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Полустанок [Polustanok / The Halt] (Sergey Loznitsa, 2000)
Mar
17
World Sleep Day
People leaning back on the train station's benches, fast asleep. DP: Pavel Kostomarov.
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On the Marriage Broker Joke as Cited by Sigmund Freud in “WIT AND ITS RELATION TO THE UNCONSCIOUS” or Can the Avant-Garde Artist Be Wholed (Owen Land, 1977)
Mar
16
National Panda Day
Two fake pandas in a black-and-white room, seated on zebra-striped chairs. The floor has black-and-white square tiles and the walls black-and-white polkadots. Framed behind them, two black squares with white passe-partouts.
Owen Land explores meaning, wit, and #WordPlay, and manages to unite the #marketing of #umeboshi #plums in a wide variety of vessels, the brokering of #brides, and pandas discussing #Freud in all of the above contexts.
“My film is going to be introduced by a fake panda and it’s going to be about Japanese salted plums among other things.”
– FIRST PANDA
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Het Leesplankje [The Reading Lesson] (Johan van der Keuken, 1973)
Mar
2
National Read Across America Day
Reading board tiles laid out on a newspaper. Half a headline – 7.000 ARRESTANTEN (“7000 DETAINEES”) – can be read. A photograph of a shellshocked, very young soldier in front of a fleeing crowd illustrates the article. DP: Johan van der Keuken.
Amsterdam schoolchildren recite the words from a reading board while the traditional teaching method's pictures are interspersed with news photos of then-current events and children's drawings.
“Aaaaap”
“Nooot”
“Miiieees”
This short, and life, is haunting and violent; schools should be safe for all. Even if only to escape in a book.
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Transition de phase dans les cristaux liquides [Liquid Crystals] (Jean Painlevé, 1978)
Feb
28
National Science Day – India
A scene that foreshadows computer-generated imagery. DP: Jean Painlevé.
Filmmaker, photographer and honorary surrealist Jean Painlevé made science films that verge on experimental art cinema. With custom-built camera setups, he explored the world above and below the water surface, and with that exposed human traits.
It's almost impossible to select one film from a filmography as vast as #Painlevé's. In honour of C.V. #Raman, lets go with his Transition de phase dans les cristaux liquides.
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Sur un air de Charleston [Charleston Parade] (Jean Renoir, 1927)
Feb
14
Parisian savage Catherine Hessling and African explorer Johnny Hudgins exploring each other's alien ways. DP: Jean Bachelet.
“I have finally discovered my ancestors' traditional dance.”
– Johnny Hudgins
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Françoise Durocher, Waitress (André Brassard, 1972)
Feb
9
freebie: Customer Service Day
23 actresses and one person in drag play the part of Québécois waitress Françoise Durocher in seven monologues.
“One grilled cheese, two slices of toast, two coffees. One pepper steak no chili and a plate of spaghetti and meatballs. Two glasses of milk. One plate of spare ribs. A chicken in a basket with three cups of honey. One lean smoked meat sandwich with pickles and mustard. One two-cream coffee and two club sandwiches. Two clubs.”
– Françoise Durocher
Watch the short on the NFB website.
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De werkelijkheid van Karel Appel [The Reality of Karel Appel] (Jan Vrijman, 1962)
Feb
3
American Painters Day
Appel at work. He said about painting “Ik begin vanuit mijn materie, dat is verf.” (“I start from my matter, which is paint.”). DP: Eduard van der Enden.
CoBrA (1948—51) was a Copenhagen / Brussels / Amsterdam art collective whose manifest revolved around the liberation from the rigidity of art and life in drab, post-war Europe. Their spontaneous primal iconography and graffiti allowed them to not only regain the pleasure of painting, but also forge a new connection to colour and material. Especially the Dutch artists involved – Corneille, Appel, Lucebert, Constant – looked at the way children respond to the act of creation resulting in easy to comprehend semi-abstract paintings, sculptures and poems. The moronic “my child can paint that” that people still associate with modernist art can be traced back to (deliberately) misinterpreting these artists' objectives.
“Ik schilder als een barbaar van deze barbaarse tijd.”
– Karel Appel
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Un chant d'amour [A Song of Love] (Jean Genet, 1950)
Jan
30
National Escape Day
From one prison window to another, a bunch of flowers swings towards a grasping hand. DP: Jacques Natteau.
An escape of sorts, in love and lust.
“He puts his cheek to the wall. With a kiss he licks the vertical surface and the greedy plaster sucks in his saliva. Then a shower of kisses.”
– Jean Genet, Notre-Dame des Fleurs (1942/43)
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Le Pétomane du Moulin Rouge [The Fart Maniac] (1900)
Jan
7
National Pass Gas Day
Flatulist Joseph Pujol blowing out a candle with his derrière.
Witness the world famous pétomane shot on location at the Moulin Rouge (and amazingly not at Edison's Black Maria), as saved for prosperity by Edison Studios. The large trumpet-like contraption that can be seen on the left, the Edison Kinetophone, also present in The Dickson Experimental Sound Film (William Dickson, 1894/95), recorded the sound on a cylinder, that then could be played back in synch with the picture.
The original audio recording that accompanied this film is lost; do check your attic.