Chicago Doc Screenings, Week of May 6 - May 12

Architecture and Design Film Festival, Siskel and The Wit, Th May 5 - Mon May 9

Week-long

NUREMBERG: ITS LESSON FOR TODAY, Music Box
WATTSTAX, Music Box, Fri & Sat midnight
CAVE OF FORGOTTEN DREAMS, continues River East 21, ICON
POM WONDERFUL PRESENTS: THE GREATEST MOVIE EVER SOLD, River East 21, Pipers Alley
I AM, Pipers Alley
AFRICAN CATS, continues multiple venues

I TRAVEL BECAUSE I HAVE TO, I COME BACK BECAUSE I LOVE YOU, Siskel

Multiple screenings
MILTON GLASER: TO INFORM AND DELIGHT w/ shorts STEFAN SAGMEISTER: ARTIST SERIES; PAULA SCHER: ARTIST SERIES, Siskel Fri 3:00; theWit Sun 7:30
EYE OVER PRAGUE w/ short WHITE BOX, Siskel: Fri 4:00 & Sat 5:00
MALLS R US w/ shorts BIG BROTHER BRITAIN, CASTRUM, theWit: Fri 5:15 & Sun 5:15
Enduring Icons program: VINCENT SCULLY: AN ART HISTORIAN AMONG ARCHITECTS; KIMBELL MUSEUM, WATER AND SKY; SAVING LIEB HOUSE, Siskel: Fri 5:00 & Sat 1:00
Amped & Revamped shorts program: MY PLAYGROUND, DUMPSTER POOLS, THE ART & SCIENCE OF RENZO PIANO, Siskel, Fri 7:00 & Sat 5:30
Oh Canada! program: CITIZEN LAMBERT: JOAN OF ARCHITECTURE; WILDERNESS UTOPIA; TWICE UPON A GARDEN, theWit Fri 7:15; Siskel Sun 1:00
SPACE, LAND AND TIME: UNDERGROUND ADVENTURES WITH ANT FARM w/ shorts LEFT BEHIND, SUBVERSIVE ARCHITECTS, Siskel: Fri 9:00 & Sun 5:30
VISUAL ACOUSTICS w/ shorts STARLIGHT; LE PETITE MAISON, AN ARCHITECTUAL SEDUCTION, theWit Fri 9:15; Siskel Sun 6:45
CONTEMPORARY DAYS: THE DESIGNS OF LUCIENNE AND ROBIN DAY w/ shorts ONION PINCH BAROQUE COUNTERPOISE; THE ALUMINIUM, Siskel Sat 3:00; theWit Sun 3:15
Down Under & Up program: 43 COLUMNS ON SCENE IN BILBAO; PETER STUTCHBURY, ARCHITECTURE OF PLACE; LE MONDE, CHRISTIAN DE PORTZAMPARC, theWit Sat 3:15; Siskel Sun 3:00
CITIZEN ARCHITECT: SAMUEL MOCKBEE AND THE SPIRIT OF THE RURAL STUDIO w/ short HEADSPACE 1, theWit Sat 7:30; Siskel Sun 8:45
Tower Power! program: THE DESERT CASTLE; FLOWER TOWER, EDOUARD FRANCOIS; STUDIO GANG ARCHITECTS: AQUA TOWER, Siseel: Sat 9:00 & Sun 4:45
Thinking Big program: THE MAKING OF THE BIENNALE WITH AARON BETSKY; MONUMENT TO A DREAM; ST. LOUIS CAN SOAR, Siskel: Sun 1:00 & Mon 6:00
STRONGMAN, facets, Wed 11 - Sun 15

Friday
SUMMER OF GOLIATH w/ short INTERVIEW WITH THE EARTH, Chicago Filmmakers, 8:00
Frames + Verities: Non-fiction Works by SAIC Students, Spring 2011, The Nightingale, 7:30
SOUTH OF THE BORDER, DePaul's Daley Building (Loop), 6:00, discussion w/ producer Sulichin follows

Saturday
Milan Redux [furniture slide show], Object Design League, 5:00
Andy Roche program, Roots & Culture, 7:00
Now It's Dark: Experimental Fim Society Edition, The Experimental Film Society, 7:00
Open House Party, Chicago Filmmakers, 8:00

Sunday
Jupiter program, Thalia Hall, 7:30

Monday
Visualize Change Film Forum, Links, Hall, 7:00
The Basic Materials of Film: Ernie Gehr, doc, 7:00
Uman Beings: Experimentations in Film & Video, UIC, 7:00
A JIHAD FOR LOVE, DePaul Student Center (Lincoln Park), 7:00

