Oscar Fischinger, Space Light Art

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I just saw this multi-screen film installation today at the Whitney, and it's an amazing 1920s precursor to the Expanded Cinema practices we will be examining tomorrow. &nbsp;I highly recommend checking it out.<br />
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<a href="http://whitney.org/Exhibitions/OskarFischinger">http://whitney.org/Exhibitions/OskarFischinger</a>

Hitchcock in 3D

The great American auteur saw much potential in 3D film technologies.  Now at Film Forum you can see a restored version of his 3D classic Dial M for Murder.

Starts tomorrow, goes to Oct 4. Info here: http://www.filmforum.org/movies/more/dial_m_for_murder

Simulacral Democracy

One theorist that keeps coming up in our readings is Baudrillaud.  His readings of the "simulacra" of postmodern experience are digested and put into crash course form here: http://www.cla.purdue.edu/english/theory/postmodernism/modules/baudrillardsimulation.html

A recent story of democracy advocates in Burma watching episodes of the West Wing to learn about democracy seems a rather interesting point of discussion in this light.  Can real lessons be gleaned from an entertainment commodity?  There are also issues of access to information and materials in repressive regimes.  More on this here:

http://blogs.wsj.com/searealtime/2012/09/20/previously-on-the-west-wing-democracy-101-for-myanmar/

For those of you who are too young to have watched the show, it's the reason for the endless walk-and-talk scenes in shows like House.

TED Talk on Memory and Video Art

Very interesting piece shared by Alexis.  Check it out here:

Architects rethink urban movie theaters

Here's an interesting article I came across from Architect Magazine.

http://www.architectmagazine.com/design/coming-attractions.aspx

Contemporary Art's play with cinematic time: Christian Marclay's The Clock and Douglas Gordon's 24 Hr Psycho

This piece (which played in New York over the summer) is a really interesting investigation of both new disjointed forms of cinematic spectatorship (re-cuts, mash-ups, supercuts) and the kinds of temporal issues that come up in Friedberg.  The whole film is 24 hours long and is projected in real time (i.e. if you go at midnight, all the scenes take place then, if you go at 8:10, all the clips mention 8:10, etc.).

More on the piece here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/filmblog/2011/apr/07/christian-marclay-the-clock




Douglas Gordon's piece is much harder (well, impossible) to sit and watch!  It has been in many galleries (I've seen it twice), but I've come across one screening that's particularly interesting to our class here: http://www.cbc.ca/news/tiff2010/2010/09/douglas-gordons-stunning-24-hour-psycho-update-screens-at-tiffs-lightbox.html

Major films to help us understand film theory

Man with a Movie Camera (1929)

Major Soviet Avant-Garde film that re-imagines the city film (a common silent documentary film in the 1920s).  This film, following the lead of Russian Constructivism and Productivism, continually reminds the viewer of the process of its making and exhibition - precisely what Baudry and Mulvey see as the concealment that's so problematic in narrative film.  Baudry explicitly mentions one clip that pull us out of the diegesis and to the materiality of the film.  It starts around 22 minutes (and goes for around 5 minutes after that).  I recommend this entire film, though!




There are also some great parts of Grindhouse, the Robert Rodriguez/Quentin Tarantino double-feature of Planet Terror and Deathproof that do this in order to re-create the lost exhibition venues their films harken back to.

Peeping Tom (1960)

One of the first real slasher flicks of postwar British film, this movie follows a psychopathic serial killer/photographer/filmmaker who is in search for the ultimate face of fear.  The opening credits are a great parallel to the scopophilic and voyeuristic drives Mulvey discusses in her feminist analysis.  The opening scene is below, but I recommend watching the entire film - it keeps you on the edge of your seat and does some fantastic things with sound later on (in addition to a very climactic ending).




I also recommend Hitchcock's Rear Window for its play on voyeurism and immobility.

Lacan 101

Excellent breakdown of some of the main concepts of Lacan's psychoanalysis, which I will be introducing to you in class.  Good resource if you choose Baudry or Mulvey for your critical response essay.

http://www.cla.purdue.edu/english/theory/psychoanalysis/lacandevelop.html

http://www.cla.purdue.edu/english/theory/psychoanalysis/lacanstructure.html

Underground Advertising/Restaurant Surveillance

Multiscreen advertising for a new show about using screens,  Restaurant Stakeout, at the Herald Square subway station.  The whole walkway was plastered with print ads, making this more dynamic display (which seems to address the passersby directly) a culmination of the entire adscape.

Video here:

Posting now available!

Everyone registered for the class has now been invited to be an author on the blog, so let's start sharing info!

Alternative screening venues

Nice list of some alternative screening sites from Monica.

http://beersandbeans.com/2012/07/04/world-cinema-must-see-screens-around-the-globe/

Eclipse: Jonah Bokaer and Anthony McCall at BAM

Anthony McCall, who we will be looking at a lot during our studies of Expanded Cinema and Installation Art, will be at Brooklyn Academy of Music starting tomorrow night for a collaborative piece with choreographer Jonah Bokaer.  Tickets are $20.



http://www.bam.org/eclipse