Lynne Sachs is one of our most dynamic filmmakers and poets. Her captivating work is a medley of documentaries, essay films, hybrid live performances, and experimental shorts. With her use of vivid visuals and intricate sound, Sachs eagerly pushes formal boundaries. She crafts transfixing and intimate moving images that draw from her own emotional and social experiences — often through a feminist lens. For Women’s History Month, Fandor celebrates this fascinating female filmmaker and her insightful cinematic achievements.
Can you tell me a bit about your background and what led you to filmmaking?
Growing up in Memphis, Tennessee, it never occurred to me to be a filmmaker. In fact, that wasn’t even a word in my vocabulary. I knew about movie directors and movie stars. I thoroughly enjoyed the occasional European art film I might see on TV or on a Saturday matinée at a community center. Then I discovered the brazen, irreverent, raw, improvised vision of Rainer Fassbinder and the internal, austere feminism of Chantal Ackerman. From that time on, I knew I wanted to make films.
Was there a particular moment or film that inspired you to become a filmmaker?
When I was a senior in high school in Memphis, Tennessee, I was able to see the films of Reverend L.O. Taylor, a Black minister, and filmmaker with an overwhelming interest in preserving the social and cultural fabric of his own community in the 1930s and ’40s. I spent that summer carrying a projector and stacks of Taylor’s films around to churches in Memphis where a group of us would ask small audiences to help us to identify the people in the films. I was transfixed by this man’s work that ten years later when I too had decided to make films, I returned to Memphis to make Sermons Sacred Pictures (29 min., 1989, streaming on Fandor) on his life and work.
Seeing French filmmaker Chris Marker’s Sans Soleil was equally transformative for me. This feature-length early 80’s essay film entered my soul. I immediately connected to its delicate mode of engaging with other cultures, its self-reflexive intensity, its compassion, its humor, and its unabashed doubt. Marker shot the film himself, so every frame reflects his vision, the way he saw and framed the world at a certain point in his own life. I hadn’t known that this was even possible until I saw Sans Soleil.
What is special to you about shooting on film and do you feel something is lost in everyone’s transition to digital?
I see light differently when I am shooting with film. When I was making Which Way is East (30 min. 16mm, color, 1994, streaming on Fandor), I traveled through Vietnam for one month carrying my Bolex camera and only 40 minutes of 16mm film stock. I had to wait for the light to find me in just the right way, simply because I could not waste a single frame. By imposing this kind of cinematic awareness and discipline on myself, I learned to make each shot matter.
I learned to engage with the medium’s ability to witness and express through knowledge of the lens and the celluloid. I have tried to imbue my filmmaking practice with this kind of awareness ever since. I don’t think I have yet accomplished this level of intimacy with my digital camera but I certainly try. I still never “overshoot”, and find that less material with more striking images still works best for me.
After the 20th anniversary of September 11th, how do you feel looking back at your film Tornado?
Tornado was very much made in the moment of September 11. I shot this film the day after the attack on the Twin Towers. Now we have so much knowledge of what it was all about, but at that moment those of us here in New York City were full of fear and confusion. My two daughters were six and four years old on that day. I made this film to help me work through their relationship to the towers, which they perceived as human beings. Their impulse as children was, surprisingly, to anthropomorphize the buildings themselves. They simply could not comprehend the real number of deaths. How could they imagine thousands of people’s lives, over, gone?
In the film, you simply see me filming my hands rummaging through pages from a desktop calendar that had blown from Lower Manhattan to Brooklyn that day. It was so eerie, so tactile, so immediate. Now 20 years later, I have perspective, an awareness of the whole history, but I also still feel deep sadness and loss.
Sound design plays a significant part in Tornado (the sounds of the bustling city, the crinkling of the paper, etc.) How do you approach sound design in your work?
Thank you for your sensitivity to the aural aspect of Tornado (3 min. 2002). While I do make feature-length films, this is one of my shortest, one of the films I made most quickly. It reflects the sensation of being alive right after a national crisis. There were still ashes blowing in the air, and yet you see teenagers riding on skateboards and older Italian-American men playing cards in the park. The sound gives an audience the chance to connect to this attempt by all of us to reconnect with what we perceived as normalcy. Over the last two years, I have referred to the pandemic as daunting now. The days right after 9/11 felt very similar.
Following the Object to Its Logical Beginning is a clever subversion of the male gaze. Can you talk about your inspiration for the film as well as the meaning of the title?
You are very observant! During the time that I was making Following the Object to Its Logical Beginning (9 min., 1987, 16mm), I was in a women’s reading group where we were drinking a lot of tea and wine and devouring texts by Sigmund Freud and Jacques Lacan. You probably won’t be surprised that I had just discovered Laura Mulvey’s essay Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema at that time. I do believe that she was the first person to develop a theory of the male gaze. I needed to explore that in my own work, so that is exactly what I did in this film.
Still Life with Woman and Four Objects is your tribute to the anarchist and feminist Emma Goldman. It reminded me of Chantal Akerman’s Jeanne Dielman. I was wondering how feminism overall has impacted your filmmaking?
Bingo! As I mentioned earlier, Ackerman’s work was and is extremely important to me. Her depiction of a woman trapped by the domestic responsibilities of a single mother trying to make a go of it was a revelation to me. I never thought of it before, but my Still Life with Woman and Four Objects (4 min., 1987, 16mm) image of a woman sitting at a table eating and slicing her food probably came right from my witnessing of Jeanne Dielman’s real-time preparation of a meal, in all it is protracted and aesthetically devised labor. Thirty years later, I was equally inspired by this film in the making of The Washing Society (co-directed with Lizzie Olesker, 45 min., 2018) which is not only streaming on Fandor but also supported by it during our production.
A Biography of Lilith combines Jewish folklore, interviews, music, and poetry. Can you talk about the process of incorporating so many different art forms and inspirations into your film?
Sometimes making my films gives me a great excuse to immerse myself in research and to see how all of the reading I do will influence my creative process. When I first heard the story of Lilith, I was shocked and thrilled to discover that this mythological figure from Jewish mysticism was born from the dirt, not Adam’s rib like Eve later would be. She became his first wife but was then thrown out of the Garden of Eden for wanting to be on top in sex.
I was captivated by this story and all of the folklore that came with it, especially since new mothers were historically told to be afraid of Lilith. She was too willful and aware of her sexuality, which was exactly what attracted me. I discovered Lilith when I was pregnant with my first daughter and finished the film right after I gave birth to my second. My film Biography of Lilith (1997, 35 min. 16mm) is a reflection of all the awe, fear, frustration, and excitement that was part of this experience.
That film is a meditation on your role as a mother. How does motherhood, as well as your perspective as a woman, inform your filmmaking? And vice-versa, how does being a filmmaker impact how view yourself as a mother?
My two daughters Maya Street-Sachs (b. 1995) and Noa Street-Sachs (b. 1997) entered my life as an artist before they were even born through the making of Biography of Lilith. I have made numerous films with them, including Photograph of Wind (3 min. 2001), Noa, Noa (8 min., 2006), The Last Happy Day (37. Min., 2009), and Wind in Our Hair (45 min., 2010) which are all streaming on Fandor. Our daughters enjoy performing and engaging with my filmmaking, or at least this is what they have told me. By integrating my daughters into my life as an artist, I was able to engage with them both creatively and intellectually throughout their childhood.
Do you have any other projects on the horizon?
I certainly do! For most of my adult life, I’ve collected and saved over 550 small business cards that people have given me – from professional conferences to doctors’ appointments, from film festivals to hardware stores, from art galleries to human rights centers. In these places, I’ve met and engaged with hundreds of people over a period of four decades, and now I’m thinking about how these people’s lives might have affected mine or, in turn, how I might have touched the trajectory of their own journey.
Rifling through the cards, I wonder about each person who offered me this small paper object as a reminder of our encounter. Some meetings were profound, others brief and superficial. And yet, almost every card actually accomplished the mnemonic purpose for which it was created. Holding a card now, a trickle or a flood of memories lands inside my internal vault, and that person’s existence is reinstated in mine. Beginning in 2021, I threw myself into the process of investigating how the component parts of these cards could hold a clue to my understanding of what they are. The concept of making distillations has been at the foundation of my work for a very long time.
As an experimental filmmaker and poet, I am more interested in the associative relationship between two things, two shots, and two words than I am in their cause and effect, or their narrative symbiosis. For me, a distillation like one of these cards is a container for ideas and energy, a concise manifestation of a multi-valent presence that does not depend on exposition. Distillation is not a metaphor; it’s more like metonymy and synecdoche, where a part stands in for a whole, where less might be more.
The Lynne Sachs Collection is now showing on Fandor, our independent film streaming service. Click here to watch the works of Lynne Sachs.
OVID in February Includes 32 Films with 10 Exclusive Streaming Premieres
Five French cinema classics, acclaimed Asian cinema, films by Charles Burnett and Shirley Clarke, and much more!
OVID.tv is proud to announce its February slate of thirty-two (32) streaming releases, including ten (10) exclusively streaming on OVID.
OVID’s February slate celebrates Black History Month with eight classic films exploring the Black experience at home and abroad. These include the 1948 documentary STRANGE VICTORY (branded communist propaganda at the time of its release), COME BACK, AFRICA, and Charles Burnett’s memorable slice of life drama MY BROTHER’S WEDDING.
Just in time for Valentine’s Day, OVID is proud to premiere five classic French films in February. The fun begins with three films by the French filmmaker and screenwriter Marc Allégret: the swooning 1955 melodrama SCHOOL FOR LOVE (starring a young Brigitte Bardot), the 1955 D.H. Lawrence adaptation LADY CHATTERLY’S LOVER, and the delightfully fluffy 1953 farce JULIETTA.
A week later, OVID offers up two seldom-seen films by Jacques Doniol-Valcroze, central figure of the French New Wave, author, actor, and co-founder of Cahiers du Cinéma: the racy 1960 film A GAME FOR SIX LOVERS (featuring music by Serge Gainsbourg) and the 1961 political thriller LA DENONCIATION (THE IMMORAL MOMENT).
Other titles in OVID’s February slate include Shirley Clarke’s Beat classic THE CONNECTION, the delightful Hong Kong genre farce VAMPIRE CLEANUP DEPARTMENT, Ilan Ziv’s eye-opening EXILE, A MYTH UNEARTHED, and five more indelible short films by OVID favorite Lynne Sachs.
Details on all films coming to OVID in February are below.
Wednesday, February 9
And Then We Marched Directed by Lynne Sachs, Documentary Short, 2017 US Filmmaker Lynne Sachs shoots Super 8mm film of the first Women’s March in 2017 in Washington, D.C. and intercuts this recent footage with archival material of early 20th Century Suffragists marching for the right to vote, 1960s antiwar activists and 1970s advocates for the Equal Rights Amendment.
A Biography of Lilith Directed by Lynne Sachs, Documentary Short, 1997 US In a lively mix of narrative, collage and memoir, A Biography of Lilith updates the creation myth by telling the story of the first woman. Lilith’s betrayal by Adam in Eden and subsequent vow of revenge is recast as a modern tale with a present-day Lilith musing on a life that has included giving up a baby for adoption and working as a bar dancer. Interweaving mystical texts from Jewish folklore with interviews, music and poetry, director Lynne Sachs reclaims this cabalistic parable to frame her own role as mother.
Tip of My Tongue Directed by Lynne Sachs, Documentary, 2017 US To celebrate her 50th birthday, filmmaker Lynne Sachs gathers together other people, men and women who have lived through precisely the same years but come from places like Iran or Cuba or Australia or the Lower East Side, not Memphis, Tennessee where Sachs grew up. She invites 12 fellow New Yorkers – born across several continents in the 1960s – to spend a weekend with her making a movie. Together they discuss some of the most salient, strange, and revealing moments of their lives in a brash, self-reflexive examination of the way in which uncontrollable events outside our own domestic universe impact who we are. (Anthology Film Archives Calendar).
A Month of Single Frames (for Barbara Hammer) Directed by Lynne Sachs, Documentary Short, 2019 US In 1998, experimental filmmaker Barbara Hammer took part in a one-month residency at a Cape Cod dune shack without running water or electricity, where she shot film, recorded sound and kept a journal. In 2018 she gave all of this material to Lynne Sachs and invited her to make a film with it.
A Year in Notes and Numbers Directed by Lynne Sachs, Documentary Short, 2017 US A year’s worth of to-do lists confronts the unavoidable numbers that are part and parcel of an annual visit to the doctor. The quotidian and the corporeal mingle and mix. Family commitments, errands and artistic effusions trade places with the daunting reality of sugar, cholesterol, and bone.
