Cinema 16

MESHES OF THE AFTERNOON is one of the most influential works in American experimental cinema. A non-narrative work, it has been identified as a key example of the trance film, in which a protagonist appears in a dreamlike state, and where the camera conveys his or her subjective focus. The central figure in Meshes of the Afternoon, played by Deren, is attuned to her unconscious mind and caught in a web of dream events that spill over into reality. Made by Deren with her husband, cinematographer Alexander Hammid, MESHES OF THE AFTERNOON established the independent avant-garde movement in film in the United States directly inspiring early works by Kenneth Anger, Stan Brakhage, and other major experimental filmmakers.

D.A. Pennebaker has been making films for over 50 years, amongst them the Bob Dylan classic DON’T LOOK BACK (1967). He is widely regarded as one of the pioneers of cinema verité, a style that revolutionized the documentary genre by using uninterrupted observation, creating a fly-on-the-wall sense of immediacy. Set to a Duke Ellington track of the same name, his early short film, DAYBREAK EXPRESS, takes the audience from one end of a New York subway route to the other, propelling us through the mid-20th century metropolis. “I didn’t know much about film editing, or in fact about shooting, so I bought a couple of rolls of Kodachrome at the drugstore, and figured that since the record was about three minutes long, by shooting carefully I could fit the whole thing onto one roll of film. Of course that didn’t work since I couldn’t start and stop my hand-wound camera that easily so I ended up shooting both rolls and even a few more before I was through. It took about three days to film, and then sat in a closet for several years until I figured out how to edit it and make a print that I could show on a projector.” D.A. Pennebaker

Andy Warhol's Screen Tests were filmed from early 1964 to November 1966. Factory visitors who had potential "star" quality would be seated in front of a tripod mounted camera, asked to be as still as possible, and told not to blink while the camera was running. Warhol manipulated light and shadow in increasingly inventive ways to capture the appearance, style, personality, and mood of both famous and lesser-known visitors to his studio, the Factory. His subjects included Dennis Hopper, Gerard Malanga, Edie Sedgwick, Susan Sontag, and Salvador Dalí. Although each film was shot at standard sound speed, or twenty-four frames per second, Warhol specified that prints be projected at a slower speed of sixteen frames per second, a rate used in the projection of silent films. The result is an unusual fluidity of pace, a rhythm gently at odds with the starkness of the lighting and the boldness of the close-ups of face and hair. In total more than 500 Screen Tests were made. Helmut was the seventh. 16mm film, black and white, silent, 4.4 minutes at 16 frames per second

Available in Europe for the first time, FREIHEIT (the German word for freedom) was George Lucas’ senior film project while at the University of Southern California. The three-minute film depicts a student, played by classmate Randal Kleiser (who went on to direct GREASE) escaping across the border from East to West Germany. The short is a rare chance to see the early work from a director whose impact on modern filmmaking is nothing short of astounding - starting in 1971 with THX 1138, and continuing on through AMERICAN GRAFFITI, the INDIANA JONES trilogy and, of course, the STAR WARS series.

An underground classic, cited by Richard Linklater (SLACKER, A SCANNER DARKLY), as one of his favorite shorts, NECROLOGY is an anthropological film about life and death in New York City - a roll call of the recently deceased. Shot in Grand Central Station, director Standish Lawder, who is best known for his photography, captured 12 minutes of anonymous commuters in their daily routine. The finished film shows lines of people ascending and disappearing into a shadowy abyss with the haunting suggestion of people on their eventless way to hell. Lawder added a lengthy list of bogus credits to the end for a touch of morbid humour that leaves viewers to ponder their own fate. "The film is one of the strongest and grimmest comments upon the contemporary society that cinema has produced". Jonas Mekas, The Village Voice

VINCENT is one of Tim Burton’s earliest directorial works. The short was filmed while Burton was still an animator at the Walt Disney Animation Studios, where he worked on films such THE FOX AND THE HOUND and THE BLACK CAULDRON. A stop-motion animated film shot entirely in black and white on 16mm film stock, it was based on a poem Burton had written himself. The short film tells the sad tale of Vincent Malloy, a suburban boy who wants to be just like his idol, Vincent Price (who provides narration for the film). It marked Tim Burton’s first teaming with collaborators who would have a great impact on his oeuvre, including Rick Heinrichs, who would go on to design several of Burton’s later films, including SLEEPY HOLLOW and PLANET OF THE APES.

THE DISCIPLINE OF D.E. is one of the finest shorts by Gus van Sant who made as many as fourteen between 1967 and 1991. Van Sant would go on to make many of the hallmarks of modern independent cinema, notably DRUGSTORE COWBOY (1989), MY OWN PRIVATE IDAHO (1991) and ELEPHANT (2003). In this narrated version of a short story by William S. Burroughs we learn the principles of "Do Easy" and the complications that can arise from the quest to perfect each movement in order to find the most efficient way of doing everything - even nothing. The black and white short culminates in a gun fight with the poignant question "How fast can you take your time, kid?".