Tuesday
Sex +++ shorts program: SISTER WIFE; THE LOVE BUREAU; MUSLIMS IN LOVE, Jane Addams Hull House, 7:00 - monthly, year-long program
FORKS OVER KNIVES, Webster Place, panel discussion follows
THE TUBES: LIVE AT THE GREEK, Delilah's, 7:00
OBJECTIFIED, Transistor, 7:30

Wednesday


Thursday
DARK DAYS, doc. 9:00
"Discovering Black Film History: Tracing the Tyler Black Film Collection" talk by Jacqueline Stewart for Chicago Film Seminar, SAIC Flaxman Center, 6:30

A FILM UNFINISHED: notes from roundtable

“The Silence of the Archive: Roundtable Discussion of A FILM UNFINISHED"

Saturday, April 30, 8:30

Participants: Tom Gunning, Noa Steimatsky, Julia Adeney Thomas, and Johannes von Moltke

Director Yael Hersonski present

 The roundtable’s title comes from the Israeli release of the film’s title – The Silence of the Archive. An odd title, not touched on during the roundtable, that is worth further discussion at a later time.  Here, I’ll briefly summarize what I thought were the most interesting points from each participant, without explicit commentary. It should go without saying that this three day event is a model for rich discussion that the documentary community desperately needs: a Thursday night screening (attended by over 200, I’d guess), followed by a Friday morning workshop (that I did not attend), and a Saturday evening roundtable driven by four academics, representing three disciplines, as well as the director present (attended by about 40). I think my notes well-represent speaker perspectives:

Julia Adney Thomas

The question of how images serve or resist (intended) representation.

The question of the artfulness/craft of the film’s construction – what does this mean given its content?

What does it mean to witness cruelties?

Two primary organizing thoughts: (1) efficacy of images; (2) evidence of images

Interested in the politics of space in the film, or political distances, framed by Helmet Lethen’s text Cool Conduct: The Culture of Distance in Weimar Germany. Cites four layers:

1) initial footage;

2) uses of original footage (as propaganda);

3) witnesses (watching original footage);

4) us as audience, consuming edited culmination w/ effects

Primarily discussed closeness and lack of freedom/options suggested by initial film’s framing, representations effectively Taylorize subjects

But also raises question of how initial filmers “saw” subjects

Posits the film was left unfinished due to fluidity of images – “too fluid” to be used

Johannes von Moltke

Raised question of what film offers as historical material, the question of formal and aesthetic considerations.

Asks “what kind of documentary is it?” Offers three suggestions:

1) Essay film – reasons by associations, committed to topics (primarily relationship of memory to history)

2) Ethnographic film, esp. regarding the production culture of Nazi filmmaking

3) Archive film, interested in questions of deterioration, muteness/power to speak

What does it mean that the images we have to work with are from the perpetrators?

Know it was propaganda, but how was it to be used.

Opines that the unfinished nature is due to Nazi shift from denigrating Jews to championing The Master Race, thus project simply abandoned

Tom Gunning

Eases into a soft critique that a value of problematic films opens spaces to discuss the problematic.

Felt that film put him “in contact with Evil”.

Felt “a deep sense of shame”, as sutured to gaze as perpetrator and spectator, as well as film critic/historian, that ‘his medium’ is capable of such evil, and/or, raises question “is film capable of evil?” Cites 1915 court case that first denies First Amendment protection to film arguing that film is more powerful than the press, that it is capable of evil.

Questions how it is problematic to remove a volatile representation such as this from its specificity – does it render the power of the original dramatically lessened? Cites Lanzmann on representing the Shoah.

Elaborates on narration at FILM’s opening that describes Nazi relationship to photography as a desire to use photography’s power to truth-claiming for telling lies.

Image is not only of what is shot but more importantly the perspectival/machine gaze, thus we “are made to inhabit a Nazi gaze” and is very uncomfortable with this move

Wonders what the Nazi’s did not show

Also highly uncomfortable with the fictionalized interviews with original filmer Wist, not only in themselves, but also importantly because the film is primarily a criticism of the original footage as false for uses of propaganda, here being replicated ‘for the other side’

Also worried about the glamorization of the testimony from survivors, its glossiness

Noa Steimatsky

Introduced herself as modernist film scholar that has willfully avoided (for the most past) screening Holocaust films “for whatever reason” that she still does not completely understand. Suggests the Holocaust is still too recent/present

Uncomfortable with Hersonski’s choice to slow and freeze moments of original footage – feels it “gives it a kind of beauty which I find horrifying…which also gives Wist a benefit”

Wonders how the chronology of the original footage matches the chronology in current film

Questions the “cold geometry of the framing…the extreme close-ups of emotionless Wist" character. This coldness acts to tame “the hot wild material of the archive”

Also, like Gunning, uncomfortable with the framing and “high-stylized” representations of the witnesses, they are “casual and expressive”, they have a “retarding effect” on the archival material

Most powerful moment when the photo from the trash is picked up. Hersonski slows and pauses on the photo, but is more interested in the fact that the Nazi filmer actually captured this – what was the motivation in capturing this?