Sachs’ Films Selected by MEHDI JAHAN & LIBERTAD GILLS
This 2021 has been a complex year, to the extent that we continue to be subjected to a pandemic, which still continues to limit the ways we access movies. It has also been a year of resilience for a type of experimental cinema, which has perhaps been forced or motivated by the “materiality” of digital. We think of spaces like @preservationinsanity by Mark Toscano on Instagram, which every week projects films from a projector while transmitting that experience live via Live. Isn’t it a kind of lifeline for those of us who find ourselves removed from these kinds of opportunities? Or the imperative of seeing the Thai – Colombian Memoriain a movie theater, not necessarily because of its visual stakes, but because of the demanding sound experience, often neglected: gathered under the darkness of a movie theater to listen attentively. The pandemic has also filled us with noise pollution, and their silence and its subtleties become escape valves, or echoes of a future survival of cinema in times of streaming and torrents.
From Desistfilm, we continue with our commitment to continue to make visible a cinema supported by online festivals above all, and the mission of this type of list is to share this appreciation for a cinema that resists and that continues to transform us. Here is the list of collaborators and friends of Desistfilm, who this year accompanied us in some way, either with their texts, appreciations or other forms of love for cinema.
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This 2021 has been a complex year, to the extent that we continue to be subjected to a pandemic, which still continues to limit the ways of accessing movies. It has also been a year of resilience for a type of experimental cinema, which has perhaps been forced or motivated by the “materiality” of digital. We think of spaces like @preservationinsanity by Mark Toscano on Instagram, which every week projects films from a projector while transmitting that experience live via Live. Isn’t it a kind of lifeline for those of us who find ourselves removed from these kinds of opportunities? Or the imperative to see the Thai Colombo Memoriain a movie theater, not necessarily because of their visual stakes, but because of the demanding sound experience, often neglected: gathered under the darkness of a movie theater to listen attentively. The pandemic has also filled us with noise pollution, and there silence and its subtleties become escape valves, or echoes of a future survival of cinema in times of streaming and torrents.
From Desistfilm, we continue with our commitment to continue to make visible a cinema supported by online festivals above all, and the mission of this type of list is to share this appreciation for a cinema that resists and that continues to transform us. Here is the list of collaborators and friends of Desistfilm, who this year accompanied us in some way, either with their texts, appreciations or other forms of love for cinema.
NICOLE BRENEZ, professor (Sorbonne nouvelle / Fémis), programmer (Cinémathèque française)
The most exciting cinephile event of 2021 for me is the simultaneous release of two magnificent and complementary documentaries / film-essays on Omar Blondin Diop, the young revolutionary filmed by Jean-Luc Godard in La Chinoise (1967) and murdered in prison in 1973: the first in Africa (Senegal) by Djeydi Djigo; the second in Europe (Belgium-France) by Vincent Meessen. This indicates to us the slowness it takes for humanity to light a sparkle of symbolic justice. But also, that perhaps the forever young Omar Diop is sending us the signal to start the general revolt.
(By alphabetic order of the authors, Twelve films)
Omar Blondin Diop le révolté / Omar Blondin Diop the rebel (Djeydi Djigo, Senegal, 2021) Topologie d’une absence / Topology of an absence (Rami El Sabbagh, Lebanon, 2021) Jean Genet: Notre-Père-des-Fleurs / Jean Genet: Our-Father-of-Flowers (Dalila Ennadre, Morocco, 2021) Signe Byrge Sørensen, Our Memory Belongs To Us (Rami Farah, Denmark / France / Palestine / Syria, 2021) Moune Ô, Belgium (Maxime Jean-Baptiste, 2021) Masters of the Land , Mongolia / Belgium (Jan Locus, 2021) Juste un Mouvement / Just a Movement (Vincent Meessen, Belgium / France, 2021) Filmatruc a? verres n ° 2, Oiseaux/ Glass film trick n ° 2, Birds, (Silvi Simon, France, 2021, Film, Installation) Frères / Brothers (Ugo Simon France, 2021) En Corps + (Lionel Soukaz, Stéphane Gérard, France, 2021, Film, Installation) The Visit (Kristi Tethong Canada, 2021) Train Again (Peter Tscherkassky, Austria, 2021)
+ 2 wonderful essays from 2020 I saw only this year: IWOW: I walk on water (Khalik Allah USA, 2020) Fiertés, inc. / Pride, Inc. (Thibault Jacquin, France, 2020)
The most amazing work I read in 2021 is Thibault Elie’s monumental research on Florent Marcie, titled Florent Marcie sur le front de l’information (“ Florent Marcie on the news front ”). I hope it will be published soon, so that cinephiles could share this sum of knowledge and passion.
One of the wittiest and most energetic book ever written about cinema is Jurij Meden’s Scratches and glitches. Observations on Preserving and Exhibiting Cinema in the Early 21st Century , Vienna, FilmmuseumSynemaPublications, 2021. Finally, one doesn’t have to be a diviner to predict that the greatest book of 2022 is Bidhan Jacob’s long-awaited Aesthetics of the signal / Esthétique du signal , to be published next February, fruit of almost 20 years of research, a true event.
ADRIAN MARTIN , Australian film critic, audiovisual essayist
To 2021 Memoir
The name of this online journal has always grabbed me: not Resistfilm , but Desistfilm . Desist: refuse, refrain from doing something, cease or abstain, just stop it. So I will desist from handing in the same old ‘Top Ten Movies’ of the year list here. I want to record some other kinds of filmic phenomena.
I discovered one of my happiest and most surprising film viewing experiences in 2021 through my occasional teaching and tutoring at the EQZE film school in San Sebastián, Spain. A student (Haizea Barcenilla), investigating collective filmmaking involving community groups, screened a 21-minute work from 2016 from the Basque region titled Andrekale, credited to Sra. Polaroiska, which is the name of a duo comprising Alaitz Arenaza and María Ibarretxe. As it began on the screen, I expected nothing: maybe a simple, observational documentary about a local community. I was wrong! Its specific subject is a ‘Street of Women’ in Hernani – a place where women gather to talk, play games, socialize, and so on. The film begins with a camera tracking backward, snaking down a curved path with tightly-spaced buildings of three or floor floors on either side. No human presence at the start. Then women begin to emerge, pouring out of one doorway and then another, and immediately taking up their voluble place at some table or sidewalk display. The camera keeps moving, the frame keeps filling, life keeps flowing – what an explosion, all in one magnificent shot! And an absolutely pure cinematic idea. From that point, I had the sense that almost anything could happen in this film – and it did. Two seemingly demure elderly ladies are seen sipping tea and chatting outdoors. Suddenly, without any prompting, they begin to hurl their cups, their fine chinaware, at a nearby rock face, smashing it all. It goes on and on, a great liberating orgy of anarchistic destruction! There’s more toAndrekale , but I will let you discover that for yourself, if you can. I loved this film, seen by chance, unforgettable.
Thanks to the job of catalog-entry-writing for the Viennale, I encountered, for the first time, the work of UK artist-critic Morgan Quaintance: his recent films A Human Certainty (2021, 20 minutes), and Surviving You, Always (2020, 18 minutes). These films offered me another kind of bracing shock: true minimalism, no slickness, no padding, no easy wash of image or sound to make the materials more palatable. Stories told in written texts, over often mysterious and cryptic image-archives: achingly personal, and also keyed to numerous forms of collective, social breakdown. An uncompromised, unfashionable form of political art.
Watching, over and over, Birth ( https://laughmotel.wordpress.com/2021/08/05/birth/), a 13-minute video by Cristina Álvarez López, was an especially powerful experience for me. She has spent a lot of time in 2021 exploring techniques of superimposition, a skill she has added to her long-conquered dexterity in audiovisual montage. You couldn’t find a more perfect fit between style and subject, form and content, than here: the emotional and psychic schisms of individual subjectivity – fusion and separation, especially in relation to mother and daughter – traced through the joining and merging, splitting and redefining, of spaces, colors, shapes, bodies. Voices on the soundtrack whisper privately or speak in unguarded conversation about loss of self, of ground, of origin, of center. Sobbing tears of depression flow from eyes, but there is distance here, as well as closeness, for the spectator as well as for the maker: the arrangement of image and sound forms takes us to another plateau of empathic contemplation. As she writes: “This is all about what images can do to each other and about how they become something else when affected by the other’s properties: it’s exactly like with people”.
For regular online reading, I like the less institutionalized or commercialized independent sites: Ubiquarian (for which I reviewed Zulfikar Filandra’s fascinating 64-minute feature Minotaur [2020]), Desistfilm , Sabzian . Among book publications devoted to adventurous cinema, I value Jurij Meden’s Scratches and Glitches (Austrian Film Museum), and Erika Balsom’s Ten Skies (Fireflies Press).
I pull of all the modish talk of algorithms, artificial intelligence, non-fungible tokens, digitally-readable and computer-generated imagery. Of Netflix and YouTube. Of whether Marvel Superhero blockbusters are Art or not. All this bears little on the reality of what I watch, from day to day, and what moves me. Cinema is still, fundamentally, what you or I can manage to film, to edit, to shape, to express, and to show to another person. Some people high up the industrial ladder still manage to do that in an intimate, eloquent, touching way, whether they are Leos Carax, Kelly Reichardt or Clint Eastwood: I salute them as a viewer and as a critic. That’s film art to me, just like the far more modestly scaled productions by Abel Ferrara ( Zeros and Ones ) or Marco Bellocchio ( Marx Can Wait); and just like the streaking, no-budget comets in the sky of cinema that I have barely described above.
TOMÁŠ HUDÁK Film critic and programmer based in Bratislava, Slovakia.
If last year I was trying to take advantage of all the online offerings and attend festivals I had never been to physically, in 2021 I had to skip many of them. I was just too tired. But it was not a “Zoom fatigue”, just good ol ‘pressure to be everywhere and see everything, to not waste any time and always be productive. I was slowly burning out (again) and had to throw in the towel many times.
Still, I have seen most of my favorite film of 2021 at home. Notable exceptions are Memoria and What Do We See When We Look at the Sky? which I am so happy that I managed to see in cinema on really huge screen. I spent a lot of time with Peter Watkins films, both watching them and reading about them ( The Journey and La Commune are still waiting for me). I have seen The Emperor’s Naked Army Marches On for the first time and it was one of the most devastating film experiences I have ever had. Practices of Viewing , an ongoing series of video essays by Johannes Binotto, is always challenging and illuminating. I learned so much reading Kim Knowles’ bookExperimental Film and Photochemical Practices . Probably no piece of writing made deeper impact on me this year than Abby Sun’s essay On Criticism . Berwick’s BFMAF public discussion about its internal practices was so important and inspirational. I had some great time with NBA and WNBA league passes. And finally, special shout out to Ecstatic Static, Another Screen, Global Media Cultures Podcast and to everyone talking about mental health (in film industry).
Here are some of my favorite films I saw in 2021 for the first time:
All Light, Everywhere (Theo Anthony, USA, 2021) Decasia (Bill Morrison, USA, 2002) earthearthearth (Daïchi Saïto, Canada, 2021) Edvard Munch (Peter Watkins, Norway, Sweden, 1973) The Emperor’s Naked Army Marches On (Kazuo Hara, Japan, 1987) Gunda (Victor Kossakovsky, Norway, USA, 2020) Landscapes of Resistance (Marta Popivoda, Serbia, Germany, France, 2020) Luukkaankangas – updated, revisited (Dariusz Kowalski, Austria, 2005) Memoria (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Colombia, Thailand, United Kingdom, Mexico, France, 2021) A Night of Knowing Nothing (Payal Kapadia, France, India, 2021) Now, At Last! (Ben Rivers, United Kingdom, 2018) Point and Line to Plane (Sofia Bohdanowicz, Canada, 2020) Still Processing (Sophy Romvari, Canada, 2020) This Is Not a Burial, It’s a Resurrection (Lemohang Jeremiah Mosese, Lesotho, 2019) Those That, at a Distance, Resemble Another (Jessica Sarah Rinland, United Kingdom, Argentina, 2019) What Do We See When We Look at the Sky? (Alexandre Koberidze, Germany, Georgia, 2021)
EVE HELLER Filmmaker (Austria)
Backyard (Peggy Ahwesh, 2021, USA, 2 min) Twin Peaks: The Return (David Lynch, 2017, USA, 18 hours) Anathema (Julie Murray, 1995, USA, 7 min) La Signora di tutti (Max Ophüls, 1934, Italy, 89 min) The Coronation (Talena Sanders, 2021, Mexico, 8 min) Herr Bachmann und seine Klasse [Mr. Bachmann and His Class] (Maria Speth, 2021, Germany, 217 min) Kristallnacht (Chick Strand, 1979, USA, 7 min) Train Again (Peter Tscherkassky, Austria, 2021, 20 min).
