Fave Short Films

Part of a trio of films that also includes ADAGIO and WINTER LIGHT, IN A SUMMER GARDEN "draws much of its power from the way it is constructed and the ways it deals with images... [T]he camera pans and pauses, almost passively looks at the fields of flowers, and then plunges through them, carrying us through space." - Robert Haller

As a visual narrative 66 scener fra America is reminiscent of a pile of postcards from a journey, which indeed is what the film is. It consists of a series of lengthy shots of a tableau nature, each appearing to be a more or less random cross section of American reality, but which in total invoke a highly emblematic picture of the USA. With the one travelling shot (through a car windscreen) and one pan (across a landscape) the tableau principle is only breached on two occasions; exceptions that prove the rule, so to speak. The images or postcards may be viewed as a number of interlaced chains of motifs, varying from ultra close up to super wide, include pictures of landscapes, highways and advertising hoardings, buildings seen from without, mostly with a fluttering Stars and Stripes somewhere in the shot, objects such as coins on a counter, refrigerator with a number of typical food products, a plate of food at a diner or a bottle of Wild Turkey, and finally, people who introduce themselves (and sometimes the content of their lives in rough-hewn form) facing the camera: for example, the New York cabbie or the celebrities Kim Larsen and Andy Warhol. The film actually consists of 75 shots but in some cases several shots combine in one scene, thus ending on sixty six. Each scene is delimited by the narrator; at the end of each shot he pins down the picture content, often by a simple indication of time or place, but in some cases more playfully, often shifting our perception in a surprising fashion. Similarly the sound close-ups in some scenes are intended to alter the viewer's immediate interpretation of the picture content, while the mood-creating or interpretive use of Erik Satie's Gnossiennes (No. 5) provides the final component of the film.

From the end of a night to dawn. An uninterrupted traveling shot. From Bastille to the Champs-Elysees, by way of the Boulevard des Italiens, Avenue de l'Opera, and Rue de Rivoli, a depopulated Paris offers itself to Marguerite Duras' mysterious and profound voice.

A 3 minute pan to the left.

One of two animation loops directed by Max Hattler, inspired by the work of French outsider artist Augustin Lesage (1876-1954). Based on Lesage's painting A Symbolic Composition of the Spiritual World from 1923.

The huge tar sands in Alberta are a potentially profitable resource, but the environmental impact could be heavy and long-term.

In December, 1941, using music by Stravinsky, this film provides a reaction to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. An egg is smashed by a hammer; red color with white and then blue dominates the frame. Blue paint runs; small bulbs float. The dark colors spread. White, red, blue, and black dominate the frame. Then comes fire. The bulbs burn and break. A broken bulb's filaments are exposed.

Snippets from discarded footage, and with footage shot on the streets of Montreal and New York City, combined to a collage with the underlying argument as to whether man is a complex machine or a creature with a soul.

An experimental film with various flashing lights, colors, and World War II footage. This is part of the Song series by Stan Brakhage.

An experimental film by Stan Brakhage combining light, color, and various footage.

A meadow, a lake, the silhouette of a hill, trees. 21 days of the same view in Saarland. 21 days with five different cut-outs in a mask before the camera, which finally reveals a complete panorama. The landscape changes with the advancing seasons and becomes slowly delirious in its technical alienation. (Claus Philipp)

A group of boys spend their day outdoors exploring, wreaking havoc and letting their imaginations run wild.

The first all-animated film in history, a series of scenes without much narrative structure, but morphing into each other.

A television star goes home to Texas for her father's funeral and spends time with her mother for the first time in five years. Reminiscing about her childhood allows the daughter to work through lifelong resentments and to forgive her mother.

From the front of a cable car, a motion picture camera records a trip down Market Street, San Francisco, California, from a point between 8th & 9th Streets, Eastward to the cable car turnaround at the Ferry Building.

Drawn in pastels, and scored with jazzy music, fantastical plant-like things "grow" from the ground, launching five spheres in to space to create even more fantastical scenes.

The Sun and the Moon is stolen by a vicious creature. Can the humans get back, what they need for their life?

Official music video for "Take on Me" by A-Ha.

An anonymous narrator outlines a bizarre journey taken through "H", aided by a series of extraordinary maps, and his previous dealings with the mysterious Tulse Luper and the keeper of the bird house at the Amsterdam Zoo.

The animated story of a leader and innovator who is undone by the distorted actions of the followers.

An abstract arctic exploration of the icebergs capturing variations of light and color before they melt into oblivion. Continues the conversation that Stan Brakhage's photographed film Creation began with Frederic Church's painting Icebergs.

Short colour animated film showing shapes moving and set to a musical score. The shapes are coloured and primarily geometric in nature.

Mental imagery of music is visualized with two-dimensional shapes dancing to the rhythm of Franz Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2.