Temple Cinematheque: David Holzman's Diary

This friday writer/actor/producer L.M. "Kit" Carson will come to discuss his role in the production of David Holzman's Diary, this week's Temple Cinemathèque film presentation. The documentary will be shown in 16mm

Friday, Febuary 17

3PM

Annenberg Hall, AH 3 (basement screening room)

13th and Norris

Temple University main campus

SCT Film Lab Coordinator Len Guercio will introduce the film as well as moderate a post-film Q&A.

In a career characterized by a diverse body of work and a singular independent filmmaking aesthetic, Carson will also discuss his latest documentary, Africa Diary, which will premiere this March on the Sundance Channel.

As before, the screening is free and open to all. However, seating is limited so please arrive early.

This Cinemathèque screening is made possible by support from Temple's FMA Department & faculty as well as the SCT Operations department.

Temple Cinematheque: City Documentaries

This Friday, Temple Cinematheque pairs two influential but often overlooked documentary shorts that aim to give a snapshot of a city subculture. Both will be screened in 16mm.

In the Street

(1948, US, James Agee, Helen Levitt, and Janice Loeb, 16m)

A silent short using hidden cameras to document Harlem street life in New York in the 1940s. The work continues photography Helen Levitt's interest in street photography, especially portraits of children, and Agee's interest in social documentation.

Momma Don't Allow

(1955, UK, Karel Reisz and Tony Richardson, 22m)
Pioneering documentary of the Free Cinema movement, documenting one evening at a North London jazz club in the 1950s. The film influenced the soon-to-emerge British New Wave, and both Reisz and Richardson went on to become key figures in that movement.

The program screens this Friday, April 22, at 3 PM in Annenberg Hall (Room 3), 13th and Norris St.

Temple Cinematheque: Experimental Shorts

The next screening in the Temple Cinematheque series will be a program of experimental shorts from the 1960s, 70s, and 80s. All of the titles will be screened in 16mm:

Styx

Director: Jan Krawitz

16mm, b/w, 10 minutes, 1976

Jan Krawitz has been making documentary films for 35 years. Her work has been exhibited and awarded at film festivals in the United States and abroad, among them: In Harm's Way, Mirror Mirror, Drive-In Blues, Little People, Cotton Candy and Elephant Stuff, Afterimage, and Styx. Her film Styx is in the permanent collection of The Museum of Modern Art in New York. She is a Professor in the Graduate Program in Documentary Film and Video at Stanford University. She has a B.A. from Cornell and a Master of Fine Arts in Film from Temple University.

"...it quickly establishes a tempo, a rhythm, and an almost symphonic kind of form that brings the everyday into a superbly balanced conjunction with the realm of the extraordinary suggested by the title..."
San Francisco Chronicle

Necrology

Director: Standish Lawder

16mm, b/w, 11 minutes, 1969

An underground classic, cited by Richard Linklater (SLACKER, A SCANNER DARKLY), as one of his favorite shorts, NECROLOGY is an anthropological film about life and death in New York City - a roll call of the recently deceased. Shot in Grand Central Station, director Standish Lawder, who is best known for his photography, captured 12 minutes of anonymous commuters in their daily routine. The finished film shows lines of people ascending and disappearing into a shadowy abyss with the haunting suggestion of people on their eventless way to hell. Lawder added a lengthy list of bogus credits to the end for a touch of morbid humour that leaves viewers to ponder their own fate.

"The film is one of the strongest and grimmest comments upon the contemporary society that cinema has produced." Jonas Mekas, The Village Voice


Life is a Bitch and Then You Die
Director: Nina Gilberti

16mm, b/w, 5 minutes, 1985

Re-editing film footage from Joris Ivens’ 1928 silent film, THE BRIDGE, Nina Gilberti added music and narration to create a completely new work that is different in mood and meaning from what Ivens’ intended. The individual shots have been re-assembled to work more closely with the narrative content. Flipping shots and screen direction, combined with rapid editing and a frenetic score, the filmmaker offers us a humorous glimpse into the narrator’s thoughts and feelings.

Last Movement of a New World Symphony

Director: Nikola Kulish

16mm, color, 11 minutes, 1974

Using the music from the last movement of Dvorak’s New World symphony as a foundation, Kulish directed this harried tale of a man on a seemingly desperate mission. With a montage that rises and subsides in conjunction with the protagonist’s energy and resolve, the film compels us to empathize with the hero until he confronts what ultimately awaits him.

The program screens this Friday, April 8, at 3 PM in Annenberg Hall (Room 3), 13th and Norris St.