Yeal Hersonski

In response to Gunning’s questioning the appropriateness of the decision to fabricate the interview material, she emphatically says “Hell, yes”.

Stated she “never intended to confuse the viewer [that interviews were not real]…didn’t mean to indicate this is how it was…[if this is the case] I should go back to my drawing boards”. Though stated she was “aware of our own dangerous power as a manipulative filmmaker”

Made point that we are “living during a time when there are so many other documentaries of atrocities”

Chicago Doc Screenings, Week of April 29 - May 5

HIGHLIGHTS: The Silence of the Archive: Roundtable Discussion of A FILM UNFINISHED, Film Studies Center, Sat 30, 8:00, reservations required; LA JETÉE, Th at doc; THE KIDS GROW UP Sun at Chicago Filmmakers.

Thursday the "Architecture and Design Film Festival" kicks off at Siskel, looks to be about 37 docs, 25ish of them shorts [breakdown in May 6 - post], screening through Sun 8, at both the Siskel and the Wit


Week-long
CAVE OF FORGOTTEN DREAMS, River East 21
QUEEN OF THE SUN: WHAT ARE THE BEES TELLING US?, Music Box
POM WONDERFUL PRESENTS: THE GREATEST MOVIE EVER SOLD, continues Landmark
BORN TO BE WILD, continues Navy Pier IMAX
AFRICAN CATS, continues multiple venues

Multiple screenings
AMERICAN: THE BILL HICKS STORY, Siskel, Fri, Sat, Wed, Th
HOW MUCH DOES YOUR BUILDING WEIGH, MR. FOSTER?, Siskel and the Wit, Th [and Mon]

Single screenings
Friday
German Provinces (4 shorts): BIELEFELD52N01 8E32, ALREADY AFTERNOON, TATOOED PRISONERS, DEMONTAGE, DANK-Haus, 7:30
I DON'T KNOW WHAT YOUR EYES HAVE DONE TO ME, St. Nicolas Cathedral School, 7:30
CULTURES OF RESISTANCE, Siskel, 8:00, discussion follows
A SECOND KNOCK AT THE DOOR, Portage, 8:00
THE PIPE, Irish American Heritage Center, 8:30

Saturday
MY HEART IS AN IDIOT, Intuit, 7:00
The Silence of the Archive: Roundtable Discussion of A FILM UNFINISHED, Film Studies Center, 8:00


A PERFECT SOLDIER, Siskel, 8:15, director & producer/editor discussion follows

Sunday
THE KIDS GROW UP, Chicago Filmmakers, 1:00
INSIDE JOB, Oak Park Public Library, 1:00
LETTERS FROM THE OTHER SIDE, Chicago History Museum, 1:30
SHOUT: THE STORY OF DOMESTIC VIOLENCE, Hideout, 5:00, discussion follows
PRISONER OF HER PAST, Anshe Amet Synagogue, 6:30
Mars, or War Huh Yeah What is it Good For Absolutely Nothing Say it Again [program: WINTER SOLDIER, FROZEN WAR, CROSSROADS, Thalia Hall, 7:30
ROCK MY RELIGION, Monument 2 Gallery, 8:00
WORD WARS, Cole's, 8:00

Monday
Space and Structure: Michael Snow and Joyce Wieland [WAVELENGTH, etc.], doc, 7:00
THE EXILE NATION PROJECT, Portage, 7:30

Tuesday
I AM MY FILMS: A PORTRAIT OF WERNER HERZOG, Goethe-Institut, 5/3, 6:00 w. short THE UNPRECEDENTED DEFENSE OF THE FORTRESS DEUTSCHKREUTZ
MUSICIAN, Transistor, 7:30

Wednesday
VEINS IN THE GULF, Front Row Cinema, 6:00, directors and talent present
JOHN & JANE, Chicago Cultural Center, 6:30
Chicago Film Archives Amateur Night, Siskel, 8:00, Center for Home Movies curator present