Most intricately stirring and thought provoking film program series of 2021:
Carte Blanche. Mark McElhatten— “To The Lighthouse,” Oct 29 – Nov 16, 2021 MoMA
JULIAN ROSS Programmer, curator, film critic
Have feature films
A Night of Knowing Nothing (Payal Kapadia, 2021) Memoryland (Kim Quy Bui, 2021) El Gran Movimiento (The Great Movement, Kiro Russo, 2021) The Story of Southern Islet (Nan wu, Keat Aun Chong, 2020) Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy (Ryusuke Hamaguchi, 2021) Inside the Red Brick Wall (Hong Kong Documentary Filmmakers, 2020) Memoria (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, 2021) Ste. Anne (Rhayne Vermette, 2021) White Building (Bodeng Sar, Kavich Neang, 2021) Feast ( Tim Leyendekker, 2021)
Have short films
Song for dying (Korakrit Arunanondchai, 2021)
Surviving You Always (Morgan Quaintance, 2021)
Maat Means Land (Fox Maxy, 2020)
Manifesto (Ane Hjort Guttu, 2020)
Tellurian Drama (Riar Rizaldi, 2020)
One Thousand and One Attempts to be an Ocean (Wang Yuyan, 2020)
Polycephaly in D (Michael Robinson, 2021)
Isn’t it a beautiful world (Joseph Wilson, 2021)
Glass Life (Sara Cwynar, 2021)
earthearthearth (Daïchi Saïto, 2021)
Have first views
Includes two 35mm films, a 16mm double-projection performance and a digital restoration presented in a cinema, as well as online presentations by Another Screen, Light Industry, MUBI, Thai Film Archive, Jeonju International Film Festival and @preservationinsanity.
Silent Light (Stellet Licht, Carlos Reygadas, 2007) La Ciénaga (Lucrecia Martel, 2001) The Round-Up (Szegénylegények, Miklós Jancsó, 1966) Tongpan (Yutthana Mukdasanit, 1977) The Zone of Total Eclipse (Mika Taanila, 2006) Untitled 77-A (Han Ok-hee, 1977) Lost Book Found (Jem Cohen, 1996) Stendalì: Suonano ancora (Cecilia Mangini, 1960) Vital Signs (Barbara Hammer, 1991) Bhuvan Shome (Mrinal Sen, 1969)
JEAN HYEMIN KIM, film scholar / writer / teacher, USA.
10 films I enjoyed this year (New & Old)
The Tsugua Diaries / Maureen Fazendeiro and Miguel Gomes
What Do We See When We Look at the Sky? / Alexandre Koberidze
Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy / Ryûsuke Hamaguchi
Stray / Elizabeth Lo
A Love Song For Latasha / Sophia Nahli Allison
The Girl from Chicago / Oscar Micheaux
Le Mystère Bunny / Wayne Koestenbaum
Nénette and Boni / Claire Denis
The Velvet Underground / Todd Haynes
10.Belle / Mamoru Hosoda
PETER TSCHERKASSKY , Filmmaker (Austria)
Au bord du monde (Gaspar Noé, F / B / Monaco 2021, 142 min) The Card Counter (Paul Schrader, USA / GB / China 2021, 112 min) Herr Bachmann und seine Klasse [Mr. Bachmann and his Class] (Maria Speth, Germany 2021, 217 min) Jaddeh khaki (Panah Panahi, Iran, 2021, 97 min) Kelti (Milica Tomovic, RS 2021, 106 min) Report (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, CO / Thailand / GB / Mexico / F / China / Taiwan 2021, 136 min) Promenade 1 (Zélie Parraud, F 2021, 1 min) Promenade 2 (Zélie Parraud, F 2021, 1 min) Re Granchio (Alessio Rigo de Righi, Metteo Zoppis, I / AR / F 2021, 106 min) Singing in Oblivion (Eve Heller, A 2021, 13 min) A Police Movie (Alonso Ruizpalacios, Mexico 2021, 107 min.)
DAISUKE AKASAKA . Film Critic (Japan)
Gavagai (Rob Tregenza, 2017) Harley Queen (Carolina Adriazola, José Luis Sepúlveda. 2019) Death will come and he will have your eyes (José Luis Torres Leiva, 2019) White on White (Théo Court, 2019) The floor of the wind (Gustavo Fontán , Gloria Peirano, 2021) Chapter eo chapter (Júlio Bressane, 2021) Luz nos tropicos (Paula Gaitán, 2020) Lúa Vermella (Lois Patiño, 2019) The year of discovery (Luis López Carrasco, 2020) Picasso in Vallauris (Peter Nestler, 2021) Annette (Leos Carax, 2021) First Cow (Kelly Reichardt, 2019) Fourteen(Dan Sallitt, 2019) Wheel of fortune and fantasy (Ryusuke Hamaguchi, 2021) Love Mooning (Kunitoshi Manda, 2021) Danses macabres, Squelettes et autres fantasies (Rita Azevedo Gomes, Pierre Léon, Jean-Louis Schefer, 2019)
DAN SALLITT , Filmmaker, USA
My favorite films that were released for the first time in 2021. This list usually grows considerably over the next 18 months or so:
El Planeta (Amalia Ulman, 2021) Souad (Ayten Amin, 2021) Pebbles (PS Vinothraj, 2021) Outside Noise (Ted Fendt, 2021) France (Bruno Dumont, 2021) Who prevents it (Jonás Trueba, 2021) Susanna Andler (Benoît Jacquot, 2021) The Cathedral (Ricky D’Ambrose, 2021) In Front of Your Face (Hong Sang-soo, 2021) Sacred Spirit (Chema García Ibarra, 2021) Wood and Water (Jonas Bak, 2021)
Some excellent older films that I saw for the first time in 2021, in chronological order: Mashenka (Yuli Raizman, 1942); But What If This Is Love? (Yuli Raizman, 1962); Encore (Once More) (Paul Vecchiali, 1988); Aux petits bonheurs (Michel Deville, 1994); Kippur (Amos Gitai, 2000); Beautiful Valley (Hadar Friedlich, 2011); Aferim! (Radu Jude, 2015); Season (André Novais Oliveira, 2018); Short Vacation (Kwon Min-pyo and Han-Sol Seo, 2020).
DENNIS COOPER, filmmaker, writer, USA
Favorite 2021 films (in no order)
Whether Line (Ryan Trecartin & Lizzie Fitch, 2019)
Sisters With Transistors (Lisa Rovner, 2020)
Nature (Artavazd Pelechian, 2019)
Unsprung Der Nacht (Lothar Baumgarten, 1982)
Annette (Leos Carax, 2021)
When We Were Monsters (Steve Reinke & James Richards, 2020)
The French Dispatch (Wes Anderson, 2021)
L’anne Derniere A Dachau (Mark Rappaport, 2020)
The Velvet Underground (Todd Haynes, 2021)
The Masturbator’s Heart (Michael Salerno)
On The Island (Daniel & Clara , 2021)
I’m Free (Laure Portier, 2021)
France (Bruno Dumont, 2021)
Mudmonster (OB De Alessi, 2021)
About Endlessness (Roy Andersson, 2019)
Tori Kudo Archive
Accidental Luxuriance Of The Translucent Watery Rebus (Dalibor Baric, 2020)
Censor (Prano Bailey-Bond, 2021)
Fat Chance (Stephen Broomer, 2021)
Moments Like This Never Last (Cheryl Dunne, 2020)
Death And Bowling (Lyle Kash, 2021)
JOSE SARMIENTO HINOJOSA Director, desistfilm.com, curator, film critic
2020, 2021 films
Train Again (Peter Tscherkassky, 2021)
Transparent, I Am (Yuri Muraoka, 2020)
Luz Nos Tropicos (Paula Gaitán, 2020)
Memory (Apitchapong Weerasethakul, 2021)
Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn (Radu Jude, 2021)
Light Trap (Pablo Marin, 2021)
Zeroes and Ones – Abel Ferrara (2021)
EARTHEARTHEARTH – Daichi Saito (2021)
Drive my Car – Rysuke Hamaguchi (2021)
10.Red Post on Escher Street – Sion Sono (2020)
11.Bela – Prantik Narayan Basu (2021)
12.Saxifrages, Quatre Nuits Blanches – Nicolas Klotz, Elizabeth Perceval (2021)
Steve Polta’s Rituals of Regeneration for Dobra Film Festival
Daniella Shreir for Another Screen :
[Silence] […] [Laughter] + Focus on Mara Mattuschka
The Practice of Disobedience: Carole Roussoupolos & Delphine Seyrig ‘restrospective
For a Free Palestine: Films by Palestinian Women
Marguerite Duras on Television
Eight Films by Cecilia Mangini
Hands Tied / Eating the Other
A One Woman Confessional: Films by Cecilia Mangini
Stephen Broomer’s Art & Trash Videoessay series The Mechanics of Light by S (8) Mostra de Cinema Periferico
First seen in 2021:
Double Labyrinthe – Maria Klonaris, Katerina Thomadaki (1976)
From Today Until Tomorrow – Danielle Hulliet – Jean-Marie Straub (1997)
Blind Beast – Yasuzo Masumura (1969)
A Portrait of Parvaneh Navai – Maria Klonaris, Katerina Thomadaki (1983)
To Camel – Ibrahim Shaddad (1981)
The Margin – Ozualdo Ribeiro Candeias (1967)
The Whole Shebang – Ken Jacobs (2019)
The Spiral Staircase – Robert Siodmak (1946)
Trail on the Road – Aleksei German (1986)
10.One Hamlet Less – Carmelo Bene (1973)
11.Messiah of Evil – Willard Huyck, Gloria Katz (1973)
12.My Winter Journey – Vincent Dieutre (2003)
13.Juvenile Court – Frederick Wiseman (1973)
14.The Crowd – King Vidor (1928)
15.Hangover Square – John Brahm (1945)
16.Flammes – Adolfo Arrieta (1978)
17.Lady Snowblood / Lady Snowblood 2: Love Song of Vengeance – Toshiya Fujita (1973, 1974)
18.Pets – Albertina Carri (2012)
19.Playback – Agustina Comedi (2019)
20.Pull / Drift / The Waiting Sands – Margaret Rorison (2013, 2013)
21.Mirage – Edward Dmytryk (1965)
22.Bourbon Street Blues – Douglas Sirk (1979)
23.The Howling – Joe Dante (1981)
24.The Hot Little Girl – Yasuzo Masumura (1970)
25.Yoshiwara: The Pleasure Quartet – Tomu Uchida (1960)
26.Blood is Redder Than The Sun – Koji Wakamatsu (1966)
27.La Casa Lobo – Cristobal León, Joaquín Cociña (2018)
28.Relativity – Ed Emshwiller (1966)
29.The Long Hair of Death – Antonio Margheriti (1964)
30.Paranoia – Umberto Lenzi (1969)
31.The Whispering Star – Sion Sono (2015)
32.Autour de Jeanne Dielman – Sami Frei (1975)
33.The Amazonian Angel – Maria Klonaris, Katerina Thomadaki (1992)
34.Satan’s Rhapsody – Nino Oxilia (1965)
35.History of Postwar Japan as Told as a Bar Hostess – Shohei Imamura (1970)
36.The Oracle – Roberta Findlay (1965)
37.Eggshells – Tobe Hopper (1969)
38.Black Sabbath – Mario Bava (1963)
39.Mark of the Devil – Michael Armstrong, Adrian Hoven (1970)
40.Madhouse – Ovidio G. Assontis (1981)
41.Her Man – Tay Garnett (1930)
42.Human Being – Ibrahim Shaddad (1994)
43.Another Decade – Morgan Quaintance (2018)
44.Ghosts – André Novais Oliveira (2010)
45.The Carabineers – JLG (1963)
46.Lost Note – Saul Levine (2015)
47.Through the Ruins – Claudio Caldini (1982)
48.Abiding – Ugo Petronin (2019)
49.Bom Bom’s Dream – Jeremy Deller, Cecilia Bengolea (2016)
50.Dark Logic / Gedanken Aus Der Lift / Funes El Memorioso / Vindmoller / Memory of August / Understory – Margaret Rorison (2016, 2017, 2014, 2014, 2014, 2019)
51.The Devil’s Backbone – Guillermo del Toro (2001)
52.Karelia – International with Monument – Andrés Duque (2019)
53.Lake Mungo – Joel Anderson (2008)
MÓNICA DELGADO , film critic, director desistfilm.com
Films released for the first time in 2021
Train Again (Peter Tscherkassky, 2021)
Memory (Apichatpong Weresethakul, 2021)
Drive my car (Ryusuke Hagamuchi, 2021)
earthearthearth (Daïchi Saïto, 2021)
The great movement (The great movement, Kiro Russo, 2021)
Pejzazi otpora (Lanscape of resistance, Marta Popivoda, 2021)
Diários de Otsoga (Maureen Fazendeiro, Miguel Gomes, 2021)
Eles transportan a morte (They Carry Death, Helena Girón, Samuel M. Delgado, 2021)
Dangsin eolgul ap-eseo (In Front of Your Face, Hong Sangsoo, 2021)
10.The Inheritance (Ephraim Asili, 2021)
11.Chapter eo chapter (Capitu and the Chapter, Júlio Bressane, 2021)
12.Mad God (Phil Tippett, 2021)
13.A Night of Knowing Nothing (Payal Kapadia, 2021)
14.Saxifrages, quatre nuits blanches (Nicolas Klotz, Elizabeth Perceval, 2021)
15.Ostinato (Paula Gaitán, 2021)
16.Sycorax (Lois Patiño, Matías Piñeiro, 2021)
17.Rock Bottom Riser (Fern Silva, 2021)
18.Annette (Leos Carax, 2021)
19.Pr1nc3s4 (Raúl Perrone, 2021)
20.Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn (Radu Jude, 2021)
21.Ste. Anne (Rhayne Vermette, 2021)
22.The Great Void (Sebastian Metz, 2020)
23.The Red Filter is Withdrawn (Minjung Kim, 2020)
24.Zeroes and Ones (Abel Ferrara, 2021)
25.All Light, Everywhere (Theo Anthony, 2021)
26.Light trap (Pablo Marín, 2021)
27.Nuclear Family (Travis Wilkerson, 2021)
28.Ahed’s Knee (Nadav Lapid, 2021)
29.Outside Noise (Ted Fendt, 2021)
30.Sacred Spirit (Chema García Ibarra, 2021)
31.Nuhu Yãg Mu Yõg Hãm: Essa Terra É Nossa! (Isael Maxakali, Sueli Maxakali, Carolina Canguçu, Roberto Romero, 2020)
32.Rêve de Gotokuji par un premier mai sans lune (Natacha Thiéry, 2020)
33.Erial (Javiera Cisterna, 2021)
34.The Canyon (Zacary Epcar, 2021)
35.Surviving You Always (Morgan Quaintance, 2021)
Peruvian films
I’ll wait here until I hear my name (Héctor Galvez, 2021)
The Old Child (Felipe Esparza, 2021)
Programs or tributes in festivals
Eight films by the Italian filmmaker Cecilia Mangini (1927–2021), presented by Another Screen.
