese twin pinhead’ act.The two would stand at the center of San Francisco’s rebellious underground film scene of the 70’s. / AA: the makers of Thundercrack! in an offensive short film of two masturbating imbecile twin pinheads, compared by Jack with Lars von Trier's Idiots
ASTHMA – 1995, 2 min., by Martha Colburn / an early collage film on the subject of smoking. One of her most straight-forward films, it hints at the more frenetic style she would later adopt. / AA: belongs to the music video phenomenon, wonderful, broken, rapid cutting, rhythm, dots, patterns, signs, interesting music by Smoking Jaunties
SPIDERS IN LOVE – 2000, 2.5 minutes, by Martha Colburn / A gloriously chaotic take on sex, spiders and various other hallucinations – handmade annimation and some found footage clips. / AA: belongs to the music video phenomenon, "an arachnorgasmic musical", rapid cutting, penis obsession, death imagery
END

The Films of Mika Taanila 3

Tampereen elokuvajuhlat 2008 traileri / Tampere Film Festival 2008 Trailer (2008) 35mm, 0'30"
Pidän tästä hiljaisuudesta / I Like This Silence (1983-1986) dvd, 1'20"
Fysikaalinen rengas / A Physical Ring (2002) 35mm, 4'40"
Täydellisen pimennyksen vyöhyke / The Zone of Total Eclipse (2002) 2 x 16mm, 6'
Optinen ääni / Optical Sound (2005) 35mm, 2,35:1, 6'
Thank You For the Music - elokuva muzakista / Thank You For the Music - A Film About Muzak (1997) 35mm, 24'
RoboCup99 / RoboCup99 - We Have a Dream (2000) 35mm, 25'
Total duration of the programme: 75 min. Viewed at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 7 Feb 2009.

A great programme with a wonderful variation, and the many technical challenges were met perfectly, including the special double-16mm presentation of The Zone of Total Eclipse with two moving 16mm projectors.

Tulevaisuus ei ole entisensä

The Future Is Not What It Used to Be / Framtiden är inte vad den brukade vara. FI 2002. D: Mika Taanila.
Excerpts from Erkki Kurenniemi's short films:
- Winterreise (1964)
- Electronics In The World of Tomorrow (1964)
- Computer Music (1966)
- Firenze (1970)
- Sex Show (1968)
- Flora & Fauna (1965)
- Carnaby Street (1968)
and the video work of Kurts:
- Videokirje tulevaisuuteen [A Video Letter to the Future] (1990)
Also excerpts from tv programs (YLE):
- Kahdeksan tahtia tietokoneelle [Eight Beats for the Computer] (1967)
- Tv-aktuellt (1968)
- Ihmisen uudet mahdollisuudet [Man's New Opportunities] (1969)
- Ungdom för helvete [Youth for Hell] (1969)
- Dimi-baletti [Dimi Ballet] (1971)
- Mihin menet Suomi? [Where Do You Go To, Finland?] (1979)
- A-studio (1980)
- A-raportti: Mikrojen maihinnousu [The Invasion of the Micro Computer] (1982)
- Numero 110384-1984, rekisteröity, tilastoitu ja kauko-ohjattu kansalainen [Number 110384: the Registered, Statistically Computed and Remote-Controlled Citizen] (1984)
- Lauantailokki (1987)
- TV-uutiset (1999)
And commissioned films by Filminor:
- Pakasteet [Frozen Foods] (1969, D: Jarva, M: EK)
- Tietokoneet palvelevat [The Computer At Your Service] (1968, D: Jarva, M: EK)
- Cosmic Love (Ruotsi, D: Jonas Sima) [Thank you, Mika Taanila, 10 Feb 2009, for the excerpt credits.]
54 min. A 35mm SES print with English subtitles by Jaana Wiik. Viewed at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 31 Jan 2009. - Presented by Mika Taanila. - A good print.
Official synopsis: "A documentary film about Erkki Kurenniemi (b. 1941), whose career represents a surprisingly natural blend of music, film, computers, robotics, science and art. His project of collecting everything around him will perhaps be the most significant of all his works. Kurenniemi records his thoughts, observations, objects and images constantly, with manic precision, with the ultimate goal of merging man and machine - reconstructing the human soul."
"Kurenniemi's story is a fascinating and forceful depiction of a forgotten visionary; it is significant because of the cultural history of the unique, never-before-seen archive material alone. The documentary includes footage of the unique DIMI instruments developed by Kurenniemi, and segments from unfinished experimental short films from the 1960s."
"The Future is not what it used to be is a film about the 1960s avant-garde in music and film, the early history of microcomputers and the open questions of 21st century science."
"The film is a logical and thematic follow-up for Mika Taanila's earlier works exploring technology and the world around us; namely Thank You For the Music, Futuro and RoboCup99. The film looks into the past, but very clearly far ahead into the future through it."
Revisited the fascinating documentary by Mika Taanila, which is also a great experimental film, about a great experimental man.