Thursday
NUREMBERG: ITS LESSON FOR TODAY, doc, 5:00
LUNCHFILM: FILM BEFORE FOOD [shorts program], Block 7:00, programmer Plante present
Nervous Magic Lantern: An Evening with Ken and Flo Jacobs [screenings and discussion], Film Studies Center, 7:00
CineYouth 2011, Front Row Cinema, 7:00 Th(-Sat)
LA JETÈE, doc, 9:00

Full Frame: Archive Brief

Though I've been working-up a couple of pieces for my Full Frame wrap-up, I've had a bee buzzing in my bonnet from the recent Daniel Loria indieWIRE piece "At the Full Frame Festival, Archives are the Future". First, the piece seems to gloss over the program, missing many of the works using significant archival material, though this in itself isn't odd for a wrap-up, it does feel a bit inconclusive here with the thesis presented. Second, though I haven't done a study on the use of archival still and moving archival material, this is obviously nothing new to documentary work, I'd even doubt this years program stands out much from programs of recent years - aside from the Prelinger series - though it feels as though use of archival materials has been gaining popularity over the past 5-10 years. That noted, it seems it would have made sense to flesh out the Spotlight itself to bulk-up the claims about the emphasis on archives

Like Daniel, or likely any other person covering a festival, it is difficult to get a complete sense of the films without being an insider with full access. While the archival angle seems an obvious one to consider, especially given the Prelinger spotlight, what struck me as interesting within this emphasis is the use of the archive against itself/its owner. My sample here is merely three (though there may be others), and each film taps the archive to a wildly different degree, but the idea is that these films are using archives of the State as evidence of poor behavior of the State. In THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF NICOLAE CEAUSESCU, the filmmakers use material that is (essentially) state propaganda to not only undermine itself by way of its obviously one-sided nature, but also suggest the state coming apart as there are a few brief moments in Ceausescu's later years that are used that portray him in a less virile and commanding light. A thoroughly compelling three hours of linear archival stitching (though it seems there might have been two reels our of order as NC celebrates his 60th before his 55th). A second film using the archive against its master, noted by Daniel, is SCENES OF A CRIME, which presents as being about the interview/interrogation process, though is more importantly about the front end of a broken - and racist - justice system. As noted, the film leans heavily on footage the police taped of the ten hour (two session) interrogation, perhaps just over half the film is comprised of this material. In each of these instances, the film arguably could not have been made without the archival material, and in each case the archive is biting the hand that has fed it. A third instance that struck me in more of a cautionary way, not quite fitting the bite-the-hand model, was BETTER THIS WORLD. Here, the filmmakers have culled street camera recordings that were expressly installed to monitor citizens - using Homeland Security monies - to "protect" the area around the 2008 Republican National
Convention in St, Paul. The importance of these three films uses of these specific archives turns on issues of citizenship, state accountability and transparency, and proves the necessity of access to these archives.

Two other outliers on the theme that I experienced over the festival were PAGE ONE: INSIDE THE NEW YORK TIMES and HOT COFFEE. PAGE ONE touches on the theme as it addresses its tenuous relationship with Wikileaks, most significantly the release of the aircraft video of civilians and reporters being gunned down. HOT COFFEE plays the theme from the corporate angle by way of the paper trail left by McDonalds in both training manuals as well as compiled records. Clearly, access to these archives is essential to keep the state and corporations accountable to citizens and the public at-large. On access, during several of the conversations tied to the Prelinger Spotlight, the issue of economic access as a gatekeeping mechanism to archives was addressed - an issue that seems will be heavily in play in the years to come.

Chicago Doc Screenings, Week of April 22-28

An attempt to note all docs screening in town for the week, we'll see if I stick with the project.  Feel free to let me know of any mistakes and/or omissions. Probably not a bad idea to verify info before making your way there:

Week-long

POM WONDERFUL PRESENTS: THE GREATEST MOVIE EVER SOLD, Landmark
I AM, RiverEast 21
BORN TO BE WILD, Navy Pier IMAX
AFRICAN CATS, multiple venues

Multiple screenings
138 POUNDS IN MY POCKETS, Siskel, Fri, Mon
 INSIDE JOB, doc, Sat, Sun
INTO ETERNITY, Siskel, Sat, Tue, Wed

Single screenings

LUNCH LINE, Siskel, Fri 22, 6:00

On A Phantom Limb: New Films by Nancy Andrews, Chicago Filmmakers, Fri 22, 8:00

THE FORGOTTEN SPACE, Block, Sat 23, 3:00

MUCH ADO IN MOSTAR, Loyola/Sullivan Center, Sat 23, 4:30

URBAN ROOTS, Siskel, Sat 23, 5:00

KINOFIL, Loyola/Sullivan Center, Sat 23, 6:00

FRAGMENTS OF A LOST PALESTINE, Siskel, Sat 23, 6:15
Performance Post Appropriation: Exchange Screening Berlin & Chicago, Nightingale, Sat 23, 7:00