First edition of Prismatic Ground, a festival centered on experimental documentary (USA). It’s wonderful when a new experimental film and video festival comes out. I loved the films of Anita Thacher.
Bette Gordon at Playdoc International Film Festival (Spain). An important tribute to a great American filmmaker. Her film Variety is indispensable. Pleasant that this fest has been able to show this film.
Homage to filmmaker Paula Gaitan at Tiradentes Film Festival (Brazil) and a retrospective at Frontera Sur Film Festival (Chile). Paula is one of the great Latin American filmmakers and her work is being revalued in the last few years. Nuhu Yãg Mu Yõg Hãm(Essa Terra É Nossa! By Isael Maxakali, Sueli Maxakali, Carolina Canguçu and Roberto Romero, 2020) at Sheffield Doc Fest. A film of an indigenous community obtaining the most important award. It is not frequent. The Big Headed Boy, Shamans & Samurais , by Bibhusan Basnet and Pooja Gurung (Nepal) at Lima Alterna Film Festival.
FARID RODRIGUEZ, program Lima Alterna Fest
In order of preference
Babi Yar. Context (Sergei Loznitsa, Ukraine)
Wood and Water (Jonas Bak, Germany)
The bones (Joaquín Cociña and Cristóbal León, Chile)
Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy (Ryûsuke Hamaguchi, Japan)
10.Terranova (Alejandro Alonso Estrella and Alejandro Pérez, Cuba)
11.Rock Bottom Riser (Fern Silva, United States)
12.Husek (Daniela Seggiario, Argentina)
13.A River Runs, Turns, Erases, Replaces (Shengze Zhu, China)
14.Nullo (Jan Soldat, Austria)
15.The great movement (Kiro Russo, Bolivia)
16.Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn (Radu Jude, Romania)
17.Sacred Spirit ( Chema García Ibarra, Spain)
18.Faya Dayi (Jessica Beshir, Ethiopia)
19.In Front of Your Face + Introduction (Hong Sang-soo, South Korea)
20.9 (Martín Barrenechea and Nicolás Branca, Uruguay)
12 of 2020 seen in the 21
Dau. Degeneration , by Ilya Khrzhanovskiy and Ilya Permyakov (Russia)
Digital Video Editing with Adobe Premiere Pro: The Real-World Guide to Set Up and Workflow , by Hong Seong-yoon (South Korea)
Ailleurs, Partout , by Isabelle Ingold and Vivianne Perelmuter (Belgium)
The Big Headed Boy , Shamans & Samurais, Bibhusan Basnet and Pooja Gurung (Nepal)
Sweetie, You Won’t Believe It , by Yernar Nurgaliyev (Kazakhstan)
The Wasteland , by Ahmad Bahrami (Iran)
Liberty: An Ephemeral Statute , by Rebecca Jane Arthur (Belgium)
Eyimofe , by Arie Esiri and Chuko Esiri (Nigeria)
Mama , by Dongmei Li (China)
February,by Kamen Kalev (Bulgaria)
Catavento , by Joao Rosas (Portugal)
Day in the Life , from the Karrabing Film Collective (Australia)
12 Great Movies of the 20th Century First Seen in 2021
Distant Journey , by Alfréd Radok (Czechoslovakia, 1949) Dracula , by Terrence Fisher (United Kingdom, 1958) Operazione paura , by Mario Bava (Italy, 1966) The bird with the crystal feathers , by Dario Argento (Italy, 1970) Muna Moto , by Jean-Pierre Dikongue-Pipa (Cameroon, 1975) One People , by Pim de la Parra (Surinam, 1976) Beirut, Never Again , by Jocelyn Saab (Lebanon, 1976) Next of Kin , by Tony Williams (Australia, 1982) Beirut, My City , by Jocelyn Saab (Lebanon, 1983) Winter adé, by Helke Misselwitz (East Germany, 1989) The Belovs , by Viktor Kossakovsky (Russia, 1992) Little Angel, Make Me Happy , by Uzmaan Saparov (Turkmenistan, 1993)
Peruvian Movies
Pneumatic conduction, by Genietta Varsi Notes on Connection III , by Andrea Franco Arquitectura entre species , by Mauricio Freyre I ‘ll wait here until I hear my name , by Héctor Gálvez Las_chicas.mp4 , by Ximena Medina, Romina Bran, Valeria Marín and Francesca Bobbio
VICTOR GUIMARÃES, film critic (Kinetics / With eyes open) and programmer (FICValdivia, FENDA) –Brazil
14 imaginary double bills in 2021:
Memory (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, 2021) + El Cuervo, la Yegua y la Fosa (Beatriz Santiago Muñoz, 2021)
The sonic depth of delusion.
The Whole Shebang (Ken Jacobs, 2019) + Agua del Arroyo que Tiembla (Javiera Cisterna, 2021)
A film is an image being born from the viscera of another image.
Detours (Ekaterina Selenkina, 2021) + Ste. Anne (Rhayne Vermette, 2021)
Landscape as fiction. Fiction as landscape.
Open Monte (María Rojas Arias, 2021) + Notes for a Déjà Vu (Colectivo Los Ingrávidos, 2021)
Truly facing the present requires some anachrony.
Antonio Valencia (Daniela Delgado Viteri, 2020) + Self-Portrait: Fairy Tale in 47 KM (Zhang Mengqi, 2021)
The politics of tenderness.
The Sky is Red (Francina Carbonell, 2020) + One Image, Two Acts (Sanaz Sohrabi, 2020)
Prison break.
Drive my Car (Ryûsuke Hamaguchi, 2021) + Chapter eo Chapter (Julio Bressane, 2021)
The theater of passion.
Il n’y Aura Plus de Nuit (Eléonore Weber, 2020) + Zeros and Ones (Abel Ferrara, 2021)
A plunge into the darkness of our times.
Rodson ou (Onde o Sol Não Temdó) (Clara Chroma, Cleyton Xavier y Orlok Sombra, 2020) + Love is a Dog from Hell (Khavn, 2021)
Cinema is full of sound and fury.
Rua Ataléia (André Novais Oliveira, 2021) + Summer (Vadim Kostrov, 2021)
The delicate rigors of light.
south (Morgan Quaintance, 2020) + A Night of Knowing Nothing (Payal Kapadia, 2021)
A fistful of burning images.
Nuhu Yãg Mu Yõg Hãm: Essa Terra É Nossa! (Isael Maxakali, Sueli Maxakali, Carolina Canguçu, Roberto Romero, 2020) + Voltei! (Glenda Nicácio & Ary Rosa, 2021)
The musical heart of political cinema.
Nosferasta (Adam Khalil & Bayley Sweitzer & Oba, 2021) + El Gran Movimiento (Kiro Russo, 2021)
How many times can a film mutate and still be awesome?
I would like to celebrate the work of two great platforms for showing films that made our lives better this year: Another Screen and Prismatic Ground. Also, the peak of my cinephile year was discovering the work of the Sudanese Film Group – especially Jamal (1981) and Jagdpartie (1964) by Ibrahim Shaddad – during the Flaherty Seminar programmed by Janaína Oliveira.
VICTOR PAZ MORANDEIRA , film critic and programmer, Spain
Ten highlights of my 2021: eight queue filmmakers will remain in the memory
Apichatpong Weerasethakul – Memory : A fit Apitcha, comfortable in Colombian terrain developing his usual themes and aesthetics. The novelty is the sound treatment, literally from another world.
Leos Carax – Annette : Total creative freedom without fear of ridicule, without barriers. It is a joyous, complex and uncomfortable film in terms of subject matter and form. Adam Driver is an acting beast.
Ryûsuke Hamaguchi: Roulette of fortune and fantasy + Drive My Car . Few times in the history of cinema will someone have made two masterpieces in one year. I like both their elaborate plot structure, their narrative pulse and the outstanding direction of the actors, supported by excellent dialogues. At the end of the day, I think I connect with the sensibility of Japanese, and that is what makes me adore him.
Yuri Ancarani – Atlantide . As if you catch one of A full throttle but with boats through the canals of Venice and give it an air of a documentary YouTuber with urban music hitting your eardrums. The edition is radically to applaud.
Pedro Almodóvar – Parallel Mothers : A brave film in which the man from La Mancha shows himself open-heartedly around the concepts of motherhood and historical memory. That last scene is breathtaking, one of the best Almodóvar has ever shot. Penelope Cruz has never shone so bright.
Abel Ferrara – Zeros and Ones : The best film that exists about confinement, no matter how much it disguises itself as a psychotic thriller. Ferrara lets her apocalyptic paranoias flow in a new exercise in cinema as therapy. Just as cryptic as his recent tapes, but less allegorical, more direct. Very playful with the digital image. A cry of a free caged artist.
Alexandre Koberidze – What Do We See When We Look at the Sky? (What do we see when we look at the sky?) Beautiful and original urban symphony in the form of an elegant romantic comedy.
Ridley Scott – The Last Duel . Crude Rashomon vintage film about how elusive the truth can be. I like him that he doesn’t judge the characters and presents his versions of events without Manichean tricks. Put together an intelligent feminist speech without the need to present yourself as a militant. What a piece of actress Jodie Comer.
An ideal shorts session
In Flow of Words (Eliane Esther Bots, 2021) + Surviving You, Always (Morgan Quaintance, 2020) + Imperdonable (Marlén Viñayo, 2020) + Le quattro strade (Alice Rohrwacher, 2021). They are films that, with different approaches to non-fiction cinema, speak of our current reality with rigor and each one of them from its own singularity.
Classics (re) discovered
The complete work of Márta Mészáros, which MUBI is recovering using new restorations from the Hungarian Film Library; and two tapes by Bette Gordon, to whom Play-Doc dedicated a complete cycle this year: The United States of America (1975, along with James Benning) and Variety (1983).
RAÚL CAMARGO , director of the Valdivia Film Festival, Chile.
15 films, in alphabetical order:
– A night of knowing nothing , by Payal Kapadia.
– Open mount , by María Rojas Arias.
– Water from the creek that trembles , by Javiera Cisterna.
– Under the sky , by Diego Acosta.
– Diários de otsoga , by Maureen Fazendeiro & Miguel Gomes.
– The Great Movement , by Kiro Russo.
– In front of your face , by Hong Sang-soo.
– The bones , by Cristóbal León & Joaquín Cociña.
– Luto , by Pablo Martín Weber.
– Memory , by Apichatpong Weerasethakul.
–My brothers dream awake , by Claudia Huaiquimilla.
– Ste. Anne , by Rhayne Vermette.
– Summer by Vadim Kostrov.
– Une histoire de cheveux (Sibérie) , by Boris Lehman.
– What do we see when we look at the sky? by Aleksandre Koberidze.
