Category Archives: Avant-Garde Film

It Came From Kuchar: Underground Film Documentary

by Cimaxion

Mike Everleth at Bad Lit: The Journal of Underground Film, has posted this fascinating documentary about legendary filmmakers George and Mike Kuchar. They’ve been making films separately and together for over 50 years. Don’t be misled by the term underground. These are simply wonderful and exuberant filmmakers who work in their own way and make films exactly the way they want to make them. Their enthusiasm for film, from totally independent low-budget to full-blown Hollywood spectacular, is infectious and should inspire any young filmmaker to follow his or her own muse and make what they really, deeply, necessarily want to make.  You can find out a lot more by reading the Bad Lit article about the documentary.

By the way, Bad Lit is in fact the most infectiously enthralling film site you will read for a long time. Go there!

Yellow Plastic Raygun Wins Best Experimental Film Award at Downtown Film Festival Los Angeles

by Cimaxion | 1 Comment

Well I’m just very pleased about this.  The Downtown Film Festival Los Angeles has given my film, Yellow Plastic Raygun, the award for Best Experimental Film.  I was having quite a nice week attending various parties and screenings at the festival.  Its use of multiple locations in the heart of downtown Los Angeles gives one a real sense of taking part in the life of the city and being involved with something that’s helping to foster the exploding art and film scene in downtown.  Most of the short films were screened in the new Civic Center Theater at the intersection of First and Main Streets, in the shadow of the famous City Hall tower that has appeared in so many crime shows and film noir classics.  I attended the screening of my own film this past Saturday evening and was amazed at seeing it large since I had put so much work into it on small monitors.  What’s great about the Downtown Film Festival is that it shows a wide range of filmmaking styles, crew sizes and budgets.  They show films made with lots of production resources right alongside films made by individual artists working with inexpensive HD cameras and even cell phone cameras.  I am very proud to have won this and I look forward to more great festivals in downtown Los Angeles from the people who put this together.

Kenneth Anger Makes a New Film for Missoni Fashion House

by Editor

The great American filmmaker, Kenneth Anger, has made a new film called Missoni. He shot it for the Italian fashion house Missoni as part of their Fall 2010 advertising campaign.  The film includes members of the Missoni family engaged in dance-like movement and poses. Can advertising be art? Yes, when it’s done by an artist.

Anger has made another beautiful and mysteriously layered film. Apparently, he has gone digital, using something called a RED digital camera. It has some characteristics in common with 35mm cameras. Anger appears to be using it as freely as he used 16mm cameras.

What’s really interesting about this whole project is its reason for existing.  I think the Missoni advertising angle is just an excuse.  I think they just wanted to be in a film by Kenneth Anger.