SAZ: THE PALESTINIAN RAPPER FOR CHANGE, Siskel, Sat 23, 8:00

w/ GHETTO TOWN

LUKOMIR SIX MONTHS OFF, Loyola/Sullivan Center, Sun 24, 2:00

            w/ THAT’S OUR CHILD;

            EXCEPTIONAL GENTLEMAN’S LEAGUE;

            RICOCHET

Films by Betzy Bromberg: Program 1, Experimental Film Society/Room 1307, Sun 24, 3:00
VANISHING OF THE BEES, Siskel, Sun 24, 3:00

THE DREAM JOB, Loyola/Sullivan Center, Sun 24, 4:00

YEARS EATEN BY THE LIONS, Loyola/Sullivan Center, Sun 24, 5:00

LITTLE TOWN OF BETHLEMHEM, Siskel, Sun 24, 5:15

Venus, aka Lover’s Rock [shorts program], Thalia Hall, Sun 24, 7:30

PLANEAT, Siskel, Mon 25, 6:00
Films by Betzy Bromberg: Program 2, Experimental Film Society/Room 1307, Tue 26, 4:00 

ANOTHER STATE OF MIND, Delilah’s, Tue 26, 7:00

ON COAL RIVER, siskel, Wed 27, 6:00

SACCO & VANZETTI, Haymarket Pub, Wed 27, 6:00

Portrait of Paris: ON THE ROOFS OF PARIS, and ALL-NIGHTER IN PARIS, Alliance

Francaise, Wed 27, 6:30

LAST TRAIN HOME, Beverly Arts Center, Wed 27, 7:00

BAG IT, Siskel, Th 24, 6:00

LUNCH LINE, block, Th 24, 6:30

A FILM UNFINISHED, doc, Th 28, 7:00, followed by roundtable on 4/30
PRISONER OF HER PAST, Chicago Tribune/Tribune Tower/Campbell Hall, Th 28, 8:00

Response to Nick Fraser's "Why Documentaries Matter"

Perhaps I am so much of a doc outsider that I don’t understand why folks have been fawning over Nick Fraser’s recent Guardian piece "Why Documentaries Matter", but I certainly don’t get it – the piece seems a bit reactionary and unimaginative. Perhaps this is because it is playing to a general audience that he wants to imagine a world without documentaries, though this seems a trite gimmick.

There seem to be two main emphases in the piece: first, that “documentaries are among the most valuable, neglected cultural forms of our times” and second, “will [quality] documentaries…be adequately funded in the squeeze on television budgets.”

The first point is obviously meant to set up the second. Docs are valuable, and if you don’t think so, it is because you are one of those neglecting/undervaluing them - you’d miss them if they were gone. Not the most compelling set-up, but I’d imagine he is also leaning heavily on the various British titles listed as popular (though I have no idea how they are consumed). It would seem that these first titles listed are playing to an anti-intellectual, or at least very broad audience – hey, don’t knock The Secret Millionaire or  “no body of theory exists to legitimise docs”. Huh? Is there a body of theory that anywhere legitimizes anything? Anyway, sure, no theory here, move along, feel safe with your doc.

But, of course, a funny thing happens halfway through the piece - in addressing the question of a documentary future with tightening television budgets, he presents the strawman of AA Gill’s suggestion that ‘anyone can do it with the cheap technology that is available.’ This seems to me a gimmick to instill fear in a future of amateurs running roughshod over documentary – we’ll save this discussion for another time. Suffice to say, Fraser here shifts from a very vernacular conception of docs as nature shows and reality programming to a film like – you guessed it – MAN ON WIRE, but also MARATHON BOY – it is these “low-budget, clever” documentaries “appealing to small, passionate audiences” that he seems to care about most.

And in all this huffing about turning noses up at reality programming and fearing budget cuts for (quality) documentary, what is lost is any real sense of the funding landscape. Sure, intuitively we know that public funding for documentary, and the arts in general, is in trouble – but wouldn’t it be cool to see some data on the trend? Further, there are the dozens of foundations that support the industry – what have their funding trends been? Fraser states that he’d “like to know how their independent spirit can be conserved and nurtured”, but this seems a rather empty thought shared. Not only in light of the lack of trending data, but in ignoring the two gorillas in the room: crowd-funding and Oprah. Not to mention that despite the suggestion that funding is drying up, (too) many have buzzed that this past year was the best ever for documentary.

Though I’d also love to see greater public support for the arts, it seems that documentary, at least, will be fine.