15 special mentions, in alphabetical order:
– A morte branca do feiticeiro negro , by Rodrigo Ribeiro.
– Antonio Valencia , by Daniela Delgado.
– Bad luck banging or loony porn , by Radu Jude.
– Dry winter by Kyle Davis.
– Eles transportan a morte , by Helena Girón & Samuel M. Delgado.
– Uruguay is not a river , by Daniel Yafalián.
– Grandma’s scissors by Erica Sheu.
– Notes, incantations. Part II: Carmela , by Alexandra Cuesta.
– One image, two acts , by Sanaz Sohrabi.
– What will be of the summer , by Ignacio Ceroi.
– Retour à Reims (Fragments) , by Jean-Gabriel Périot.
– Short vacation by Kwon Min-pyo & Seo Hansol.
– Train again , by Peter Tscherkassky.
– Tonalli , from Colectivo Los Ingrávidos.
– Tropico de Capricornio, by Juliana Antunes.
PABLO GAMBA , film critic and teacher, Venezuela, Argentina
Terranova , by Alejandro Alonso and Alejandro Pérez (Cuba, 2021)
Israel , by Ernesto Baca (Argentina, 2021)
The promise of return , by Cristián Sánchez (Chile, 2020)
Sol de campinas, by Jessica Sarah Rinland (Brazil, 2021)
Watchmen , by Paz Encina (Paraguay, 2021)
The Wind Floor , by Gloria Peirano and Gustavo Fontán (Argentina, 2021)
The dog that does not shut up , by Ana Katz (Argentina, 2021)
35combro5 , by Raúl Perrone (Argentina, 2021)
Window boy would also like to have a submarine , by Alex Piperno (Uruguay-Argentina-Brazil, 2020)
10.Dark journey light , by Tin Dirdamal (Mexico-Vietnam, 2021)
Terranova’s approach to Havana , which may seem unusual, delusional, is the successful result of the search for an honest way of looking at one of the cities and one of the countries in the world on which preconceptions weigh the most, the cliches. It is also an expression of Cuban cosmopolitanism, a way of seeing the country in the world that can be very different from how the world sees this country.
ANDREEA PATRU , programmer and film critic (Romania / Spain)
Features
Petit Maman (Céline Sciamma, 2021) The Worst Person in the World (Joachim Trier, 2021) The Tale of King Crab (Alessio Rigo de Righi, Matteo Zoppis, 2021) The Card Counter (Paul Schrader, 2021) Vengeance Is Mine , All Others Pay Cash (Edwin, 2021) The Girl and the Spider (Ramon Zürcher, Silvan Zürcher, 2021) The Tsugua Diaries (Maureen Fazendeiro, Miguel Gomes, 2021) The Dorm (Roman Vasyanov, 2021) A Night of Knowing Nothing (Payal Kapadia , 2021) All Light, Everywhere (Theo Anthony, 2021) Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy (Ryûsuke Hamaguchi, 2021) Dirty Feathers(Carlos Alfonso Corral, 2021) What Do We See When We Look at the Sky? (Aleksandre Koberidze, 2021) North by Current (Angelo Madsen Minax, 2021) The Souvenir: Part II (Joanna Hogg, 2021)
Shorts
Civil War Surveillance Poems (Part 1) (Mitch McCabe, 2020)
Naya (Sebastian Mulder, 2021)
In Flow of Words (Eliane Esther Bots, 2021)
Creature (María Silvia Esteve, 2021)
Beast (Hugo Covarrubias, 2021)
SEBASTIAN WIEDEMANN , Filmmaker, film scholar, editor and curator at humanacine.com (Colombia)
In no particular order:
Open Monte (Maria Rojas Arias, Colombia, 2021) Dark Pacific (Camila Beltrán, Colombia, 2020) Bicentennial (Pablo Alvarez Mesa, Colombia, 2020) Memory (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Colombia / Thailand, 2021) To Ultima Floresta (Luiz Bolognesi, Brazil , 2021) A Cosmopolítica Dos Animais (Juliana Fausto & Luisa Marques, Brazil, 2021) Fluxus Fungus (Tuane Eggers, Brazil, 2020) Seed, Image, Ground (Abelardo Gil-Fournier & Jussi Parikka, Spain / Finland, 2020) Train Again (Peter Tscherkassky, Austria, 2021) Signal 8 (Simon Liu, Hong Kong, 2019)
+ Online Retrospectives
Bruno Varela – Mexico (Camara Lucida Film Festival, Ecuador, 2021)
Jürgen Reble – Germany (Filmmuseum München, Germany, 2021)
Becoming Earth by Ursula Biemann – Switzerland (Art Museum at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Colombia, 2021)
Carrabing Film Collective – Australia (Forumdoc.BH Film Festival, Brazil, 2021)
ÁNGEL RUEDA , director S8 Mostra de Cinema Periférico, Spain
A list of some of the films, programs and cycles that I want to highlight from this 2021, mostly seen in the theater and some in online programs.
– Earthearthearth (Daïchi Saïto, 2021)
– Ste. Anne (Rhayne Vermette, 2021)
– Flowers blooming in our throats (Eva Giolo, 2020)
– Train Again (Peter Tscherkassky, 2021)
– Configurations (James Edmonds, 2021)
– Bethanien Tetralogy (Deborah S. Phillips, 2020)
– Letter from Your far-off Country (Suneil Sanzgiri, 2020)
– The Fantastic (Maija Blåfield, 2020)
– One Image, Two Acts (Yek Tasveer, Do Bardasht) (Sanaz Sohrabi, 2020)
– Spinoza / Ongodist(Bruno Delgado Ramo, 2021)
– Meihodo (Jorge Suárez-Quiñones Rivas, 2020)
– # 005 and # 006 (Yonay Boix, 2021)
– Light Trap (Pablo Marín, 2021)
– Be careful out there (Alberto Gracia, 2021 )
– Bravío Flash ( Ainoha Rodríguez, 2021)
– Sacred Spirit (Chema García Ibarra, 2021)
– Eles Trasportan a Morte (Helena Girón and Samuel Delgado, 2021)
– Husek (Daniela Seggiaro, 2021)
The following Film Performances:
– Listening Exercises 2. Film performance by Helena Girón and Samuel Delgado. 2021
– Kicked with the front foot on the dark side of the deck. Film performance by Esperanza Collado. 2021
– “A Lecture by Hollis Frampton”, performed by Valentina Alvarado Matos and Carlos Vásquez Méndez. 2021
– Echo Chamber. Film performance by Valentina Alvarado Matos and Carlos Vásquez Méndez. 2021
The carte blanche produced by Jean-Claude Rousseau at the (S8) Mostra de Cinema Periférico 2021, which included the following titles:
– La Chambre (Chantal Akerman, 1972)
– Standard Time (Michael Snow, 1967)
– Césarée (Marguerite Duras, 1979)
– Surface Tension (Hollis Frampton, 1968)
– Films Sans Caméra Stst (Giovanni Martedi, 1975)
– Taris, Roi de L’eau (Jean Vigo, 1931)
The cycle on the 40 years of Light Cone, curated by Elena Duque and Yann Beauvais for the Seville European Film Festival 2021.
– SESSION 1. LANDSCAPE / ECOLOGY. http://festivalcinesevilla.eu/peliculas/ciclo-light-cone-sesion-1-paisajesecologia
– SESSION 2. GENDER / IDENTITY http://festivalcinesevilla.eu/peliculas/ciclo-light-cone-sesion-2-generoidentidad
– SESSION 3. CINEMA AS MATERIAL http://festivalcinesevilla.eu/peliculas/ciclo-light-cone-sesion-3-el-cine-como-material
ORISEL CASTRO . Filmmaker, programmer and coordinator of the Master in Documentary Film, EICTV
Year of returning to Cuba, to film school, to Glauber Rocha. Less solo films and more in the living room, with the students. The island of the island. The most important is divided into: what I saw on the big screen programmed by Jorge Yglesias, the teacher; what I saw on the computer, sometimes through MUBI, especially to program EDOC and what I saw to think of professors for the Master’s in Documentary Film that I coordinate at EICTV.
I. What I saw in the Glauber Rocha room
– Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn (Radu Jude, 2021)
– The Power of the Dog (Jane Campion, 2021)
– Annette (Leos Carax, 2021)
– The Spirit of the Beehive (Víctor Erice, 1973)
– Last year in Marienbad (Alain Resnais, 1961)
– Beau Travail (Claire Denis, 1999)
– In a certain way (Sara Gómez, 1974)
II. Alone and for EDOC
– Victoria (Sofie Benoot, Liesbeth De Ceulaer, Isabelle Tollenaere, 2020)
– Bosco (Alicia Cano, 2020)
– Things we don’t do (Bruno Santamaría, 2020)
– Hiroshima mon amour (Alain Resnais, 1959)
– Princes Cyd (Stephen Cone , 2017)
– The Quince Sun (Víctor Erice, 1992)
– Bergman Island (Mia Hansen-Løve, 2021) thanks to Jules for “the refuge”
III. Casting for mastery
– Playback: rehearsal of a farewell (Agustina Comedi, 2020)
– In the image and likeness (Jessica Sarah Rinland, 2019)
– My Mexican Bretzel (Nuria Giménez, 2020)
– Arabia (Affonso Uchoa, 2017) in the presence of the director, also in the EICTV room, when he came to teach the Experimental and Hybrid Cinema class.
– Recollection (Kamal Aljafari, 2015) in the presence of the director, on the recommendation of the master’s students. A great revelation for me.
December Bonus
– Memory (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, 2021)
A haunted projection in a mixing studio in a foreign country, full of familiar thoughts and sonorous ghosts. A true sonic attack on the heart of cinephilia. I was awakened by the memory of The Sleeping One (Pascal Aubier, 1966) and I showed it in class the next day. A song in the chest …
LIBERTAD GILLS , filmmaker, film critic, video essayist, Ecuador
I imagine my list as a program that would be shown in this order:
Belmarsh Christmas Day Soundscape (Julian Assange, Stella Morris)
Train Again (Peter Tscherkassky)
Birth (Cristina Álvarez López)
Dreams Under Confinement (Christopher Harris)
Covid Messages (John Smith)
Quebrantahuesos (Martin Baus)
Notes, Imprints (On Love): Part II, Carmela (Alexandra Cuesta)
Figure & I (Lynne Sachs)
Light Year (Bruno Varela)
Mutationem (Maile Costa Colbert)
Light Trap (Pablo Marin)
+
a long: Under the sky (Diego Acosta)
+
video essays:
“Young (Women) Filmmaker (s)” (Katie Bird)
Edge (Catherine Grant)
Murky Waters (Jaap Kooijman and Patricia Pisters)
Once Upon a Screen: Explosive Paradox (Kevin B. Lee)
+
“Unmaking Cinema”: conversation with Raphael Montañez Ortiz at Light Cone
Program by Cecilia Mangini at Another Gaze
“Practicing Abolition Futures” with Pooja Rangan, Brett Story, Christopher Harris & Alex Rivera at UnionDocs
State of Cinema 2021 by Nicole Brenez
+
in Ecuadorian cinema:
Equatorial Program at Cámara Lúcida Festival
JUAN CARLOS LEMUS POLANÍA, Film Critic and director of Cine con Acento podcast
A list of the movies that moved me the most in 2021
2021 was the year in which we realized that nothing was going to change if not to get worse. More so when we have been depleted by overexposure to everything, to the immeasurable of knowledge, of attention. This being, knowing and doing everything and for everything has become imperative for many of my contemporaries. More so when Bauman’s liquid has appeared in gaseous: and the Berlinale I could see her in her pajamas while stopping Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy because the water bill came to the door. But resistance — to which one can cling, to which one puts faith — in my case goes through the adjective given to a certain cinema: slow. The works that I will list do not all fit into the aforementioned category, but for the most part they walk through that introspection,
Babardeala cu bucluc sau porno balamuc (Bad Luck Banging or Lonely Porn, Radu Jude, 2021 Berlinale 71) Golden Bear for the Romanian director with this satire that on the surface shows the life of a couple and the no border between the private and the public , diluted today by technology, with its blow it has called in past decades the “weaker sex”. And meanwhile he talks about the social cost of entering Europe for his country. Understanding its metaphor, it would be multiple penetration received with feigned pleasure, just like in hardcore porn.
Azor (Andreas Fontana, 2021, Berlinale). The Swiss director surprises with this dramatic thriller set in Argentina to talk about how corruption is engendered and who are the progenitors. The big bankers, of course from the white countries that have third world countries listed as corrupt, do not fare very well in this DNA test to certify paternity.
