AMERICAN CINEMA

Job
Director: Lisa McElroy
1996 16mm black & white/color ray-o-graph 5:30
San Francisco

Filmed on location at the director’s former work site, Job is a dark celebration of the trivial task. Inspired by 1930’s monster movies and Man Ray’s surrealist ray-o-graphs (a cameraless technique where objects are exposed directly on to the undeveloped film), Job takes the viewer into the mind of the barely human, working cog.

Motion Picture Genocide
Director: Robert Banks 1997
35 mm color 4:00
Cleveland, Ohio.
MPG is mixed-media social commentary exploring violence and racial stereotypes prevalent in the Hollywood film industry. The film was shot entirely from film stock left over from the Hollywood production Telling Lies.

Short films By Modi- 1994-97
Director Modi
Video, black & white
Los Angeles. 15:00

Pump with a Chump
Muscle man Henry Rollins (Black Flag, The Rollins Band ) flexes as he pumps up the Chump.
Rosa Mi Amor
Manny Chevrolet mourns for his love Rosa, but is there even a Rosa?
Shut Up.
The football obsessed Manny becomes consumed by the sport he loves.
Woodstock Revisited.
Manny travels to the Woodstock Revival show to raise havoc and cause trouble.
Mommy, Daddy, & Me!
Manny tries to do the family life, a real and revealing look at a dysfunctional family.

The Fetishist
Director: Jim Trainor Music by Joe Miucco
1997 16mm Animation, black & white 38:00
New York

The Fetishist is a animated film based on the criminal career of William Heirens, a serial killer active in Chicago in the 1940’s. He is best know for the chilling message he wrote in lipstick on the bedroom wall of one of his victims: For Heavens Sake Catch Me Before I Kill More, I Cannot Control Myself. The film dwells on the early life of its subject, who suffered a head injury in infancy and whose childhood obsession with stealing women’s underwear prestages an escalating series of violations.

Killing Time
Director: Adam Davis
1996 16 mm/color 29:00
New York

The daily lives of Tex and Weasel consist doing nothing and more of nothing. Then one day Weasel comes up with the idea to kill someone….Thus begins a comedic journey into ridiculousness, as these two anti-heroes attempt to add purpose to their lives by talking someone else’s. See what can happen when you have to much time on your hands and too little on your mind.

City of Sleep
Director Jon Filthe
1996 16mm/color 20:00
Burlington, Vermont.

Maya, a glue-sniffing punk rocker, decides to leave town after her best friend Darby blows his brains out in front of their high school Biology class. Leaving behind a alcoholic father and a mother who has withdrawn, Maya starts living on a roof in Montreal. Then one morning she wakes up to find herself dead. Suddenly, she meets Sid Vicious the angel! Is she on here way to punk heaven?

In The Course of Human Events
Director Dominic Angerame
Sound design by Amy leigh Hunter
1997 16mm/black & white 23:00
San Francisco
A surrealistic depiction of the dismantling of the Embarcado Freeway that was damaged in the 1989 San Francisco earthquake. Tractors like dinosaurs gnash at the organic tangle of metal. Subtly montaged with double and triple exposures, this film takes on symphonic sounds and visuals showing the styles of early cinema and a futuristic vision.

The Gift
Director Tony Gault
1997 16mm/color 11:00
Englewood, Colorado

The Gift is a experimental psychodrama focusing on the family relationships and the downward genetic spiral of drug and alcohol addiction. The Gift examines four generations of one family and the repercussions of ignoring the family addictive heirloom.

Out Of Loop
Director: Scott Peterson
1997 Video 86:00
Chicago

A documentary focusing in on the Chicago musical sound. It features interviews and live performances by Steve Albini, Die Warzau, Eleventh Dream Day, The Jesus Lizard, Pulsar, Seam, Veruca Salt, The Wesley Willis Fiasco, Pulsars, and Yum-Yum.It also features some of Chicago’s premiere recording labels, including Touch and Go and Wax Trax.

Sonic Outlaws
Director: Craig Baldwin
1995 16mm/Video, color and black & white 87:00
San Francisco

Sonic Outlaws is a continuation into Baldwin’s practice of reworking found film and sound into fresh new contexts. As a member of a post-industrial generation of media savages, the filmmaker, with a cult comic book aesthetic, drives an ironic, archaeological dig through the debri of American popular culture. Featuring, Negative Land’s infamous U2 lawsuit by Island Records. Also featuring: Emergency Broadcast Network, John Oswald, Tape-Beatles, Barbie-Liberation.

Man On The Moon
1995 Pixilvision, black & white 20:00
Director Corey McAbee
San Francisco.

A dejected husband goes to the moon with his cat to live in seclusion. They transmit information back to earth telling of life on the moon, through song, humor and lunatic fringe.

Billy Nayer
1993 16mm animation/color 2:30
Director Corey McAbee
San Francisco

Hand-painted animation features Billy Nayer, a barroom drunk who breaks into song. The style is a mixture that fondly satirizes 1950’s beatnik poetry readings.