THE FILMS OF MIKA TAANILA 1 + PORI WITH CIRCLE LIVE

Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 17 Jan 2009.

Futuro - tulevaisuuden olotila / Futuro - en framtidsutopi / Futuro - A New Stance for Tomorrow. FI (c) 1998. Kinotar. D: Mika Taanila. 30 min. - A good SES print with English subtitles by Jaana Wiik. - Revisited: the brilliant documentary on the UFO-shaped Futuro house (1968) by Matti Suuronen.

Circle in live concert (Janne Westerlund: guitar, vocals - Mika Rättö: vocals, keyboard, percussions - Tomi Leppänen: drums - Jussi Lehtisalo: bass, vocals - Tuomas Laurila: sound design - Janne Tuomi: percussions) to the film

Pori. FI (c) 1998 Mika Taanila / Kiasma. With inserts from Porin uusi silta (The New Bridge of Pori, Adams Filmi, 1926). A triptych (like Abel Gance's Polyvision) in Cinerama proportions of three 16mm projectors and colour slides. 35 min. - A good print, a perfect performance.
Circle is a many-sided band which has been associated with space rock, experimental music, metal music, post-rock, Krautrock and maybe also neo-psychedelia. Their performance was dynamic and inspired.
The film is a tribute to the seaside city of Pori, mixing old newsreels with new footage, sewer video surveillance imagery, abstract flashes and SMPTE test and leader strip. It starts with the waves of the sea upside down, the seagull in the sky, and the new bridge (of 1926) replacing the old Charlotta. There is footage from a concert at the Yyteri sand beach, showgirls, vapour, night lights, electric towers, the half moon in the sky. The abstract passages are great.

MP - minä pelkään

MP - jag är rädd / [MP - I Live in Fear]. FI 1982. PC: Lähikuva Oy. D+SC: Pekka Hyytiäinen. DP: Petteri Kotilainen - shot on 16mm - colour and b&w - released on 35mm - the director's last will: the 16mm print is definitive. CAST: Liisa Halonen (mother), Pekka Valkeejärvi (father), Heta Hyytiäinen (Mari, their young daughter), Matti Kanerva (soldier). 83 min. A 16mm print viewed at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 10 Dec 2008. - Pekka Hyytiäinen in memoriam (he died in January 2008). He directed three totally original feature films, of which this is the last. - This film got only 302 spectators during its term of release, so we, though not many, were a significant part of the total audience of the film which has never been transmitted on tv or released on home formats. - The print has a soft quality and the colour looks faded, but this seems to have been the case already at the release. - It begins and ends without image, with a male voice. - It's a poet's vision of the fear of war. A family retreats at their country house, incessant sounds of military exercises are heard day and night. - Nightmares and visions of warfare are intercut with the story of the family's stay. - There is a lone soldier in the wood nearby, and he makes an attempt to rape the mother, interrupted, as he cannot sustain erection. - Cinematic stream of consciousness. - There is some affinity with Ingmar Bergman's Skammen. - The film would deserve to be much wider known, with friends of experimental film, to begin with. It is marred by its substandard technical and visual quality (in a Jack Smith kind of way).