Gûzen to sôzô (Wheel of fortune and fantasy, Ryûsuke Hamaguchi, 2021, Berlinale 71) Replicating the first Christians, Hamaguchi creates his Holy Trinity in this work. I do not think I fall into a solipsism when I say that we have become used to gruesome, and sometimes even brutal, narratives and make these our masterpieces – did Romanticism abuse us? -. So when this wonder of compassion and humanity is revealed; of solidarity and human warmth; It is possible to classify it as brilliant and subversive from distancing itself from the self to reaching the we. And more today than before, or as always, a necessary balm.
Annette (Leos Carax, 2021, Cannes 74). The French director brings this musical in which he is related to the tradition of his fellow sociologists dedicated to radiographing the state of the art of human behavior at a certain time. Carax undresses us in this narcissism and struggle of egos, at the point of social networks, which has become our daily life. This particular moment where high and low culture coexist in marriage, where sexist violence is increased by professional jealousy and where we exploit even the most precious in search of wealth as a synonym of success.
Memory (Apichatpong Weerasethakul, 2021, Cannes 74) The first film I saw by this director was at Cannes 2015, and it left my head scratched for a long time, something that led me to become interested in his work and try to find meaning, or a message. I found relationships between the physical and what is not seen, but which is. However, with Memoria I feel that the Thai is going to more and can only be carried away in the trance in which the viewer is induced to see his cinema. A sensory experience that speaks of being, being and transcendence. As a Colombian, you can read what we have been hiding in order to forget when what we must collectively remember.
Compartment No. 6 (Juho Kuosmanen, 2021, Cannes 74) A budding separation and a journey kick off this road trip, but on rails and very claustrophobic. A trip in a train car that allows two worldviews to meet and then some understandings to emerge. The Finn is another of those who proposes this kind of vital companionship, of detaching armor to make the fucking path of life calmer and cushion the shocks.
The Velvet Underground (Todd Haynes, 2021, Cannes 74). The Californian’s documentary is special for fans and informative for neophytes. Haynes imitates his idols and breaks some of the rules, making his work formally disruptive and that form is already a message — I bet on Warhol’s blessing. The lives of Nico, Tucker, Reed, Cale and how the avant-garde was made music in an unthinkable and little exposed sixties nihilism, which would later bring to punk. Also a memory about the cool pose, which has already been marked since Wilde’s decadence and that pretentious way of being in the cold, boring world and of no surprise and therefore conservative and elitist.
Drive my Car (Ryûsuke Hamaguchi, 2021, Cannes 74) Handling personal and moral losses. The weight that we have left and that we must continue to carry as we can. But it seems that the Japanese sum up stoicism and temperance, according to the protagonists without actually teaching us. Hamaguchi repeats on the list with plenty of reasons. Because in addition to those moral forces mentioned, it also gives way, once again, to human communication beyond words, where hugs, looks, affection, subtleties have a place. And compassion and tenderness.
The Power of the Dog (Jane Campion, 2021, Venice 78) And the donkey returns to the wheat, however. Campion flaunts the purest postmodernism in his mix of film genres with such mastery that The Power of the Dog doesn’t have a bump. And from western to drama and thriller and something else. What and where is the power of the dog? Perhaps in that he domesticated us insofar as he made us believe otherwise.
The Card Counter (Paul Schrader, 2021, Venice 78) You already remember Travis. And it is that the protagonists of Schrader are in search of personal redemption through the other. And just as I have mentioned compassion for the other as a force that supports and helps us, perhaps among those on the other side is revenge. This one that in certain cases is necessary to the point of stupidity. Also, I add that this is the year of Oscar Isaac with this magnificent role for which we will remember.
Colophon
To pay the debt with last year (before): So many souls (Nicolás Rincón Gille, 2019. Just released this year due to its cancellation in 2020 by COVID). To contribute with the commercial fee: No Sudden Move (Steven Soderbergh, 2021, HBO Max). The usual: The empire of the senses (Nagisa Oshima, 1976). The classic: The discreet charm of the bourgeoisie (Luís Buñuel, 1972). The unforgettable: Mimosas (Oliver Laxe, 2016). The Colombian: Bicentennial (Pablo Álvarez-Mesa, 2020).
ALDO PADILLA , Cinemancia Festival programmer and critic, Bolivia – Chile
In astronomy there is often talk of “looking back” when looking at planets outside the solar system, we look at them hundreds or thousands of years ago while it seems impossible to think of that planet in the present. The cinema of this 2021 seems in the same way a cinema of a past world, since although two years have passed since the beginning of the pandemic and its multiple waves, the masks and the radical changes that the world has undergone seem something alien to a cinema that by its nature usually takes more than two years from its filming to its presentation, will 2022 be a cinema with masks, with social distances, with slight references to a world that is no longer the same? For now, the films that have referenced the global pandemic seem to have understood human fragility (The Great Movement),
Top 10
The Great Movement , Kiro Russo, Bolivia, 2021
What Do We See When We Look at the Sky? , Alexandre Koberidze, Georgia, 2021
Rêve de Gotokuji par un premier mai sans lune , Natacha Thiéry, France, 2020
10.Beyond the night , Manuel Ponce de León, Colombia, 2021
PAOLA VELA, Peruvian visual artist and filmmaker
Movies (short and long) seen through platforms like MUBI, by festivals like MUTA or Lima Alterna, or thanks to friends who sent me the private links from VIMEO.
Four Roads (2021) by Alice Rohrwacher Terranova (2021) by Alejandro Alonso Estrella and Alejandro Pérez Serrano The Cloud in her Room (2020) by Xinyuan Zheng Lu Private Collection (2020) by Elena Duque One thousand and One Attempts to Be an Ocean ( 2020) by Yuyang Wang 13 Ways of Looking a Blackbird (2020) by Ana Vaz Felix in Wonderland (2019) by Marie Losier
Three Peruvian voices working outside Peru: No One Cried (2021) by Daniel Jacoby Notes on Connection III (2021) by Andrea Franco The Old Child (2021) by Felipe Esparza
Short films seen in person in museums Plastic Limits – For the Projection of Other Architectures (2021) by Rosa Barba, short film as part of her solo exhibition In a Perpetual Now at the Neue Nationalgalerie Berlin, Germany. Framer Framed (2021) by Ramaya Tegegne, documentary film as part of the group exhibition The Equality of the Possibility at the Kunstverein Bielefeld, Germany.
Discoveries / reviews of Peruvian filmmakers from the past thanks to Corriente Encuentro Latinoamericano de Cine de No Ficción, friends who sent me the links, or YouTube. 3 x 16 (2007) by Marcos Arriaga Beijing (1988) by Rose Lowder Cimarrones(1975) by Carlos Ferrrand Niños (1974) from the Liberation without Rodeos Group Vision of the Jungle (1973) from the Liberation without Rodeos Group
RODRIGO GARAY YSITA , Co-editor of Correspondences, Berlinale Talents student and member of FIPRESCI (Mexico)
I never thought a Wes Anderson movie or car commercial would end up among my favorites of an entire year, but here we are. I am very excited about what I saw in 2021. I was accompanied by darker movies last year, but now I notice a game search on this list. I feel restless, in a good way.
***
I never thought a Wes Anderson flick or a car commercial would end up among my year-long favorites, but here we are. I’m truly moved by my 2021 picks. Last year I turned to more somber films, but now I feel a spirited pursuit in this list. I feel restless, in a good way.
What Do We See When We Look at the Sky? (Alexandre Koberidze, 2021)
The French Dispatch (Wes Anderson, 2021)
What will be of the summer (Ignacio Ceroi, 2021)
The Canyon (Zachary Epcar, 2021)
Das Mädchen und die Spinne (Ramon Zürcher and Silvan Zürcher, 2021)
Day is Done (Dalei Zhang, 2020)
Friends and Strangers (James Vaughan, 2021)
earthearthearth (Daïchi Saïto, 2021)
A táxi do Jack (Susana Nobre, 2021)
10.Looking for Venera (Norika Sefa, 2021)
11.Flowers blooming in our throats (Eva Giolo, 2020)
12.Blutsauger (Julian Radlmaier, 2021)
13.The founders (Diego Hernández, 2021)
14.Rock Bottom Riser (Fern Silva, 2021)
15.Feast (Tim Leyendekker, 2021)
16.Jesus Egon Christus (David Vajda and Sasa Vajda, 2021)
17.È Stata la mano di Dio (Paolo Sorrentino, 2021)
This year I also took the time to go back to old favorites of mine that I hadn’t seen in years — like Airplane! (Jim Abrahams, David Zucker and Jerry Zucker, 1980), The Wild Bunch (Sam Peckinpah, 1969) or Once Upon a Time in America (Sergio Leone, 1984) – and confirm my resounding love for them.
***
This year I also took the time to revisit old favorites of mine that I hadn’t seen in years —such as Airplane! (Jim Abrahams, David Zucker and Jerry Zucker, 1980), The Wild Bunch (Sam Peckinpah, 1969) or Once Upon a Time in America (Sergio Leone, 1984) -, confirming my resounding love for them.
RENATO LEÓN , journalist and film critic from Peru
My favorite movies that I saw this 2021 (theaters, streaming, festivals, Torrent), in order of preference.
Drive my car by Ryusuke Hamaguchi.
Memory , by Apichatpong Weerasethakul.
The card counter , by Paul Schrader.
Wheel of fortune and fantasy , by Ryusuke Hamaguchi.
Annette , by Léos Carax.
Petite maman , by Celine Sciamma.
Malignant by James Wan.
The innocents by Eskil Vogt.
Benedetta , by Paul Verhoeven.
10.Bergman Island by Mia Hansen-Løve.
11.Esquirlas , by Natalia Garayalde.
12.Night of fire , by Tatiana Huezo.
13.Power of dog by Jane Campion.
14.Un médecin de nui t, by Elie Wajeman.
15.La Nuée , by Just Philippot.
16.Spencer , by Pablo Larraín
17.Nobody by Ilya Naishuller.
18.The Green Knight by David Lowery
19.Val by Ting Poo and Leo Scott.
20.Cruella by Craig Gillespie.
Series:
Succession , Season 3 (HBO Max).
Midnight Mass (Netflix).
Small Ax .
Them (Prime Video).
The white Lotus (HBO Max).
Mare of easttown (HBO Max).
Servant , Season Two (Apple TV +).
Hellbound (Netflix).
Sex Education , third season (Netflix).
10.Scenes from a Marriage (HBO Max).
Films more inflated than a hot air balloon:
Titane by Julia Ducournau.
Cry male , by Clint Eastwood.
Nomadland by Chloé Zhao.
FRANCISCO ÁLVAREZ RÍOS , programmer and director of the Cámara Lúcida festival, Ecuador
Non-fiction circuits, or experimentation fiction:
Just a Movement by Vincent Meessen The great movement by Kiro Russo Rock Bottom Riser by Fern Silva The Invisible Mountain by Ben Rusell The moon represents my heart by Juan Martín Hsu Taming the garden by Salomé Jashi One image, two acts by Sanaz Sohrabi A night of knowing nothing by Payal Kapadia Ste. Anne by Rhayne Vermette Eles transport a morte by Helena Girón and Samuel M. Delgado
Experimental circuit:
earthearthearth by Daïchi Saïto Train Again by Peter Tscherkassky Pentalfa Neón by Bruno Varela The Canyon by Zacary Epcar Zero Lenght Spring by Ross Meckfessel 2020 by Fried Von Gröller Epoca is Another Thing by Ignacio Tamarit and Tomas Maglione Notes on connection III by Andrea Franco Tonalli from the Colectivo Los Ingrávidos Night Reflection (IV) by Benjamin Ellenberger
Ecuadorian circuit:
Dawn of Datura by Jean-Jacques Martinod and Bretta Walker Winds of Chanduy by Mario Rodríguez Dávila Notes, incantations: part II, Carmela by Alexandra Cuesta Open sky / Open sea / Open ground by Libertad Gills and Martin Baus Bearded vulture by Martin Baus
ALONSO CASTRO , Peruvian film critic
In no order of priority:
– Charm Circle , Nira Burstein (2021)
– Luto , Pablo Martín Weber (2021)
– My last adventure , Ezequiel Salinas, Ramiro Sonzini (2021)
– Window boy would also like to have a submarine , Alex Piperno (2021)
– Her socialist smile , John Gianvito (2020)
– The Wheel of Fortune , Ryusuke Hamaguchi (2021)
– Une chanson d’anniversaire , Jaques Perconte (2021)
– The dog that does not shut up , Ana Katz (2021)
– A l’abordage , Guillaume Brac (2020 )
– Otsoga Newspapers, Miguel Gomes (2021)
– Notes on Connection III , Andrea Franco (2021)
– Les choses qu’on dit, les choses qu’on fait , Emmanuel Mouret (2020)
– The bones , Cristóbal León, Joaquín Cociña (2021)
AARON CUTLER (Mutual Films / The Moviegoer), United States / Brazil
Some movies I loved in 2021 (and as always, I apologize to all the works I forgot):
– All of Your Stars Are but Dust on My Shoes (Haig Aivazian)
– Blind Body (Allison Chhorn)
– The Canyon (Zachary Epcar)
– earthearthearth (Daïchi Saïto)
– Home When You Return (Carl Elsaesser)
– The red filter is withdrawn (Minjung Kim)
– Rua Ataléia (André Novais Oliveira)
– sem title # 7 : Rara (Carlos Adriano)
– Light Trap (Pablo Marín)
– Untitled (34bsp) (Philipp Fleischmann)
– Wasteland No. 3: Moons, Sons ( Jodie Mack)
– What is it that you said? (Shun Ikezoe)
Some samples that will impress me:
– ” I Am Independent ” – Jeonju International Film Festival. The beautiful book published in conjunction should also be mentioned .
