The Age of Ademi

While searching for intellectual pornography (you know, looking up filmmakers, authors, artists, and the like that make you squirm six inches under your belly button) I stumbled upon this little gem I had no idea about. In continuing the NFB theme (see below), here is, without further ado, Guy Maddin's latest piece, NIGHT MAYOR (say it quick...). In a nutshell, the film is a portrait of Ademi Nihad, a Bosnian immigrant living in Winnipeg with his children. He created an organic television to transcribe the Aurora Borealis into sound and images, but it's not enough. He devises a plan to spread this transmission via telephones across the country with his Telemelodium. Of course, there's a conflict...

Maddin is a director I greatly admire above all others, but it's not just his absurdist, comical, silent and experimental cinema throwback style that gets me hot, but the fact that he continues to make short works when the rest of the world seems to be dealing with the pressure to create feature-lengths. When will people realize they can say a lot more in 10 minutes than dragging our dollars out for three hours in a megaplex swallowing our own demented drool over the latest piece of Hollywood's anal drivel? Check out any short by the Kuchars, Anger, or even Maddin, for that matter, and I'll bet there is enough material in just one of those films for Hollywood to make 3 films out of. Anyway, enough ranting. I just want more short "features" (even 45 - 60mins would be awesome). Enjoy.

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The Real Begone Dull Care

This is in response to Patrick's previous post about the Junior Boys and their album, "Begone Dull Care," which I had no idea about. Thought I'd go ahead and post the inspiration (I assume...) for that album.
Presented by the NFB of Canada, here is Norman McLaren's groundbreaking cameraless film, animated to a groovy soundtrack by Oscar Peterson. As a practitioner of found footage and cameraless filmmaking, all I can say is that this is what we dream of making, and Mr. McLaren pulled it off (I'll bet it took a few years...). Speaking of dreams, and making, I think it was Len Lye who said something along the lines of: making a film with a camera - the images come from without, but making a film without a camera - the images come from within. Pretty neat, huh?

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