Todd Solondz is one of the most singular voices in American cinema. Over the past 10 years his films WELCOME TO THE DOLLHOUSE, HAPPINESS, STORYTELLING and PALINDROMES have marked him out as a provocative and maverick talent. Amongst the shorts he made while studying film at NYU is FEELINGS. Solondz himself takes the lead role in the film where a sensitive young man finds he can no longer endure life without his beloved. "My movies are not for everybody, especially for people who like them." Todd Solondz.

CARMEN was Alexander Payne’s first short film, made while he was studying at UCLA Film School. It is a silent comedy, derived from the opera of the same name. In the film a mentally challenged gas station attendant is put in charge of the store, which leads to love and a tragic-comic end. With his films ELECTION, ABOUT SCHMIDT and SIDEWAYS Payne has since become known for his auteur distinctiveness - amplifying the disappointment and regret lurking within the can-do civic culture of middle America, while acknowledging the sweetness and innocence that’s still there.

Director Adam Davidson made THE LUNCH DATE while he was a student at New York’s Columbia University. The film went on to become a worldwide success. In 1990 it won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival for best short film, the Student Oscar from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, Outstanding New Director by the Directors Guild of America and, in 1991, the Academy Award Oscar for Best Short Film. The film explores ideas about fear and stereotyping through the story of a well-to-do white woman who is forced to confront her prejudice while stranded in a train station. Adam Davidson currently works in television where his credits include LAW AND ORDER (for which he received a DGA nomination) and LOST.

Three years after graduating from USC, Joe Nussbaum directed and co-wrote the short film, GEORGE LUCAS IN LOVE. This short satire of STAR WARS and SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE, shot over two days, has Lucas searching for the true origins of the Star Wars saga during the creator's college years, and introduces an assortment of characters that serve as the director's inspiration. The film was a download sensation when it was made available temporarily online. George Lucas wrote to the filmmakers to let them know how amused he was by the film.

FIVE FEET HIGH AND RISING is an inspired look at sexual innocence and discovery set in the distinctive world of New York City’s Lower East Side, where Victor, a twelve year-old boy, experiences what growing up is all about. Peter Sollett graduated from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts in 1998. His thesis film, FIVE FEET HIGH AND RISING, won a string of awards including the Jury Prize in Short Filmmaking at the 2000 Sundance Film Festival and the award for Best Short in the Cinéfondation section of the Cannes International Film Festival. The film also provided the inspiration for his feature debut, RAISING VICTOR VARGAS, which premiered at Cannes in 2002 and went on to win several international awards as well as five Independent Spirit Award nominations.

For more than a decade, Mike Mills has bridged the worlds of film, music video, commercials, fashion, art and design, working with artists including Air, Moby, Beastie Boys, Beck and Sonic Youth. Amongst his short films is PAPERBOYS - a beautiful exploration of the unique and ever-changing role of this symbol of American life and culture. Mills’ debut feature THUMBSUCKER starring Lou Taylor Pucci, Keanu Reeves, Tilda Swinton and Vince Vaughn was released in 2005.

This debut short by Stefan Nadelman, who had been working as a print and web designer, prior to making films, is a stunning portrait of a hidden corner of New York City. TERMINAL BAR is a Flash animated documentary about one of the toughest most eccentric bars in the city, as seen through the haunting black-and-white photographs taken by the directors father, Sheldon, who was a bartender at the 42nd Street bar from 1972 to 1982. Amongst its accolades the film won the Jury prize at the 2003 Sundance Film Festival.

Following his graduation from the University of Southern California, where he earned an MFA in producing, Rawson Marshall Thurber came up with an idea for a short. It was Terry Tate, Office Linebacker, a film about an American football player office manager whose job was to tackle anyone who breaks an office rule, no matter how benign. He shot it over a weekend for $2,000, hoping to sell it to one of the many Internet companies looking for content. Terry Tate ended up being bought by Reebok and re-commissioned as a series of shorts, which were played during the 2003 Super Bowl. The shorts were a sensation on the internet, where they were downloaded over 15 million times. Here we see the first in the series of shorts, which introduced Terry Tate to the American audience. Rawson Marshall Thurber went on to direct DODGEBALL, starring Ben Stiller in 2004.

When teenager Felix, from a deadbeat Brooklyn home, is asked by Mr. H, the kindly corner store owner, to mind his dog while he's away, it's up to Felix to either reciprocate the benevolence Mr. H has always shown him, or perpetuate the neglect handed down as a family legacy. Born in Knoxville, Tennessee, Adam Parrish King went on to get degrees from the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Southern California. He has directed eight short films prior to The Wraith of Cobble Hill, and has also worked in sound editing, mixing and writing. THE WRAITH OF COBBLE HILL won the Jury Prize at Sundance 2006.