In girum imus nocte et consumimur igni

We Turn In the Night, Consumed by Fire. FR (c) 1978 Simar Films. P: Gérard Lebovici. D+SC: Guy Debord. DP: André Mrugalski. DP: Stéphanie Granel. S: Dominique Dalmasso. Documentalist: Joëlle Barjolin. M: François Couperin; Benny Golson ("Whisper Not", performed by Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers). Voice: Guy Debord. 35mm, B&W, 105 min. A Love Streams / Agnès B. print presented with e-subtitles in English by Ken Knabb edited by Tommi Uschanov. Avanto, Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 15 Nov 2008. Guy Debord: "On the question of stolen films, that is, of fragments of preexisting films incorporated into my films — notably in The Society of the Spectacle — (I’m talking here primarily about the films that interrupt and punctuate with their own dialogues the text of the spoken “commentary” derived from the book), the following should be noted:"
"In A User’s Guide to Détournement (Lèvres Nues #8) we already noted that “It is thus necessary to conceive of a parodic-serious stage in which detourned elements are combined . . . in order to create a certain sublimity.”"
"“Détournement” is not an enemy of art. The enemies of art are those who have not wanted to take into account the positive lessons of the “degeneration of art.”"
"Thus, in the film The Society of the Spectacle the (fiction) films detourned by me are not used as critical illustrations of an art of spectacular society (in contrast to the documentaries and news footage, for example). On the contrary, these stolen fiction films, external to my film but brought into it, are used, regardless of whatever their original meaning may have been, to represent the rectification of the “artistic inversion of life.”"
"The situation shifts in In girum due to several important differences: I directly shot a portion of the images; I wrote the text specifically for this particular film; and the theme of the film is not the spectacle, but real life. The films that interrupt the discourse do so primarily to support it positively, even if there is an element of irony (Lacenaire, the Devil, the fragment from Cocteau, or Custer’s last stand). The Charge of the Light Brigade is intended to crudely and eulogistically “represent” a dozen years of the SI’s actions!"
"As for the use of music, even though it is detourned like everything else, it will be felt by everyone in the normal way; it is never distanciated and always has a positive, “lyrical” aim." Guy Debord (1989)
Guy Debord: "The entire film (including the images, but already in the text of the spoken “commentary”) is based on the theme of water. Hence the quotations from poets evoking the evanescence of everything (Li Po, Omar Khayyam, Heraclitus, Bossuet, Shelley), who all used water as a metaphor for the flowing of time."
"Secondarily, there is the theme of fire; of momentary brilliance — revolution, Saint-Germain-des-Prés, youth, love, negation in the night, the Devil, battles and “unfulfilled missions” where spellbound “passing travelers” meet their doom; and desire within this night of the world (“nocte consumimur igni”)."
"But the water of time remains, and ultimately overwhelms and extinguishes the fire. Thus the brilliant youth of Saint-Germain-des-Prés, the fire of the ardent Charge of the Light Brigade, advancing “under the cannon fire of time,” were drowned in the flowing water of their century…" Guy Debord (1977)
Print has ok visual quality but signs of wear. - The consumer society. The irony is more bitter here. The scorn on the family idyll feels strange. Debord's voice sounds more melancholy, old, tired. Robin des Bois. Bliss it was to be young in this city, but nothing remains of the Paris of my youth. Where are the young hooligan girls of my youth? Excerpts: They Died with their Boots On, Les Enfants du Paradis, Orphée. Rien est vrai, tout est permis.

La Société du Spectacle

The Society of the Spectacle. FR 1973. PC: Simar Films. P: Gérard Lebovici. D+SC: Guy Debord (adapted from his 1967 book). DP: Antonis Georgakis. ED: Martine Barraqué. DOC: Suzanne Schiffmann. S: Antoine Bonfanti. M: Michel Corrette. Voice: Guy Debord. 35mm, B&W, 90 min. a Love Streams / Agnès B. print presented with e-subtitles in English by Ken Knabb edited by Tommi Uschanov. Avanto, Cinema Orion, Helsinki. - Brochure [Guy Debord n.c]: "Until now it has generally been assumed that film is a completely unsuitable medium for presenting revolutionary theory. This view was mistaken. The lack of any serious attempts in this direction stemmed simply from the historical lack of a modern revolutionary theory during virtually the entire period of the cinema’s development; as well as from the fact that the potentials of cinematic composition, despite so many declarations of intent on the part of filmmakers and so much feigned satisfaction on the part of a miserable public, have as yet scarcely been liberated."
"Published in 1967, The Society of the Spectacle is a book whose theoretical insights have profoundly influenced the new current of social critique that is now more and more openly undermining the established world order. Its present cinematic adaptation, like the book itself, does not offer a few partial political critiques, but a total critique of the existing world; that is, a critique of all aspects of modern capitalism and of its general system of illusions."
"The cinema is itself an integral part of this world, serving as one of the instruments of the separate representation that opposes and dominates the actual proletarianized society. As revolutionary critique engages in battle on the very terrain of the cinematic spectacle, it must thus turn the language of that medium against itself and give itself a form that is itself revolutionary."
"The text and images of this film form a coherent whole; but the images are never mere direct illustrations of the text, much less demonstrations of it (cinematic “demonstrations” are in any case never reliable due to the unlimited possibilities of manipulation offered by the unilateral editing of the material). Instead, the film’s use of images (whether photographs, newsclips, or sequences from preexisting films) is governed by the principle of détournement, which the situationists have defined as “communication that includes a critique of itself.” The images through which spectacular society presents itself to itself are taken and turned against it: the spectacle’s means should be treated with insolence. As a result, in a certain sense this film, coming at the end of the cinema’s pseudo-autonomous history, incorporates all the memories of that history. It can thus be seen simultaneously as a historical film, a Western, a love story, a war movie, etc. Like the society it examines, it also presents a number of comical aspects. In talking about the spectacular order, and about the commodity domination that it serves, one is also talking about what this order hides: class struggles and strivings toward real historical life, revolution and its past failures, and the responsibilities for those failures. Nothing in this film is made to please the fashionable blockheads of leftist cinema: it has equal contempt for what they respect and for the style in which they express that respect. One who is capable of understanding and denouncing an entire socio-economic formation will denounce it even in a film. Objections to our “extremism” are meaningless, because current history is already on the verge of going beyond the most extreme possibilities imagined."
"Theses that have never before been presented in the cinema will now appear there in a never before seen form, simply because for the first time a filmmaker has undertaken an uncompromising critique."
"In the socio-economic context, the total freedom required to create such a film obviously means that the producer must renounce any claim to exert any preliminary control over the director, whether by insisting that he present a synopsis or by seeking to obtain from him any other sort of meaningless commitment. This has been recognized in the contract between the filmmaker and the producer, Simar Films: “It is understood that the filmmaker will carry out his work in complete freedom, without any control or supervision whatsoever, and without even being obliged to pay the slightest attention to any comment that the producer might make regarding any aspect of the content or of the cinematic form that the filmmaker feels appropriate for his film.”"
"Considering that this film itself expresses its meaning in a sufficiently comprehensible manner, the producer and the filmmaker believe that it is unnecessary to provide any further explanations." Brochure [Guy Debord n.c. (1974)].
The print quality not as good as Debord's short films, duplication apparently at more generations' distance from the original. - A sold-out screening, dozens could not get tickets. - Famous film excerpts (Arkadin, Johnny Guitar, The Shanghai Gesture, Potyomkin, ?Ernst Thälmann). - Debord's breast fetish that masquerades as media criticism amused the audience. - The spectacle as a permanent opium war. - Deservedly famous, but maybe the short films are even more interesting, and The Society of the Spectacle functions better as a book.