Paranoia
1996 16mm/color 23:00
Director Roberts Edwards
Palo Alto, California

Paranoia examines the forces which influence our lives every day and the extent to which we should or should not feel threatened by them. In a age when media, government, and advertising continually bombard us with information, where is the line between healthy skepticism and lunacy?

Shadow1997 16mm/color 13:40
Director David Alexander Davidson
Los Angeles

An agoraphobic woman struggles to define the boundaries between reality and illusion in her mind and backyard.

Line of Fire
1997 16mm/black & white 10:00
Director Dominic Angerame
Sound design by Amy Leigh Hunter
San Francisco

This film explores two major events in the filmmaker’s life. One explores Angerame being diagnosed with coronary arterial disease and another the fire that destroyed his apartment.

American Skin
1995 Video/black & white 107:00
Director Michael Rohr
Washington D.C.
A fast-paced punk noir that starts in the gritty streets of Washington D.C. Neo-Nazi skinheads and an urban drug gang are manipulated by a power hungry crime cartel bent on starting a race war in a quest for total domination. Soundtrack features: Fugazi, Clutch, Slant 6, Nation of Ulysses, Iron Cross, Tone, Who is God, Pitchblende, Holy Rollers, The City Bleeds, 9353 and Lucy Brown.

Fatzer Fragments
1996 Video 30:00
Directors Mark Siska & Stefan Brun
Chicago/Berlin
Presented in English and German.

Based on the writing's of Bertolt Brecht, Fatzer Fragments is a Chicago/Berlin co-production. Fatzer examines deconstruction through the text of Brecht and behind the back drop of Chicago and Berlin.

Circus Life
1997 Video 23:00
Director Mark Siska
Chicago and Krakow,Poland

Explore the lives of Carlos, Claudia (tightrope walkers), Natasha their daughter and their dog Lucas as you take a look behind the scenes of a circus and discover Circus Life.

Idling Brando
1997 35mm/black & white 14:00
Director Angelo Guglielmo
Los Angeles

Idling Brando is a documentary short about Hollywood icon, Dennis Woodruff and his dark, romantically misguided journey on the road to fame and fortune.

Subdue the Universe
1997 Video 56:00
Director James Taylor
Madison, Wisconsin
An impoverished camera crew ventures through the seamy underbelly of presidential politics in the USA, seeking fringe candidates ignored by the mainstream media. In the shadow of snowbound New Hampshire, they encounter freaks, misfits, the comically deluded, the impossibly inane and the occasional genius. All of whom think they should be President of the United States.

Harshlight1996 16 mm/black & white 25:00
Director E.B. Hughes
Ocean City, New Jersey

Harshlight is a character study focusing on an aging boxer named Clyde, whose career gets sidetracked when he gets involved with a shady drug dealer named Parris. Enter Morris Jones, a hard-nosed cop determined to bring Paris down, but only with the help of Clyde. Filled with intrigue, and suspense.

Haunt
1997 Super 8/color 7:30
Director Lisa McElroy

San Francisco Haunt is a atmospheric slice of the after-life. A small girl emerges from behind an armless statue, caught in a loop of memories. The loss of a guardian a century ago is her recurrent obsession, interrupted and triggered by the seemingly mundane moments that make up the modern world. Shot in Super 8, a medium that is currently disappearing from practical existence.

Empire Of Ache
1996 Super 8/black & white 9:00
Director Lisa Hammer
New York

Caught on living celluloid for the first time, the hot-blooded mania of Dame Darcy conversing with dolls no bigger than god’s foot… see with your own dripping wet eye the real life adventures of crazies on parade. Dare to hold hands with danger and run blindfolded into the psycho fire.

Bugfeast
1993 16mm/color animation 4:00
Director Kohn Bros
Bainbridge Ohio

We witness ‘everyman’ as this black comedy that pokes fun at the often tedious routines and regiments of daily existence, as well as the potentially undignified end.

Born To Lose
1996 16mm/color 57:000
Director Doug Cawker
Toronto, Canada

Born to Lose is a pseudo-documentary about ‘The Spoilers’, a punk band from Venice, California. Born to Lose is a realistic look into the life of a struggling underground punk band and lead singer Stevie Monroe’s odyssey of nihilism.

Echo Off
1997 35mm/black & white 27:00
Director Lee Songe
New York

Different genders, different sexuality's collide around social identity. Once we delve into the narcissism of desire, where could it take us? In the case of Echo Off, it leads us to a paradox where maybe a drag queen is the only true reality.

Here Dies Another Day
1997 Digital Betacam transfer to 35mm, color 30:00
Director Caryn West
California

Here Dies Another Day is a noir thriller set in the early 1950’s about how unexpected violence and emotions disrupt the somber life of of an English teacher and her father suffering from dementia.

It Crawls Inside Me

1994 Super 8/black & white 10:00
Director Raoul Vehill
Chicago

David Yow (Jesus Lizard) stars in this dark dominatrix vampire thriller.