– Quinzaine des Réalisateurs – 2021 edition
– Paulo Rocha Retrospective – São Paulo International Film Festival
A thought: One of the first values I discovered in the cinema was a healthy opportunity to get out of the house. Always when I read about a new virtual programming now, even the most interesting one, I end up remembering that. The physical movie theater will always have its value.
MALENA MARTÍNEZ CABRERA , filmmaker, Peru
Films by Florent Marcie A.I. at War. France 2021, 107min
[Retrospective Film as a subversive art of the Vienna Filmmuseum. Curated by Roger Koza]
SAÏA. A front line at night in Afghanistan . France, 2000, 30 min.
Films of Grace Passô: Republic . Brazil, 2020, 15 min. Vaga carne by Grace Passô, Ricardo Alves Júnior, Brazil 2019, 45 min.
[Flaherty International Film Seminar]
In a certain way . Sara Gomez. Cuba 1974, 1975, 1976, 1977. 73min.
[Filmfestival Viennale]
Other films from the Retrospective Film as a subversive art, a tribute to Amos Vogel from the Vienna Filmmuseum.
Demain et encore demain, journal 1995 Dominique Cabrera. France, 1997, 79 min. [Curated by Birgit Kohler]. Cage rain . César González, Argentinien, 2019, 82 min. [Curated by Roger Koza] brouillard # 14 by Alexandre Laroes, Canada, 2013, 10 min. Lightning dance by Cecilia Bengolea, Argentina, 2018, 6 min. [Curated by Nicole Brenez] What am I doing in this very visual world? Manuel Embalse, 2020, AR, 64 min. [This Human World Festival (online)].
Other films seen at the Flaherty International Film Seminar, online.
The Klan comes to town by Deanna Bowen. Canada, 2013, 20 min. Sum of the parts what can be named by Deanna Bowen. Canada, 2010, 19 min. Yãy Tu Nunãnã Payexop: Encontro de Pajés (Meeting of Shamans) of Sueli Maxakali, Brazil, 2021, 23 min. Jamal (A Camel) from Sudanese Film Group, Sudan, 1981, 14 min. Public service announcemente from Athi Patra Ruga, South Africa, 2014, 15 min. Thaumamorphic Video 2: Massage by Teddy Ogborn, US, 2020, short. [Fellows screenings]
Films by the duo Gray Cake (Alexander Serechenko, Ekaterina Pryanichnikova): Dreams of the Machine . Russia, 2021, 14 min. Backlash , Russia 2020, 4min Vremyanka , Russia, 2’33 ”
Uncanny Dream Cycle of Ars Electronica Animation Festival 2021
Etéreo y Lejano de Juan Llacsa, DOCLA, Moyobamba, Peru, 2021 1’41
[DOCLA School social networks]
Peruvian longs
Genaro’s betamax , Miguel Villalobos, 2015, 114min
[Cineaparte.com, Peruvian film platform].
Seen in Focus Peru at the Latin America Festival of Biarritz
Films by Omar Forero Complex Cases . Trujillo, 2018, 81 min. Chicama . Trujillo, 2012, 75 min. Manco Capac by Henry Vallejo, Puno, 2021, Among these trees that I have invented by Martín Rebaza, Trujillo, 2021, 78 min.
BonusVista again in 2021. AI by Steven Spielberg, US, 2021, 146 min.
MARIANA DIANELA TORRES VALENCIA , visual artist, video essayist, Mexico
10 or 15 Favorite Movies 2021
Sedmikrásky (Vera Chytilová, 1966)
Where Is My Friend’s House? (Abbas Kiarostami, 1987)
Ozols (Laila Pakalnina, 1997)
Selva Tragica (Yulene Olaizola, 2020)
Double Phase (Takashi Makino, 2020)
Glimpses from a Visit to Orkney in Summer 1995 (Ute Aurand, 2020)
Holiday (Holiday) (Azucena Losana, 2021)
The road is made by walking (Paula Gaitán, 2021)
What will be of the summer (Ignacio Ceroi, 2021)
Labor of Lov e (Sylvia Schedelbauer, 2020)
S4D3 (Raúl Perrone, 2021)
Underground pulses (Elena Pardo, 2020- 2021-…)
Neon Crystals(Bruno Varela, 2021)
All the light we can see (Pablo Escoto, 2020)
The wait (Celina Manuel, 2021)
WILDER ZUMARÁN , film critic, Peru
This year, due to different factors, I have seen very little cinema. I saw little and, above all, I was aware of what could be seen in Peru and at festivals in Latin America. I think this list reflects well the intermittent journey that 2021 has been for me. A political year, a bit tragic, energetic at times, suffocating many times. A year, for me, however, of great brief moments with the cinema.
Luz nos Tópicos , by Paula Gaitán
Los conductos , by Camilo Restrepo
La France contre les robots , by Jean-Marie Straub
Chaco , by Diego Mondaca
First Cow , by Kelly Reichardt
Fauna , by Nicolás Pereda
Like the sky after it rains , by Mercedes Gaviria
The Whole Shebang , by Ken Jacobs
Playback. Essay of a farewell , by Agustina Comedi
Of all the things to know , by Sofía Velázquez
Esquirlas , by Natalia Garayalde
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Sutís Interferências , by Paula Gaitán
Poilean , by Claudio Caldini
Sisters with transistors , by Lisa Rovner
Peruvian films
Of all the things to know , by Sofía Velázquez
The Old Child , by Felipe Esparza
pov: you have dystrophy and you are going to turn 25 artificial years , by Claudia Vanesa Figueroa
Spotlights and curatorial proposals
Spotlight María Galindo and Mujeres Creando – Transcinema
Spotlight Paula Gaitán – Frontera Sur
Traversed Peruvian cartographies: Heterogeneous routes and horizons in five decades of audiovisual production – Corriente. Latin American Non-Fiction Film Encounter
Discoveries
María Galindo and Mujeres Creating
Kinuyo Tanaka [Thanks to Marianela Vega]
Carolee Schneemann’s trilogy [thanks to Ivonne Sheen]
The disappearance (and the future return?)
Transcinema
CARLOS ESQUIVES , Peruvian film critic
These are the recent movies seen this year that I liked the most. It is worth mentioning that my presence in physical theaters has been almost nil, which has limited me to see commercial premieres. I also add to the failure to see important recent releases of the Netflix platform so far. Here is my list, in no order of preference.
The Father (Florian Zeller, 2020)
A Man on a Camera (Guido Hendrikx, 2021)
The Viewing Booth (Ra’anan Alexandrowicz, 2019)
A Very Long Exposure (Chloé Galibert-Laine, 2020)
Piccolo Corpo (Laura Samani, 2021)
Digital Video Editing with Adobe Premiere Pro: The Real-World Guide to Set Up and Workflow (Hong Seong-yoon, 2020)
Mother Lode (Matteo Tortone, 2021)
Friends and Strangers (James Vaughan, 2021)
Petite maman (Céline Sciamma, 2021 )
The Killing of Two Lovers (Robert Machoian, 2020)
Between Two Dawns (Selman Nacar, 2021)
The Taking(Alexandre O. Philippe, 2021)
Who prevents it (Jonás Trueba, 2021)
Our happiest days (Sol Berruezo Pichon-Riviere, 2021)
Annette (Leos Carax, 2021)
The Green Knight (David Lowery, 2021)
Memory (Apichatpong Weerasethakul , 2021)
CRISTIAN SALDÍA , Filmmaker, director and programmer at the Frontera Sur Festival (Chile)
Memory (Apichatpong Weerasethakul) Eles transportan a morte (Helena Girón, Samuel M. Delgado) Train Again (Peter Tscherkassky) Un monde flottant (Jean-Claude Rousseau) In Front of Your Face (Hong Sang-soo) Esquirlas (Natalia Garayalde) Les Antilopes (Maxime Martinot) Water from the creek that trembles (Javiera Cisterna) Bicentennial (Pablo Álvarez-Mesa) Saxifrages, quatre nuits blanches (Nicolas Klotz, Elisabeth Perceval) The great movement (Kiro Russo) The floor of the wind (Gustavo Fontán, Gloria Peirano ) The sky is red(Francina Carbonell) Light trap (Pablo Marín) Pão e Gente (Renan Rovida) Diários de Otsoga (Maureen Fazendeiro, Miguel Gomes)
MEHDI JAHAN , Filmmaker (India)
Favorite first time views of 2021 / Films seen for the first time which reinforced my faith in Cinema this year:
FEATURES (in no particular order):
1. Fertile Memory | Michel Khleifi | Palestine | 1980
2. Wedding in Galilee | Michel Khleifi | Palestine | 1987
3. Leila and the Wolves | Heiny Srour | Lebanon | 1984
4. Radiograph of a Family | Firouzeh Khosrovani | Iran | 2020
5. Pride | Manuel Mur Oti | Spain | 1955
6. O Cangaceiro (The Bandit) | Lima Barreto | Brazil | 1953
7. Sunday Afternoon (Sunday Afternoon) | Antonio De Macedo | Portugal | 1966
8. Daichi no Komoriuta (Lullaby of the Earth) | Yasuzo Masumura | Japan | 1976
9. Duel to the Death | Ching Siu-Tong | Hong Kong | 1983
10. Onna (Woman) | Keisuke Kinoshita | Japan | 1948
63. Ville Marie | Alexandre Larose | Canada | 2010
64. Fluorescent Gir l | Janie Geiser | USA | 2018
65. Cathode Garden | Janie Geiser | USA | 2015.
FAVORITE CINEMA EVENTS / FESTIVALS (which led to the discovery of a great wealth of Cinema previously unknown to me or a rediscovery / revaluation of works of filmmakers / artists I admire):
1. State of Cinema 2021 (Projections. Provisionals. Provisions) by Nicole Brenez + Dossier (On the Earth / At the Bottom of the Heart) compiled by Nicole Brenez and Gerard-Jan Claes for Sabzian
2. Films by Palestinian Women | Another Gaze: A Feminist Film Journal (Curated by Daniella Shreir)
3. MUTA International Festival of Audiovisual Appropriation
4. DOBRA – Festival Int’l de Cinema Experimental
5. Moscow International Experimental Film Festival
http://www.kinorebelde.com/lynne-sachs-complete-filmography/ Kino Rebelde has created a retrospective that traces a delicate line connecting intimacy, power relations, violence, memory, migration, desire, love, and war in Lynne’s films. By looking at each of these works, we can see a director facing her own fears and contradictions, as well as her sense of friendship and motherhood. Moving from idea to emotion and back again, our retrospective takes us on a journey through Sachs’ life as a filmmaker, beginning in 1986 and moving all the way to the present.
With the intention of allowing her work to cross boundaries, to interpret and to inquire into her distinctive mode of engaging with the camera as an apparatus for expression, we are delighted to present 37 films that comprise the complete filmmography, so far, of Lynne Sachs as visual artist and filmmaker. Regardless of the passage of time, these works continue to be extremely contemporary, coherent and radical in their artistic conception.
About Kino Rebelde
Kino Rebelde is a Sales and Festival Distribution Agency created by María Vera in early 2017. Its exclusively dedicated to promotion of non-fiction cinema, hybrid narratives and experimental.
Based on the creative distribution of few titles by year, Kino Rebelde established itself as a “boutique agency”, working on a specialized strategy for each film, within its own characteristics, market potential, niches and formal and alternative windows.
This company supports short, medium and long feature films, from any country, with linear or non-linear narratives. They can be in development or WIP, preferably in the editing stage.
The focus: author point of view, pulse of stories, chaos, risk, more questions, less answers, aesthetic and politic transgression, empathy, identities, desires and memory.
Kino Rebelde was born in Madrid, but as its films, this is a nomadic project. In the last years María has been living in Lisbon, Belgrade and Hanoi and she’ll keep moving around.
About María Vera
Festival Distributor and Sales Agent born in Argentina. Founder of Kino Rebelde, a company focused on creative distribution of non-fiction, experimental and hybrid narratives.
Her films have been selected and awarded in festivals as Berlinale, IFFR Rotterdam, IDFA, Visions Du Réel, New York FF, Hot Docs, Jeonju IFF, Sheffield Doc/Fest, Sarajevo FF, Doclisboa and Viennale, among others.