THE SHADOW OF DEBORD (SEMINAR)

Avanto, Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 15 Nov 2008.
Mr. Kari Yli-Annala (convener)
Mr. Pekka Luhta (moderator)
Mr. Tommi Uschanov (Debord translator)
Ms. Helena Sederholm (expert on Situationism)
Mr. Jussi Vähämäki (expert on Situationism)
Ms. Tiina Purhonen (expert on art theory)
Mr. Lauri Luhta (meta-commentator)
An excellent seminar on Guy Debord, hopefully the presentations will be published. There was also a lively an intelligent discussion. The spirit of Debord lives also in healthy irony and distanciation.
- Having seen Debord now for the first time, and his complete films at the same time, one of the interesting observations was the affinity of Debord and Godard. Debord was first.

Réfutation de tous les jugements, tant élogieux qu’hostiles, qui ont été jusqu’ici portés sur le film “La Société du Spectacle”

Refutation of All the Judgments, Pro or Con, Thus Far Rendered on the Film “The Society of the Spectacle. FR 1975. P: Simar Films. P: Gérard Lebovici. D+SC: Guy Debord. ED: Martine Barraqué. S: Paul Bertauld. Voice: Guy Debord. 35mm, B&W, 20 min. A Love Streams / Agnès B. print presented with e-subtitles in English by Ken Knabb edited by Tommi Uschanov. Avanto, Cinema Orion, 14 Nov 2o08. - Dialogue from the film: "Refutation of All the Judgments, Pro or Con, Thus Far Rendered on the Film “The Society of the Spectacle” is an attack on the somewhat mixed feedback Debord got after his 1974 feature film."
”In a freer and more truthful future people will look back in amazement at the idea that pen-pushers hired by the system of spectacular lies could imagine themselves qualified to offer their smug opinions on the merits and defects of a film that is a negation of the spectacle - as if the dissolution of this system was a matter of opinion. Their system is now being attacked in reality and it is defending itself by force. Their counterfeit arguments are no longer accepted, which is why so many of these professional agents of falsification are facing the prospect of unemployment.” Dialogue from the film. - A good print. - The counter-review technique reminds me of Syberberg. Illustrated with commercials. It grows into an meta-essay.