Cult of the Cubicle
1997 Video 45:00
Director George Kuchar

A visit into George's New York past. Visit with Stars from his early New York films, Meet old childhood friends and even see George's mother as she makes him good home cooked meal. As George can only do it in his semi documentary, camp style mixed with melodrama Cult of the Cubicle is a funny and some times touching personal diary into George past as he goes home to The Bronx on his Birthday.

The Files of Eddie Gray
1995 Video 20:00
Director George Kuchar

Mixing documentary with staged drama George Explore the Real Men in Black and interviews there creator. Great exploration into conspiracy and Aliens.

 

BULGARIAN CINEMA

A Journey to the Whistling Beach
1997 35mm/bw
Director Victor Bozhinov.
The change of places often makes us forget, as we forget a dream, what we want to be true. Three hipsters rob a store so they can afford a cab to take them from Sofia, to the Sea. A road trip with a unexpected turn.

Mud
1997 35mm/BW 24:00
Director Ivaylo Simidchiev

An American tourist visiting Sofia tries to catch a gypsy boy who has just stolen some money from a kiosk. The American is stabbed by the boy. Then the boy tries to save the tourist and takes him to a place close to the end of the world.

Reel Mix
1996 35mm/color 20:00
Director Valentin Valtchev

You take several mixed reels of old Soviet negative film stock ( whatever you can find in Bulgaria). Then mix with the American Dream, Bulgarian Superstition,drugs,motorcycles,Elvis Presley,Jesus Christ, NBA Super Stars a ghost and a porcupine. Re-mix this. Reel it until it blends like a movie and you will have 5 reels of REEL MIX.

Salt Works
1997 Video 8:00
Director Sunny Sunynsky

A little tiny salt shaker in the middle of the table is witness to a conversation about the salt of the earth.

Martini Dry
1997 video 5:00
Director Stanislav Todorov

Sitting in a bar is just one's exercise in loneliness ( L.Bunuel)

Cake
1997 Video 17:00
Director Nadezhda Kosseva

'I dreamt of a very strange film"-A bored women decides to leave her lover, but she doesn't succeed.

The Liar
1997 Video 19:00
Director Svetla Tsotsorkova

A young girl, provoked by Nabokov's Lolita, decides to lie so she can discover her own sexuality.

Bobby
1997 Video 16:00
Director Ventsislav Vassilev

With Valentin Goshev-Vigo and children from the Home for children and Teenagers. A new boy in school meets his first love and meets with disappointment.

Bug on a Bush
1997 Animation Video
Director Christo Stamboliev

A bug has settled on a bush and starts to play. A film based on the original Bulgarian folk song A Bug on a Bush.

Dear Mummy and Daddy
Animation Video
Director Radostina Neykova

A 7 year old girl tries to mend the somber reality in children's camp by the optimistic absurdness of a letter she is writing to her mother and father.

Cold Cuisine
1997 Video
Director Julian Minko

A director tries to shoot a film. He finds the leading lady, but he does not have the male lead to play her lover. As he tries to find the lead any thing that will go wrong does in this film about making a film.

 

GERMAN CINEMA

AKA KRAK
1994-1998 Video

Aka Krakk translates to octopus. This is a media collective in Berlin that develops video magazine work on issue that range from police activities in Berlin, squatters, social issue effecting the poor, Protests, workers right.

Selected work from the Tilsiter Lichtspiele
Production from the Tilisiter Lichtspiele, the host of the Berlin 97 Euro Underground Film Festival.

 

ITALIAN CINEMA
 

Cartolone (Postcards)1997 35mm/color 11:00
Director Stefano Paratesi

A young wife is put to the test when forced to chose between ‘Appearing’ and ‘Being’ after a sudden event has destroyed her security and certainty.

Shot1996 16mm/BW
Director Stefano Paratesi

A murder that you never see,. But some times what you do not see is more disturbing than what you do see.

Memories1995 Video/16mm Color/Black and white 10:00
Directed by Stefano Paratesi

Memories is the look at destructive images cut with the innocents of children playing with the world. As the world is thrown around the world destruction happens will the kits ultimately destroy the world.

 

FILMS FROM PRAGUE

Hitmen1996 35mm 8:00
Directed by Pavel Jech

Not your average hitmen. Ever heard of hitmen from heaven?

 

MOLDAVIAN ANIMATION

The selected work of Valeria Kurtu All colorsA childrens animated piece about a kangroo and her babies.
Holy Sunday
How can you escape the constant bombarment of commercialism?
The Optimist
The only escape from the indusrial an modern world for a old world Moldovian is the moon.
The Victim
A worker drone works in his office but dreams of the beach and womens breast.

 

AUSTRALIAN ANIMATION

Astroturf1996 3-D animation in video 6:18
Director Ian Haig
Melbourne

Astroturf looks at retro-futurism and the way in which the future has been depicted as a 20th century modernist ideal. In particular how technological objects, from TVs to robots, have carried with them a utopian-futuristic promise of a better tomorrow. The technological utopia in Astroturf is seen as malfunctioning, backfiring and short circuiting.

 

RUSSIAN CINEMA

Spin
1997 Video 5:00
Director. By Anrei Rabodzeenko

A experamental look at the movement of rotation.