Category Archives: historical

Lucy Mills – Simply British

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Simply British (2013, 77MB, 4:03 min)

Hi Lucy,
I think it’s really good. Who did the Hard Day’s Night remix?
I really like the way it is clearly a powerful comment on lots of things to do with the contrast between Britishness & flag waving and national hubris &c. and the actual situation for many people, but it’s never simply a piece of agit-prop.
At first I thought its slowness in unfolding might be a problem but I like the way it makes us take the time to think, with the various repeated images (like the bus with the slogan on it) but also with different material developing against the background you establish, especially the ever present and heartbreaking Big Issue guy – it turns out to be slow burning as opposed to slow. I also like the 90 degree rotation of some of the stuff and the way that then fits rather nicely into empty-ish spaces in the other “channel”. Great work – congratulations!
michael

Locusts

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Emergence – Locusts (2008, 233.8MB, 11:19)

From celebrated MC Invincible, a docu-music-video
about the history of gentrification and capitalism’s
destruction of communities in Detroit.
Video features several local activists, including
Grace Lee Boggs and (full disclosure) my good friend
Ron Scott.
This intense collaboration gives me chills every
time I watch it.
I’ll let the rest speak for itself.

Kino Da!

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kino
Kino Da! (1981, 5.6 MB,1:42 min )

Kino Da! , a wonderful portrait of the poet and communist Jack Hirschman
by the American experimental filmmaker Henry Hills is just one of the Hills films
that can be viewed at . More about Hills and his work see – henryhills.com

PS There is a marvellous DVD of Hill’s work now available. I have a copy and I
unreservedly recommend it. I come back to it time and time again.

David Askevold – Nova Scotia Fires

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Nova Scotia Fires
Nova Scotia Fires (1969, 5MB, 3:00 min)

I hadn’t, to my shame, heard of the late David Askevold until the Camden Arts Centre
put on a beautifully put together and gripping retrospective last year.
Here’s one of the pieces on show then. It’s not particularly great quality plus
it’s in a tiny window but it does conjure (perhaps an appropriately Askevoldian
choice of word) something of the impact -witty, smart and otherwordly – of his work.

* and there’s a good review of that here.

5 Lumières

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Me and Pop
Me and Pop (2004, 3.88MB, 1:00min)

Maker’s site


Sleeping
Sleeping (2007, 2.34MB, 57 secs)

Maker’s site

gallo
Gallo (2007, 5.17MB, 55 secs)

Maker’s site

slugs
Dance of Death (2007, 5.53MB, 1:00 min)

Maker’s site

A Week
A Week’s Worth (2007, 4.93MB, 1:00 min)

Maker’s site

The rules for Lumière videos are as follows:

* 60 seconds max.
* Fixed camera
* No audio
* No zoom
* No edit
* No effects

In the spirit of the Lumière brothers and comparable in some ways to Dogme 95,
the Lumière video project emerged from a documentary perspective,
as Auguste and Louis Lumière blazed the trail in this genre.
In the tradition of the the cinematographe, the first movie camera,
which was arguably used and possibly built by the brothers, all
21st C Lumiere videos should be made only using features available in
camera (ie, no external editing, including bumpers and titles, should
be included).
Lumière videos hope to expand upon the ways that online video allows for
the advancement of personal narratives by capturing the everyday, and sometimes
unexpected, within a specific framework of constraints, less conflicted by sometimes
unnecessary editing.

See all Lumière videos.