Critique de la séparation

Critique of Separation. FR 1961. PC: Dansk-Fransk Experimental-filmskompagni. D+SC: Guy Debord. DP: André Mrugalski. ED: Chantal Delattre. M: François Couperin, Joseph Bodin de Boismortier. Voice: Guy Debord. Voice (during the credits): Caroline Rittener. Actress: Caroline Rittener. 35mm, B&W, 19 min. A Love Streams / Agnès B. print presented with e-subtitles in English by Ken Knabb edited by Tommi Uschanov. Avanto, Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 14 Nov 2008. - Guy Debord: "Before the credits, a hodgepodge of meaningless images is punctuated by a series of text frames — “Coming soon to this screen . . . One of the greatest antifilms of all time! . . . Real people! A true story! . . . On a theme the cinema has never dared to confront!” — while Caroline Rittener reads the following passage from André Martinet’s Elements of General Linguistics: “When one considers how natural and beneficial it is for man to identify his language with reality, one realizes the level of sophistication he had to attain in order to be able to dissociate them and make each an object of study.” All the rest of the film’s commentary is spoken by Guy Debord. Caroline Rittener also plays the young woman in the film. The music is by François Couperin and Bodin de Boismortier."
"The images in Critique of Separation are often taken from comics, ID photos and newspapers, or from other films. In many cases subtitles are added, which may be rather difficult to follow at the same time as the spoken commentary. The people who have been directly filmed are almost always none other than members of the film crew."
"The relation between the images, the spoken commentary and the subtitles is neither complementary nor indifferent, but is intended to itself be critical." Guy Debord, 1964
Excellent print. - Great self-irony ("one of the greatest antifilms of all time"), ironic Baroque music (like soon Greenaway with Nyman), media critique seasoned with loving looks at Paris, a fascination with the face of a woman, colonial violence, the world of commercials, found footage, the ravages of storms, a film which interrupts itself and does not come to an end.

Sur le passage de quelques personnes à travers une assez courte unité de temps

On the Passage of a Few Persons Through a Rather Brief Unity of Time. FR 1959. PC: Dansk-Fransk Experimental-filmskompagni. D+SC Guy Debord. DP: André Mrugalski. ED: Chantal Delattre. Voice 1: Jean Harnois. Voice 2: Guy Debord. Voice 3: Claude Brabant. M: George Frederick Handel, Michel-Richard Delalande. 35mm, B&W, 18 min. A Love Streams / Agnès B. print with e-subtitles in English by Ken Knabb edited by Tommi Uschanov screened at Avanto, Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 14 Nov 2008. - Guy Debord: "The spoken commentary is read in somewhat apathetic and tired-sounding voices by Jean Harnois (Voice 1, tone of a radio announcer), Guy Debord (Voice 2, more sad and subdued) and Claude Brabant (Voice 3, a little girl)."
"The sound track during the opening credits is from a recording of a discussion during the Third Conference of the Situationist International in Munich, primarily in French and German. The Handel theme is from the ballet suite The Origin of Design; the two themes by Michel-Richard Delalande are from Caprice #2 (a.k.a. Grande Pièce)."
"The spoken commentary includes a large portion of detourned phrases, drawn indiscriminately from classic thinkers, a science-fiction novel, and the worst pop sociologists. In order to go against the usual documen-tary practice regarding spectacular scenery, each time that the camera is on the verge of coming upon a monument this has been avoided by shooting in the opposite direction, from the viewpoint of the monument (just as the young Abel Gance shot a passage from the viewpoint of a snowball). The initial plan for this documentary envisaged more détournements from other films, particularly recent ones. (...) These extensive film-quotations were ultimately prevented because several distributors refused to sell reproduction rights for at least half of the scenes selected, which refusal destroyed the montage envisaged. Instead, more exten-sive use was made of the Monsavon soap ad, whose star (actress Anna Karina, trans. note) was to have a brighter future. André Mrugalski is responsible for the sequence of detail photos detourning the style of “art documentaries.”"
"This short film can be considered as notes on the origins of the situationist movement; notes which thus naturally include a reflection on their own language." Guy Debord, 1964.
A brilliant print, cinematography professional, an invigorating sociological essay. Anna Karina appears in a Monsavon commercial.

Hurlements en faveur de Sade

Howls for Sade. FR 1952. D+SC: Guy Debord. Voice 1: Gil J Wolman. Voice 2: Guy Debord. Voice 3: Serge Berna. Voice 4: Barbara Rosenthal. Voice 5: Jean-Isidore Isou. Originally 35mm, B&W, 75 min. The only film print can no longer be screened, and no negative exists. Dvd projection with e-subtitles in English by Ken Knabb edited by Tommi Uschanov at Avanto Festival, Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 14 Nov 2008.
Guy Debord: "Howls for Sade, a feature-length film created in June 1952, contains no images whatsoever. The soundtrack is accompanied by a completely blank white screen during the spoken dialogues. These dialogues, which altogether total no more than twenty minutes, are broken up into short fragments amid passages of total silence totalling one hour (the final portion of the film consisting of an uninterrupted 24-minute period of silence). During the silences the screen, and thus the theatre remains totally dark."
"The film contains no other sound or accompaniment, with the exception of a solo lettrist improvisation by Wolman during the first white screen passage, immediately before the beginning of the dialogue. The first two statements comprise the only credits."
"The content of this film should be considered in the context of the lettrist avant-garde of the period, both on the most general level, where it represents a negation and supersession of Isou’s conception of “discrepant cinema,” and on the anecdotal level, from the mode of using double first names (Jean-Isidore, Guy-Ernest, Albert-Jules, etc.) or the reference to Berna, the organizer of the Easter 1950 scandal at Notre Dame, to the dedication to Wolman, creator of the preceding lettrist film, the admirable Anticoncept. Other aspects should be considered in the light of positions since developed by the situationists, particularly the use of detourned passages."
"The first showing of Howls for Sade — in Paris, June 30, 1952, at the Ciné-club d’Avant-Garde, then directed by A.-J. Cauliez, in the Musée de l’Homme building — was violently disrupted almost from the beginning by the audience and the film club managers. Several lettrists then dissociated themselves from such a crudely extremist film. The first complete showing took place October 13 of the same year at the Ciné-club du Quartier Latin in the Sociétés Savantes room, defended by a group of “left-lettrists” and a couple dozen additional supporters from Saint-Germain-des-Prés. A few months later the presence of these same people prevented the same film club from presenting a Sadistic Skeleton which had been announced and attributed to a certain “René-Guy Babord,” a joke which was seemingly intended to consist merely of turning out all the theater lights for a quarter of an hour." Guy Debord
A dadaistic anti-film with black and white passages only on screen, and dialogue and total silence on the soundtrack. Almost all stayed, only a few members of the audiences left.