Ed Halter at Temple

The Visiting Filmmakers series continues at Temple, with a speaker known more for his curatorial work. Ed Halter is curator of the New York Underground Film Festival and founder and director of Light Industry, a venus of film and electronic art in Brooklyn.

The event takes place tomorrow, Wednesday, March 23, and starts at 5:15 in Temple's Annenberg Hall (13th and Norris), room 3.

Temple Cinematheque: Trader Horn

Temple University Cinematheque Presents:

Trader Horn

1931, W.S. Van Dyke, 122m

Time: 3 PM, March 18, 2011
Location: Annenberg Hall (Room 3 - Basement), 13th and Norris St., Philadelphia, PA


"While on safari in an unexplored area of Africa, Trader Horn and Peru find missionary Edith Trent killed by natives. They decide to carry on her quest for her lost daughter Nina. They find her as the queen of a particularly savage tribe, and try to bring her back to civilization."

This pre-code era film is the first non-documentary shot in Africa and was nominated for an Academy Award (Best Picture) in 1931. Most of the crew contracted Malaria, including Director W.S. Van Dyke and actress Edwina Booth. An African crewman fell into a river and was eaten by a crocodile. Another was killed by a charging rhino (which was captured on film and used in the movie). The film will be shown on 16mm.

This screening is being programmed by Temple University Film & Media Arts ungraduate Katy Gronsbell.

Visiting Filmmaker: Kathryn Ramey

Fall (Kathryn Ramey, 2006)

As part of the Visiting Filmmaker Series sponsored by Temple's Film and Media Arts department, filmmaker Kathryn Ramey will be discussing her work, which uses experimental film techniques to address anthropological and socio-cultural research.

The event starts at 5:15 in Temple's Annenberg Hall (13th and Norris), room 3.

Temple Cinematheque: 60s/70s Animation

The next screening in the Temple Cinematheque series will be a program of Academy Award-winning animation shorts from the 1960s and 1970s. All of the titles will be screened in 16mm:

Pas de Deux (Norman McLaren, 1968, 13m)
Closed Mondays (Bob Gardiner and Will Vinton, 1974, 11m)
Special Delivery (Eunice Macauley and John Weldon, 1977, 7m)
Afterlife (Ishu Patel, 1978, 7min)
The Critic ( Ernest Pintoff, Mel Brooks and Bob Heath, 1963, 4m)
Frank Film (Frank and Caroline Mouris, 1973, 9m)

The program screens next Friday, February 18, at 3 PM in Annenberg Hall (Room 3), 13th and Norris St.

Sam Green at Temple

Weather permitting, this Wednesday evening (Feb. 2) documentary filmmaker Sam Green (The Weather Underground, Utopia in Four Movements) will be presenting and discussing his work at Temple University's Film and Media Arts department. The event starts at 5:15 in Temple's Annenberg Hall (13th and Norris), room 3.

This is the first in a series of visiting filmmakers, so stay tuned for future announcements.

Temple Cinematheque

Temple Cinematheque is beginning a semester of (mostly 16mm) Friday afternoon screenings. First up is a pair of Student Academy Award-winning documentary films made by students in Temple's Film and Media Arts (nee Radio Film and Television) program in the 1970s. The films screen this Friday, February 4th, at 3 PM in Annenberg Hall (Room 3), 13th and Norris St.

You See I've Had a Life

1972, B/W - a film by Ben Levin

- A 13-year-old boy does his best to live a normal life despite the fact that he has been diagnosed with leukemia.

Ben Levin was born in Joliet, Illinois. After attending the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York, he served in the United States Marine Band in Washington D.C. He then entered Temple University to pursue an MFA with an emphasis in documentary production -- the start of a 17-year relationship with that institution -- culminating in his directing the MFA program there for seven years. Levin is currently Film Professor at the University of North Texas

Through Adam's Eyes

1978, B/W - a film by Bob Saget

- A portrait of a young boy with a facial birth defect. Narrated by Adam, it deals with corrective surgery performed on him and his post--surgical social adjustment.


Bob Saget - TV actor, writer, director, and producer - was born in Philadelphia. His father, Benjamin, was a supermarket executive, and his mother, Rosalyn, was a hospital administrator. Saget lived in Norfolk, Virginia, and Encino, California, before moving back to Philadelphia and graduating from Abington Senior High School. Saget originally intended to become a doctor, but his Honors English teacher saw his creative potential and urged him to seek a career in films. He attended Temple University's film school, where he created Through Adam's Eyes, a black-and-white film about a boy who received reconstructive facial surgery, and was honored with an award of merit in the Student Academy Awards. He graduated with a B.A. in 1978.