?O, Zoo! (The Making of a Fiction Film) is ostensibly about the making of Peter Greenaway’s feature film, A Zed and Two Noughts, the production of which Phil Hoffman was invited to the Netherlands to observe. However, Hoffman’s film actually concerns the terms and conditions under which it was itself made. In part, the film translates actuality and memory into invention and fiction in which the symbolic father is cast as a real ancestor. Hoffman rewrites the Canadian documentary tradition into a family memory and romance.
rarefilmm | The Cave of Forgotten Films Posts
Passing Through/Torn Formations is a wide open ramble through the labyrinth of memory… The film deals with the life and history of Philip Hoffman’s Czech-born mother and her family, as presented as a kind of polyphonic recitation of words, of images and of sounds.
This film celebrates the life and work of one of Cornwall’s best-loved artists, Alfred Wallis (1855-1942). We’re invited to look afresh at his paintings in light of the land and seascapes that inspired him. Reminiscences by friends and relatives are the focus rather than appraisal of his work by an authoritative art critic – aptly enough for an artist who worked outside the ‘establishment’.
The rugged world of those who built the Alaskan pipeline provides the backdrop for this drama featuring the non-singing film debut of soul-singer Gladys Knight (she and her Pips do sing on the soundtrack though). The story centers on her attempts to regain the love of her estranged husband who works up there. She goes to the wild, wooly town where he is based. There women are hard to find, and those who are there make big bucks selling themselves to lonely workers. Knight is a pretty woman so it doesn’t take long for the man who runs the town to try and convince her into becoming a high–priced prostitute.
Originating from the filmmaker’s childhood confusion over an English expression regarding sex, Marie Paccou’s 1998 animation is the absurd, yet emotive tale of a woman who wakes one day to find a small man growing out of her abdomen. Telling her surreal story through sketchy black-and-white animation, complemented by a philosophical voiceover, at the center of Un Jour is a thought-provoking metaphor that is bound to provoke many different readings.
Through a meaningful hail of bullets, flying glass and bloodshed, this animated film poses many profound questions about watching and responding to TV violence. Its images and sounds are disturbing and provocative, forcing viewers to examine what, why and how they watch TV, and to examine the effects of television violence on themselves and others.
The life story of the famed rocket scientist Dr. Werner von Braun, one of the most brilliant and controversial figures of the space age. Dr. von Braun helped pioneer man’s adventure into space through his rocket experiments; his was the brain behind the V-2 rockets which blasted London in World War II; his was also the brain which led America into the development and the launching of space satellites.
A young orphan who lives with her grandmother in a large Virginian home infatuates herself with the voices of Joan d’Arc. Her nanny seeks out the help of a rich suitor (David Lynch’s first real acting role) to take her and the orphan away when she realizes that the often cruel grandmother cannot offer the orphan the love that she needs.