THE CORRICK COLLECTION 1

THE CORRICK COLLECTION 1. Viewed at Le Giornate del Cinema Muto, Pordenone, Cinema Verdi, 6 October 2008. Grand piano: Gabriel Thibaudeau, e-subtitles in Italian.
[Coronation of King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra]
GB 1902. 257 ft /16 fps/ .4’30”, (printed on colour stock, reproducing original hand-colouring); print: National Film and Sound Archive, Australia (Corrick Collection #88), no intertitles. - Good print.
Leslie Anne Lewis: "The Corrick Family often opened their shows with a film depicting the reigning British monarchs, of which they had several in their collection. After a performance in India, one reviewer noted how these patriotic images, “At once aroused the loyal feelings of the whole assembly as they stood up while ‘the King’ was sung by the Corricks. The feelings thus aroused put the audience, particularly the Military element, in the best of humour and spirits which were maintained throughout the evening.” This three-shot film of the coronation parade of Edward VII and Alexandra, which took place on 9 August 1902, is undoubtedly one of the more spectacular views of the Royals shown during these concerts. The first shot shows the carriage passing by, attended by members of the nobility and soldiers of the realm. The next is a long shot of the procession as it makes its way through Whitehall, the background dominated by Canada’s contribution to the festivities, a large archway that proudly declares, “Canada – Britain’s Granary in War and Peace – God Bless Our King and Queen”. At first, the third shot seems similar to the first – soldiers and dignitaries passing by – but the camera is positioned closer to the action rather than above the crowd, and the expressions on the faces of spectators are more clearly visible as they look down the street in anticipation. When the royal carriage comes into view, it brings with it a treat: in the last few seconds of the film, the royal carriage, horses, flags, and guards have been hand-painted – bright orange and blue, vibrant red and yellow – a pleasing detail unexpected in a newsreel-style film such as this." – Leslie Anne Lewis
The Lost Child
US 1904. PC: Biograph. D: Wallace McCutcheon; DP: G.W. Bitzer; cast: Kathryn Osterman; 479 ft /16 fps/ 8 min, print: National Film and Sound Archive, Australia (Corrick Collection #66), no intertitles. - OK print
Leslie Anne Lewis: "A child left alone to play in the front yard crawls into the doghouse for a nap. His mother panics when she discovers he is missing, and begins searching frantically for the child. Spying a passer-by with a large basket, she assumes he has kidnapped the baby and so sets off in hot pursuit. In typical chase-comedy fashion, the hapless man is pursued across the countryside by a mob which swells with each passing shot – adding, among others, a policeman, a man being pushed in a wheelchair, a one-legged boy, and an entire family of farmers. After finally catching the man, the crowd watches the policeman reach into the man’s basket and pull out... a large guinea pig. Meanwhile, blissfully unaware of the trouble he’s caused, the child awakens from his afternoon slumber. Biograph advertisements claimed that The Lost Child was based on a recent event in Brooklyn, New York. Though details of that case remain shrouded in mystery, one would assume that the guinea pig was purely a construct of the filmmaker’s imagination." – Leslie Anne Lewis. - A wild escalation.
Marie-Antoinette
FR 1903. PC: Pathé. 516 ft /16 fps/ 8’30” (printed on colour stock, reproducing original tinting); fonte copia/print source: National Film and Sound Archive, Australia (Corrick Collection #41). English intertitles. - A fine print, effective colour.
Leslie Anne Lewis: "Depictions of the lives of historical figures could provide a dash of legitimacy to a programme often filled with chase comedies and trick films. This 9-part tableau-style historical drama features scenes in the life of the ill-fated Marie Antoinette, from lavish parties at Versailles to her trial and imprisonment, and finally the slow march to the guillotine. Missing is the coup de grâce, the execution of the Queen by Revolutionaries; however, a shot showing the prisoner being taunted by a severed head on a pole stuck through her cell window adds a bit of gruesome zip to this film touted as “educational” by both the Corricks and reviewers." – Leslie Anne Lewis. - An impressive history lesson with some blunt cuts: from the merry frolick to the taking of the Bastille.
Toto exploite la curiosité
