Re: more Perfect Films

From: andrew lampert (email suppressed)
Date: Tue Jul 29 2008 - 10:13:30 PDT


Hey Mark

Thanks for mentioning BENETTON, although I'm not entirely sure that this particular title or the many other films in that series are really perfect films. I do edit them quite a bit, and always use ugly tape splices so that the edits will be really visible. The original footage that I've been working from for the last few years is 2 1/2 hours long and so far there are 13-14 pieces in the BENETTON series. Of these, I'd say that only one of the films is "perfect", meaning unaltered, as found. In any case, I'm continually returing to to this huge body of footage to make a lot of different pieces with the eventiual goal to use all the raw material for I dunno how many pieces, still a lot left to go....

The cinemascope trailer piece is called, by me at least, HEAD/TAIL, however FEVER seems to be the title of the film they are talking about (starring Ronda Jo Petty). It, like 98% of the other films included in the Unessential Cinema series, is probably a perfect film. In fact, nearly all these films are as perfect as the day they were tossed by labs, dumped by widows or discovered on doorsteps. If we are talking about anonymously/mysteriously produced perfect films then I can make a massive list of them....

Bradley Eros does a wonderful piece with an 8mm print of THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING MAN that he projects into a doll house. I think this counts. Speaking of J. Liotta, she has a great and perhaps perfect film of Lil' Jeanne that she has shown on occassion (a found home movie of a doppelganger). Come to think of it my piece FOR PLASTIC MAN is kind of a perfect film in that it uses one reel of footage that is very tweaked during projection. The list could keep growing and growing....

Best,
A.

----- Original Message ----
From: Mark Toscano <email suppressed>
To: email suppressed
Sent: Tuesday, July 29, 2008 2:52:41 AM
Subject: more Perfect Films

Owen Land's 'This Film Will Be Interrupted After 11 Minutes By A Commercial' incorporated a found commercial at its end (according to the Two Films By... book, on a separate reel to be threaded up following the initial 11-minute film)

Also, his Film In Which There Appear... sort of works as a found object, though he did have the lab loop it. And What's Wrong With This Picture part 1 is probably relevant here too.

Bruce Conner's legendary 'countdown leader' film. Wasn't it just 30+ minutes of countdown? This may have only been shown once, not sure...

The Color of Love by Peggy Ahwesh.

James Otis's film We and I is a found object, and a damn good find it is.

Dark Dark by Abigail Child has, I'm told one or two minor edits, but is otherwise presented as-found, albeit with added music.

Morgan Fisher has a great film called The Wilkinson Household Fire Alarm, which is a sort of "found made film" or a "made found film" or... and related to Myron's comments on Morgan's work, some of his films would qualify in that vein, such as Screening Room, which is site-specific, and several states of which have been shot by people other than Morgan. Phi Phenomenon also qualifies, as a film that was in many ways "made" as soon as it was conceived. Same with his installation, Passing Time.

Andy Lampert screened a track negative for a porno trailer in Cinemascope once, and that was pretty amazing. Andy, what about Benetton? Does that qualify?

Bill Jones's recent and controversial Tearoom.

Carolyn Faber has a piece which is a found 16mm film which had alternating frames of checkwriters and their checks, a grocery store security camera film made in the '70s maybe.

Stan Brakhage's film Gift, which was blown up from a found Super 8 film. His Two Found Objects of Charles Boultenhouse may also qualify, as they were unfinished (?) works of CB that Stan had printed and released.

One or more works by Yervant Gianikian and Angel Ricci Lucchi may qualify, or at least be worth discussing. From the Pole to the Equator is the main one I'm thinking of...

How about the idea of found video in the (ridiculous but I think still valid) sense of the 'Star Wars kid' and stuff like that? Different impulse there for the finder, but perhaps interesting?

Dominic Angerame made a film called Pixiescope, in which a roll of film he had shot around SF was returned with someone else's footage superimposed over it. He released it as-is (correct me if I'm wrong, DA). He also has a quite disturbing and powerful recent piece called Anaconda Targets which is a found video.

I believe some of Luis Recoder's pieces have involved found leaders and other cinematic detritus.

Paul Sharits refers to Bad Burns as a "made 'found object'".

Chick Strand's amazing film Loose Ends uses a big, unadulterated chunk of an educational film somewhere in its middle.

Phil Solomon's Snowman was originally a found object, though he of course optically printed it and edited it.

Some of Dean Snider's films - especially the 35mm ones - are sort of modified found objects.

Doesn't Ken's Star Spangled to Death have big chunks of unedited TV? Haven't seen it yet, that's just what I've heard.

OK, that's all I can think of for now...

mark t

--- On Mon, 7/28/08, Thomas Beard <email suppressed> wrote:

> From: Thomas Beard <email suppressed>
> Subject: [FRAMEWORKS] Perfect Films
> To: email suppressed
> Date: Monday, July 28, 2008, 6:54 AM
> Hello Frameworkians,
>
> I'm finishing up some research right now on ready-mades
> in experimental
> cinema--works like Ken Jacobs's Perfect Film, Hollis
> Frampton's Work and
> Days, Brian Frye's Anatomy of Melancholy, etc.--and
> wanted to check in with
> the list for suggestions about related films.
>
> Best,
> Thomas
>
>
> __________________________________________________________________
> For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at
> <email suppressed>.

      

__________________________________________________________________
For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.

__________________________________________________________________
For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.