Aki Kaurismäki | Finland, Sweden | 1989

October 29, 2012

Il giorno della prima di Close Up (original title) | Nanni Moretti | Italy, France | 1996 | Short, 7 min

October 28, 2012

La coquille et le clergyman (original title) | Germaine Dulac | France | 1927 | Short, 31 min

October 28, 2012

The Seashell and the Clergyman. Directed by Germaine Dulac (1882-1942). Shot June-September 1927. Premiere at Ciné-Club de France October 25, 1927. First theatrical exhibition February 9, 1928 at Studio des Ursulines, Paris. Scenario by Antonin Artuad, revised by Dulac. Photographed by Paul Guichard. Edited and special effects by Paul Parguel. Cast: Alex Allin (clergyman), Lucien Bataille (general), Gênica Athanasiou (woman).

In this independent production, often regarded as the first surrealist film, Dulac employs dream-like environments to probe the mind of a cleric whose religious vows frustrate his sexual impulses. It was originally banned by the British Board of Censors, which issued the statement that "the film is so cryptic as to be almost meaningless. If there is a meaning, it is doubtless objectionable."

"The film is composed of a series of episodes using Freudian imagery to express the clergyman's mental anguish. Antonin Artaud, dissatisfied with the way Dulac handled his script, incited against her at the Studio des Ursulines. Despite Artaud's dissatisfaction, Dulac's film is a sincere and honest experiment whose sequences in the streets of Paris are especially notable."

—French film historian Georges Sadoul

ทีมพากย์พันธมิตร | Rian Johnson | USA | 2012

October 28, 2012

Alex Kurtzman | USA | 2012

October 27, 2012

Le notti di Cabiria (original title) | Federico Fellini | Italy | 1957

October 27, 2012

Kim Min-Suk | South Korea | 2010

October 27, 2012

Charles Chaplin | USA | 1931

October 27, 2012

Marc Webb | USA | 2012

October 26, 2012

Lorene Scafaria | USA et al. | 2012

October 23, 2012

Felix Chong and Alan Mak | China | 2012

October 22, 2012

Peter Greenaway | UK | 1978 | Short, 12 min

October 21, 2012

Peter Greenaway | UK | 1976 | Short, 17 min

October 21, 2012

Tomas Alfredson | UK et al. | 2011

October 21, 2012

ยุทธเลิศ สิปปภาค | 2554 / 2011

October 21, 2012

Jean Painlevé | France | 1939-45 | Short, 9 min

October 20, 2012

Directed by Jean Painlevé (1902-1989). Cinematography by André Raymond. Music by Duke Ellington ("Echoes of the Jungle").

The doyen of French scientific filmmakers, Painlevé was a specialist in scientific documentaries which became popular with experimental filmmakers and surrealists, who were taken with their wit and the director's eye for mysterious and bizarre details, bringing his own form of poetry and fantasy to his films. An active militant during the Occupation, he fought against the Nazis as a member of the Underground.

Le Vampire begins with clips of animals known for sucking or squeezing their prey dry. After a few shots from Murnau's 1921 Nosferatu, the first significant vampire film, Painlevé introduces his film's star, the South American vampire bat. The bat approaches a guinea pig, seems to kiss it, numbing it, and then begins sucking on its cheek. The guinea pig sits calmly while its blood is drained by the bat. At the end, the bat extends one of his wings in what looks like the Nazi "Heil Hitler" salute. The blood-sucking bat is clearly a metaphor for Nazism.

Symphonie diaganale (original title) | Viking Eggeling | Germany | 1924 | Short, 7 min

October 20, 2012



Diagonal Symphony. Directed by Viking Eggeling (1880-1925). Completed in the fall of 1924 and shown for the first time on November 5, 1924 in Berlin.

Swedish painter and avant-garde filmmaker Eggeling went to Paris at 17, then later joined the Dada movement in Switzerland. He began a close association with Hans Richter in 1918. Eggeling was the only Swedish dadaist. He labored for three years completing thousands of drawing that were necessary to animate his "scroll painting." The result, Diagonal Symphony, was a landmark in abstract cinema, a unique examination of delicate and almost art deco tones and lines. It was greatly admired by members of the Bauhaus.

Eggeling was interested in the creation of visual analogs to musical composition and in his notes, has cited the composer and music theoretician Ferrucio Busoni as an inspiration.

"Diagonal Symphony aspires to musical form. Eggeling conceived of the film screen as a network or axes; two diagonal co-ordinates crossing the screen like and 'X' and extending in depth into the vanishing point... The total evolution of the film occurs in waves; scenes become more complex or simplify; sections of the film repeat themselves directly, or with some form of inversion."

—P. Adam Sitney
Cinema, A Critical Dictionary

Vormittagsspuk (original title) | Hans Richter | Germany | 1928 | Short, 9 min

October 20, 2012



Ghosts Before Breakfast. Designed and directed by Hans Richter (1888-1976). Shot in Berlin in 1927-1928 for showing at the 1928 International Music Festival of Baden Baden. Photographed by Reimar Kuntze (1902-1949). Cast: Paul Hindemith, Darius and Madeleine Mihaud, Jean Oser.

Painter, filmmaker and theoretician Richter became involved in the activities of the Dada movement in Switzerland and Germany and was eventually recognized as Germany's most important exponent of surrealism. When the Nazis took over, he emigrated to the US.

The Nazis destroyed the sound version of this charming work as "degenerate art." An absurdist comedy in which everyday objects (hats, ties, coffee cups) rebel against their daily routine, the film defies all conventions, cinematic and social alike. Its fantasy elements are a nod to the trick films of early cinema and American slapstick comedies, but its particular with belongs to the world of Dada.

Critic Ed Lowry noted: "The liberation of objects from their functional roles, in a total rebellion against their owners, against logic, against the laws of time and space, becomes a joke on the narrowly defined, stuffy lives of the bourgeoisie, the society which defines itself by the clock. Utilizing time-lapse photography, pixillation and split screen, Richter creates a delightful bit of film trickery that challenges our perception of the cinema."