Ralph Benefits by People’s Curiosity. FR 1909. PC: Pathé. 274 ft /16 fps/ 5 min (printed on colour stock, reproducing original stencil-colour); print: National Film and Sound Archive, Australia (Corrick Collection #93), no intertitles. - A beautiful print. - Leslie Anne Lewis: "Toto (or Ralph, in this English-titled version) uses a kaleidoscope to supplement his family’s meagre income by charging passers-by for a peek into the optical toy. The narrative, however, is chiefly an excuse to feature the brilliantly colored geometric designs of the kaleidoscope as they shift from one hue to the next. The precisely stenciled blues, greens, reds, and yellows seen in the Corricks’ print are bright and vivid, the dyes seemingly unfaded in the century since their application at the Pathé factory. Only briefly glimpsed in this print, the Pathé logo included with this film is unusual and specific to the subject: a kaleidoscopic view of Pathé’s trademark rooster shown in varying shades of red." – Leslie Anne Lewis. - A beautiful film bordering on the experimental with its kaleidoscope effects. Lively street scenes.
La Vie indigène au Soudan égyptien
Native Life in Egyptian Sudan. FR 1908. PC: Pathé. 404 ft /16 fps/ 7 min (printed on colour stock, reproducing original tinting); print: National Film and Sound Archive, Australia (Corrick Collection #75), no intertitles. - Suffering from decomposition of the nitrate original, yet with beautiful definition of light wherever the image is intact.
Leslie Anne Lewis: "Rather than repeating the typical views of ancient pyramids, temples, and the Sphinx that had traditionally defined “Egypt” in the minds of Westerners, this documentary-style film highlights aspects of the everyday lives of modern Egyptians. Given the West’s long-standing fascination with the culture, it isn’t surprising that Egypt was one of the first places early producers sent their cameramen. As cinema is a medium that embraces movement and life, the modern inhabitants of the region and their daily lives provided a pleasing contrast to the static backdrop formed by the familiar relics of ancient Egypt, and soon more films along this vein began to find their way to audiences throughout the world. By focusing on the lives of modern Egyptians, films such as this presented a view of Egypt essentially hidden from Western audiences before the turn of the 20thcentury. Scenes include maize flour preparation, the drawing of water from a well, ‘Native Home Industries’, children reading from the Koran, ‘The Pasha Feeding the Poor’, and – as nitrate decomposition worsens – a number of women moving past the camera." – Leslie Anne Lewis. - I agree with LL, this is an interesting view of Sudan / Egypt about the everyday life.
Le Chapeau
My Hat. FR 1906. PC: Pathé. 231 ft /16 fps/ 5 min; print: National Film and Sound Archive, Australia (Corrick Collection #74), no intertitles.
Leslie Anne Lewis: "Comedy ensues when two men accidentally swap hats at the barber’s. After discovering the mix-up, the first man to leave returns to the shop to correct the mistake. Furious when he finds that the other customer has disappeared with his hat, the man storms through the city demanding to inspect the headgear of every man he meets." – Leslie Anne Lewis. - A funny comedy. Too small a hat leads to a revenge to the world.
Miracle de Noël
Christmas Miracle. FR 1905. PC: Pathé. 266 ft /16 fps/ 5 min (printed on colour stock, reproducing original tinting); print: National Film and Sound Archive, Australia (Corrick Collection #21), no intertitles. - Beautiful colour.
Leslie Anne Lewis: "After unsuccessfully begging from parishioners as they leave a Christmas service, a child slips into the church for warmth and collapses on the altar. A stained-glass image of a saint comes to life and scoops up the boy, who then assists the saint as he delivers toys to the homes of sleeping children. Though not screened as a part of Leonard’s Beautiful Pictures’ “Trip Round the World” programme, in the eyes of at least one reviewer (in The Ceylon Morning Leader, December 1907) Miracle de Noël was similarly enlightening, allowing viewers to experience distant lands in ways impossible before the development of motion pictures: “The subjects of the pictures were carefully chosen, and, besides being interesting, were of considerable educational value to the majority of the audience. For instance, in the course of the pretty story of Santa Claus, the snow falling on Christmas Eve was depicted in a way which brought home to Eastern minds a detail of the English climate in a vivid and living way which no amount of reading could ever do.” This five-shot film combines optical effects with studio settings reminiscent of a children’s pantomime. Starting with a child desperately begging for coins in cold weather, the film warms to a more joyous mood of wish-fulfillment fantasy." – Leslie Anne Lewis. - A moving story belonging to the tradition of A Little Match Girl.
A Canadian Winter Carnival
