Super 8 Film Festival at Block T

This Saturday, I'm participating in the Super 8 Festival at Block T in Dublin. During the 'Mixtape' session, there will be the first public attempt to coax my film Money Spent at Night through a projector without it disintegrating. Regardless of the outcome, I'll also be sitting on a panel to justify 'Why Super 8' later in the day.

Here is their programme:

SATURDAY MAY 3RD at BLOCK T, NOON TIL MIDNIGHT.
Tickets €40 including dinner, only 40 tickets available!

https://www.facebook.com/events/271079293066014/

With a special focus on the Kuchar Brothers this one-day event, which runs from noon until midnight, celebrates the continued revolutionary potential of a not-yet-obsolete medium featuring films, performance and discussion.

Tickets are available directly through BlockT or by emailing Super8festivaldublin@gmail.com

Super8 Pioneer George Kuchar claimed that “8mm is a tool of defense in this society of mechanized corruption because through 8mm and its puny size, we are closer to the dimensions of the atom”. Somewhat perversely right now seems like the perfect time to celebrate this not-yet-outmoded medium not as a relic of the past but as a tool of the present. In a moment when we are surrounded by the pseudo retro convenience of Instagram and the controlled limitations of Vine why not spend a whole day celebrating the joyful inconvenience of Super8 Film. 

Noon: Irish Experiments in Super 8 Film 'THE MIXTAPE' 

With assistance from Experimental Film Club this programme features work by many exciting filmmakers including Vivienne Dick, Max Le Cain, Una Quigley, Aoife Desmond and many more.   

2pm: D1 RECORDINGS JAPAN

Screenings of Films Alan Lambert shot for D1 recordings in the nineties with live musical accompaniment by Alan Lambert and Junshi

4pm: 'THE HOMEMADE CINEMA'

An experiential analogical montage of found sound and film performed by Fergal Brennan and Sharon Phelan

5pm: WHY SUPER 8?

A Round-table Discussion addressing the continued significance of the format featuring Aoife Desmond, Max Le Cain, Vivienne Dick.

6pm: SUPER ATE

A simple dinner provided by Luncheonette Dublin (dinner included in ticket price)

8pm: KUCHAR!

A Focus on the Kuchar Brothers, true Super 8 Pioneers!

10pm: HOLLYWOOD BABYLON PRESENTS

Party time with Dublin's 'best film club' (or at least that's what the Irish Times said) with Super8 digest screenings of trash classics The Warriors and Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry

FORBIDDEN SYMMETRIES @ The Picture Show, New York

Forbidden Symmetries will receive its North American premiere on Saturday, May 10th at The Picture Show, New York. Full details here.

Rashidi's INVESTIGATING THE MURDER CASE OF MS.XY Complete

Rouzbeh Rashidi’s 26th no-budget experimental feature film Investigating the Murder Case of Ms. XY. is now complete. This cosmically disconcerting film, in which I briefly appear, is the first in what is to be an ongoing series of collaborations between Rouzbeh and Berlin-based actor/director Mario Mentrup. A very exciting prospect! (Mentrup's own feature, I Do Adore, from 2007 is a must-see.)

And for those interested in exploring Rashidi's work, fifteen of his other feature films can be seen here. 

SONIC VIGIL (SKETCHES) to Screen at Sonic Vigil

Sonic Vigil (Sketches), a 20 minute video I made from footage taken at last year's Sonic Vigil event, will get its first screening on Friday May 2nd at The National Sculpture Factory, Cork. This will be part of Sonic Vigil 8, a festival of improvised music, sound art and performance. It features a number of performances, screenings and talks over a three day period. The lineup also includes contributions from two of my regular collaborators: Vicky Langan, and Karen Power who will be opening the festival with a talk.

Full infomation here.

Music by Frans Zwartjes: Cassette Release

An exciting upcoming release from Purge: an album comprised solely of never-before heard music composed and recorded by Frans Zwartjes between 1966 and 1999. Screen printed and signed by the artist, the album will be available in an edition of 50 cassette tapes. I made a contribution to the liner notes. To pre-order the tape: http://purge.xxx/purge-projects/music-by-frans-zwartjes/

The cassette will be launched at a special screening event at the ICA, London, on May 11th.

Here's an amazing piece of footage exclusive to Purge from Zwartjes' archive with music from the release: http://vimeo.com/92317365

Dean Kavanagh Short Films Online

Dean Kavanagh, director of the magnificent feature A Harbour Town (which received a rapturous reception at its Irish premiere in Cork last week) and Cinema Cyanide compadre, has made his short films available for viewing online here.

It's a great resource for tracing the development of this unique and disconcerting filmmaker. I profiled his work in this article a while back.

TANGLED AND FAR @ AIEFF

Tangled And Far, my most recent collaboration with Vicky Langan, will play twice at the Australian International Experimental Film Festival next month, once in Melbourne and once in Perth:

Perth: 6pm, Sunday 3rd May
Replants, 96 Wray Avenue, Fremantle

Melbourne: 6pm, Sunday 18th May
Goodtime Studios, basement 746 Swanston Street, Melbourne
(hosted by Artist Film Workshop)

DAMP ACCESS: New Work Online

Damp Access, a brand new video of mine, is now available to see here. A sort of oneiric video diary, it gives the impression of having been discovered on an old VHS tape forgotten in someone's basement.

Thanks to Rouzbeh Rashidi for creating the lovely poster.

2nd Phantoscope Screening: Kavangh's A HARBOUR TOWN

 When Dean Kavanagh completed A Harbour Town last year, I expressed my stunned reaction to seeing it in this post.

I'm now delighted to be programming it in Cork, along with Kavanagh's short Maritime, as part of Triskel Christchurch Cinema's experimental film series Phantoscope on April 10th. Dean will be present at the screening and on hand for a Q&A.

Screening information and tickets can be obtained here.

Here's the official blurb:

Triskel Christchurch Cinema,  Tobin St., Cork
6.15pm, Thursday April 10th
104 mins – Ireland 2013 – Dir: Dean Kavanagh
Starring: Leon Kavanagh, John Curran and Rouzbeh Rashidi

Phantoscope, the Triskel Christchurch experimental film screening series, is delighted to welcome one of Ireland’s most visionary filmmakers, Dean Kavanagh, to introduce his latest feature, A Harbour Town. This journey into the dark visions of a small coastal town might be made of memories of the inhabitants or memories created by the place itself. It blurs the boundaries between banal details of daily life and the weirdness of our unconscious, often tactile perception of them. Kavanagh’s almost wordless films are deeply immersive experiences, heavy on unsettling atmosphere and powerful visual detail. For Jit Phokaew of Limitless Cinema, “Kavanagh is an impressionist filmmaker… [he] can use a camera like a paintbrush. There are very few filmmakers that I know who can do this”.