María has a background as producer of socio-political and human rights contents as well as a film curator.Envelope
Lynne Sachs (1961) is an American filmmaker and poet living in Brooklyn, New York. Her moving image work ranges from documentaries, to essay films, to experimental shorts, to hybrid live performances.
Working from a feminist perspective, Lynne weaves together social criticism with personal subjectivity. Her films embrace a radical use of archives, performance and intricate sound work. Between 2013 and 2020, she collaborated with renowned musician and sound artist Stephen Vitiello on five films.
Strongly committed to a dialogue between cinematic theory and practice, she searches for a rigorous play between image and sound, pushing the visual and aural textures in each new project.
Between 1994 and 2009, Lynne directed five essay films that took her to Vietnam, Bosnia, Israel, Italy and Germany – sites affected by international war – where she looked at the space between a community’s collective memory and her own perception.
Over the course of her career, she has worked closely with film artists Craig Baldwin, Bruce Conner, Ernie Gehr, Barbara Hammer, Chris Marker, Gunvor Nelson, and Trinh T. Min-ha.
“In a lively mix of narrative, collage and memoir, A Biography of Lilith (35 min. 1997) updates the creation myth by telling the story of the first woman. Lilith’s betrayal by Adam in Eden and subsequent vow of revenge is recast as a modern tale with a present-day Lilith musing on a life that has included giving up a baby for adoption and working as a bar dancer. Interweaving mystical texts from Jewish folklore with interviews, music and poetry, director Lynne Sachs reclaims this cabalistic parable to frame her own role as mother. ”
“Sachs’ film conveys the real experience — bloody and poetic — of Lilith alive and now in every woman. Bravo! A film felt, imagined, and informed by life.” – Barbara Black Koltuv, Ph. D. Clinical Psychologist, Jungian Analyst, and Author of The Book of Lilith
“Sachs’ art for fusing documentary and experimental narrative is unquestionably enormous. Her combination of an interview with a friend, the myth of Lilith and beauteous images of things like jelly fish (which float like iridescent breasts on screen) culminates in stunning cinema.” Molly Hankwitz, Art Papers
In addition to screening her film, Sachs will present a discursive mixed-media lecture. Her presentation includes video clips from conversations she had with Rabbi Mayer Fund, a brilliant, confrontational Orthodox rabbi from Brooklyn. Next she will show excerpts from conversations she had with four wonderful octogenarians from the Hebrew Home for the Aged in the Bronx. Then, a zig-zag ahistorical mapping of LILITH sightings including: images of Lilith in haunting silver, hebrew protection amulets from medieval Europe (stored in the Jewish Museum in New York); Lilith on Baroque canvases and Mesopotamian ceramics; Lilith played by screen-beauty Jean Seberg as a crazed, exquisitely sensual woman living in a mental hospital; intense, intellectual, ridiculous Lilith in the TV-sitcom “Cheers”; and, Lilith, as a kind of Amazonian cannibal mother in the outrageously puerile comic book series Ghost Rider.
NARRATION: When God created Adam from the earth, he realized that it was not good for man to exist alone, so he created a woman out of dirt and impure sediment just as he had created Adam. He called this woman Lilith. Alphabet of Ben Sira, 800 C.E.
NARR: Like a beast, she sat when making water.
NARR:Unwilling to give up her equality, she disputed with Adam the manner of their intercourse, wishing to lay on top during the sexual act. But Adam would not agree.
Lilith Speaks to Adam (song and recitation by Cherie)
Just when I am on my way to becoming,
My eyes open and you are there.
Is Eden large enough for the two of us?
Wherever I turn,
There are branches pulling at my hair.
Earth between my toes and under my tongue.
I slither and sometimes I use my wings.
Let’s slither together.
Earth becomes dirt becomes dirty.
Bent knees turn into corners.
Am I not right for this world?
Before you, I did not know I was I.
Now this I is part of my unbecoming.
NARR: Lilith was not only disappointed — she was angry. She called out the unspeakable Name of God and flew from Eden to the Red Sea, a place full of evil demons. There, she howled her hatred of mankind through the night and vowed vengeance because of the shabby treatment she received at the hands of Adam.
No Kingdom There (from Isaiah 34)
Streams turn to pitch.
Soil into sulfur.
Land burns.
“No Kingdom Here.”
And all the goats called Evil cry out
“Bah, bah.”
LYNNE: From the Zohar, I read these words, it’s Lilith:
I flew up to touch the small faces
But he tore me away.
He made me crawl below
And then I saw I was nothing.
I had no beauty.
I flew up again to touch the small faces,
To melt inside their eyes.
But the guards barred my way,
And he slapped me
And cast me into the sea.
An owl perched on a tree above
Blinks, shivers and flys into a cloud.
NARR: There in the waves of the Red Sea, she engaged in unbridled promiscuity.
TEXT: A single drop of Lilith’s menstrual blood is enough to poison a whole town. Kabbalistic legend, 12th Century
NARR: She was unable to bear human children and had no milk in her breasts.
Cherie’s Interview: So you get your bookings weekly and you hit all your Podunk towns from New Jersey, you work from nine to two. Can you hear me? The pay is very good. 10 to 15 bucks an hour, and it’s kind of cool in New Jersey because all you do is dance. You keep your clothes on. There’s not a lot of pressure, but you feel the pressure because every other dancer is hustling. The men come in there because they are horny or lonely. The lonely ones always found me. I guess they’re all lonely. I got to hear their sad stories about their wives, their rotten jobs and their poor economic situation. They plied me with liquor. You had to B drink. That means for every drink you get a kickback. They put little straws in the drinks to keep track. I wasn’t good at that.
NARR: Eventually, God sent three angels, Sanvai, Sansanvai and Semongolof, after Lilith. They found her by the sea and threatened that if she did not return , 100 of her demon sons would die everyday. She refused. Lilith preferred her punishment to living with Adam.
NARR: Back in Eden, Adam was overcome by a feeling of isolation when the animals came to him in pairs to be named. So God took one of Adam’s ribs, made it into a woman and brought her to Adam. Adam said, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; this one shall be called Woman. Her name will be Eve.”
NARR: As we all know, Eve disobeyed the will of God by eating an apple from the tree of knowledge. Some say it was the serpent who encourged her, others claim it was Lilith. God punished Eve for her transgression: “I will greatly increase your pangs in childbearing; in pain you shall bring forth children, yet your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you.”
Cherie Interview: I’ve never had any true relationship with men. My criteria for being a mother is having the stability to play that role fully. I don’t think I could do that as a single mother. I am too ambitious and eccentric and creative to give up who I am and what I’ve done in my life. By doing that I gave up the role of mother because I could not have done it alone.
TEXT: It is forbidden for a man to sleep alone in a house, lest Lilith get hold of him to steal his seed. Babylonian Talmud, 6th Century
SYNC: Lilith with three Angels talking in car:
Angel #1: Why do you need all this stuff for children? You don’t have any children Lilith. Isn’t that right?
Lilith: All the world’s children are my children.
Angel #1: All the world’s children are Eve’s children. It’s time you got that through your head.
Angel #2: We’re concerned with what you’re eating in reference to our children.
Lilith: I don’t care who I am eating!
NARR:The angels Sanvai, Sansanvai and Semongolof came back once again and spoke to Lilith on behalf of God: “You must stop haunting expectant mothers and newborns, giving them the sleep of death, drinking their babies’ blood, sucking bone marrow, eating flesh. When you see a mother wearing an amulet with your image or hear her singing our names — Sanvai, Sansanvai and Semongolof — you must stop your violent acts. That is your contract with God.”
TEXT: When Lilith finds no children born, she turns on her own.
Numbers Rabbah, 11th Century
POEM recited:
LYNNE:Mother Speaks to Baby
I’m learning to read all over again,
A face, this time, connected to a body.
At first, I feel your story from within–
Nose rubs against belly, elbow prods groin,
Your silent cough becomes
A confusing dip and bulge.
You speak and I struggle to translate.
I lie on my side, talk to myself,
Rub my fingers across my skin, from left to right.
I read out loud,
And I hope you can hear me.
I’m learning to read all over again
But this time I have a teacher.
TEXT: In ancient Babylonia, expectant mothers believed that Lilith could be trapped under a bowl inscribed with a formula against her. Alphabet of Ben Sira, 8th Century
LYNNE: Birth Poem
At last, nine full moons leave bare
The dust against the sky.
Air fills up with brightness.
A clumsy babies drops.
Dice on a betting table
Or rich, ripe fruit atop worn grass?
TEXT: A circle is drawn around a mother’s lying-in bed, and a magical inscription against Lilith is chalked upon the walls of the room.
Elijah Levita, 15th Century
Cherie’s Interview: At the time, keeping a child was just as absurd as everything else. I made an excellent choice because I’ve just been a person living on the fringes of society, battling to keep myself alive. To put a child through that would have been immoral. That’s how I felt then and that’s how I feel now.
TEXT:Lilith comes to earth to fornicate with men who experience nocturnal emissions or masturbate.
Demons and spirits born from this union are called “the plagues of mankind.”
The Zohar, 13th Century
Demon children born from a man’s adultrous encounters could make claims on their father’s property.
In Jerusalem, therefore, some burial societies forbid children from attending their father’s funeral. The evil spirits of their illigitimate brothers and sisters may be lurking about the open grave. Sephardic Burial Practice
Lilith Niggun Music
LYNNE: Mother Speaks to Baby
A smile comes over your face.
Lips flutter, flutter, quiver, turn up to touch cheek.
I know, am told, have heard — that
In the dark, under your cradle,
There in the empty space of dust between
Lies Lilith.
I catch the reflection of my face in her eyes.
I am a snake, a spider,
The flame of a burning sword,
A feather that tickles at the nape of your neck,
Broken glass and nakedness.
I touch your nose and her spell is broken.
Something lost and nothing gained.
For a moment your head swishes between ears.
To say no, to resist and then to sink into
Nothing more than a pillow.
TEXT: If a child laughs in his sleep, especially on the night of the full moon, this is a sign that Lilith is tickling him.
A mother will do well to tap her child on the nose and say “To her that flies in rooms of darkness, pass quickly, quickly, Lilith. You have no inheritance here.”
Emek ha-Melekh, 17th Century
Cherie Interview: I’ve always been a dance and I loved that. I spend a lot of money on costumes and carefully selected my music. Then I had inspiration when I was up there. The guys didn’t like me too much when I was up there dancing. I was in my own little world.
Durme Durme Music
Cherie Interview: If I could tell a different story and have a different history to tell you, playing another role, the mask, the social games, that was what I got paid for. A lot of places didn’t want me back because I wasn’t making money for the house. It was my life. That’s how I supported myself. I never thought of it. It kept me sane. If I zeroed in on what the job really was, it’s very degrading to women.
“A Biography of Lilith” 16mm Color Sound 1997 35min.
In a lively mix of off-beat narrative, collage and memoir, A Biography of Lilith updates the creation myth by telling the story of the first woman and for some, the first feminist. Lilith’s betrayal by Adam in Eden and subsequent vow of revenge is recast as a modern tale with present-day Lilith (Cherie Wallace) musing on a life that has included giving up a baby for adoption and work as a bar dancer. Interweaving mystical texts from Jewish folklore with interviews, music and poetry, Sachs reclaims this cabalistic parable to frame her own role as a mother. With music by Pamela Z and Charming Hostess (Jewlia Eisenberg and Carla Kielstadt).
Partially supported by a finishing fund grant from the Experimental Television Center, as a project of the New York State Council on the Arts.
“The true story of this not so mythical, mythic first female. Sachs’ film conveys the real experience — bloody and poetic — of Lilith alive and now in every woman. Bravo! A film felt, imagined, and informed by life.” – Barbara Black Koltuv, Ph. D. Clinical Psychologist, Jungian Analyst, and Author of The Book of Lilith
“Sachs’ art for fusing documentary and experimental narrative is unquestionably enormous. In this new film, her combination of an interview with a friend, the myth of Lilith and beauteous images of things like jelly fish (which float like iridescent breasts on screen) culminates in stunning cinema.” Molly Hankwitz, Art Papers
Screenings: Pacific Film Archive, Berkeley, CA; San Francisco Cinematheque; Women in the Director’s Chair Film Festival, Chicago; Ann Arbor Film Festival; Charlotee Film Fest (prize) Onion City Film Festival, Chicago; Humboldt Film Festival; Big Muddy Film Festival; Anthology Film Archive, NY; Fordham University; University of Maryland; California College of Arts and Crafts; Maryland Institute of Art; University of South Florida; Millennium Film Workshop, NY; Madcat Women’s Film Festival
Prizes: NY Film Expo; Black Maria; New York Women’s Film Festival