US 1909. PC: Edison. 659 ft /16 fps/ 11 min; print: National Film and Sound Archive, Australia (Corrick Collection #24), original English intertitles.
Leslie Anne Lewis: "According to Harper’s Bazaar (8 March 1884), the Montreal Winter Carnival was founded as a means of promoting tourism to the country, aiming “to show that life in Canada may be not only endurable during the winter months, but enjoyable.” During the annual celebration, thousands of tourists would journey to Quebec to experience the charms of the Canadian winter through various snow sports, parades, races, and masquerade balls. Twenty-five years after the festival began, A Canadian Winter Carnival helped extend the reach of the founders’ efforts by transporting a glimpse of these attractions to the far corners of the globe. Included are views of the ski-jumping, tobogganing, and snowshoeing, along with a parade of sleighs. The festival’s featured attraction was the Ice Palace, a massive structure illuminated each evening by electric lamps, which at the end of the season would be destroyed in a mock battle by snowshoers with torches and fireworks. The Edison film shows workers along the St. Lawrence River harvesting of some of the thousands of ice blocks needed to construct the palace." Leslie Anne Lewis.
The Hand of the Artist
GB 1906. PC: R.W. Paul. D: Walter R. Booth; 191 ft /16 fps/ 3 min; print: National Film and Sound Archive, Australia (Corrick Collection #54), no intertitles.
Leslie Anne Lewis: "Walter R. Booth, magician and stop-motion animation pioneer, began his career as one of the first British animators with The Hand of the Artist. Like the vengeful artist in later animated classics such as Duck Amuck (...), Booth’s film features subjects that inhabit a world controlled by their mercurial creator. The photographic images are composed and brought to life on a whim, and then just as quickly transformed or reduced to immobility by the Hand of the Artist. After each animated sequence, the Hand crumples the paper and disposes of it in a shower of confetti. (...) one of several films in the Corrick Collection that make use of the stop-motion technique (...)" Leslie Anne Lewis.
Les grandes eaux de Versailles
Big Fountains at Versailles. FR 1904. PC: Pathé. 183 ft /16 fps/3 min (printed on colour stock, reproducing original hand-colouring); print: National Film and Sound Archive, Australia (Corrick Collection #43), no intertitles.
Leslie Anne Lewis: "Another highlight of the “Trip Round the World” programme, these images taken at Versailles were billed as “Gorgeously colored, the most beautiful fountains in the world”. Les Grandes Eaux de Versailles takes the viewer on a tour of the grounds of the historic French palace. The last section of the film shows off the famous fountains with a hand-painted, multi-coloured sequence." Leslie Anne Lewis
Les Invisibles
The Invisible Men. FR 1906. PC: Pathé. D: Gaston Velle; FX: Segundo de Chomón; 655 ft /16 fps/ 11 min (printed on colour stock, reproducing original stencil-colour); fonte copia/print source: National Film and Sound Archive, Australia (Corrick Collection #59), no intertitles.
Leslie Anne Lewis: "In this remarkable film, an alchemist discovers a potion that renders the drinker invisible. After he and his assistant leave the lab, two thieves break in and steal the potion. Enjoying their new-found power, the thieves wreak havoc throughout the city, finally framing the alchemist and his assistant for their crimes. Eventually the thieves are caught and brought before the court.
Under the direction of Gaston Velle, special-effects wizard Segundo de Chomón takes full advantage of the possibilities afforded by the premise of Les Invisibles, using the fantastic nature of the story as a canvas for a series of elaborate effects. In a richly detailed laboratory surrounded by all the essential accoutrements of a proper mad scientist – including a skeleton in the closet and a giant stuffed crocodile – the great effort of the alchemist’s thinking is realized when his brain literally explodes. Surprisingly quick to recover, he then sets the stage for a series of amusing disappearing and reappearing tricks that continue throughout the film. One of the most striking scenes comes after the thieves knock out a light while making their escape. What follows is a chase scene through the city shown in silhouette, recalling the intricate shadow puppets that provided optical entertainment in previous centuries. The finale is peculiar, but right in line with the film’s other surreal imagery: the courtroom suddenly disappears and the prisoners and court officers are transformed into giant vegetables, complete with detailed stencil-colouring. These also fade away, leaving the professor and his assistant to exit the now-empty black screen." Leslie Anne Lewis. - A marvellous fantasy film of miraculous transformations.