SEP 11 12 SAT 4 PM, SUN 4 PM
GUILD THEATRE
ZOE BELOFF: PSYCHIC PROJECTIONS—
3D FILM PERFORMANCES
US 2004
New York-based film and media artists Zoe Beloff uses both digital and archaic film trickery to conjure up phantasmagorical worlds where mediums conjure up spirits, calling shadowy beings into reality. Drawing from cinema history, psychoanalytical studies and 19th century acounts of séances and medium, Beloff’s multimedia works create a dialogue between technology, history and the unconscious. Beloff presents two different programs of work—the first features SHADOW LAND or LIGHT FROM THE OTHER SIDE and LOST. SHADOW LAND is a stereoscopic, 16mm film drawn frm the 1897 autobiography of Elizabeth d’Espérance, a materializing medium who could produce full body apparitions. LOST is a piece for stereo 35mm slides, hand-cranked 16mm -projection and phonograph that recreates forgotten spaces from New York’s Lower East Side. For the second program, Beloff’s presents CLAIRE AND DON IN SLUMBERLAND, a combination of 3D slides and 16mm projection. Set against the empty, quiet background of Pleasure Beach, Connecticut, the characters act as conduits for the voices of the past and the fears and axieties of the surrounding culture. (90 mins.) Discussion with the artists to follow screenings.

SEP 16 THU 7 PM
GUILD THEATRE
JOANIE 4 JACKIE
DIRECTORS: VARIOUS Joanie 4 Jackie is an independent distribution network and archive for women who make movies. It was started in Portland in 1995 by performing artist and moviemaker Miranda July. In 2004 July handed Joanie 4 Jackie over the the Bard College Film Department where a rotating group of students and faculty are dedicated to keeping it alive and kicking. This is how it works: every woman who sends her movie to J4J receives a Chainletter tape her movie it. Each Chainletter is a random compilation of 10 movies by 10 women from all over the world, who’ve sent their movies to J4J. Joanie 4 Jackie is currently screening and distributing more than 100 movies—and receives more every day. This program is a best-of sampler, a taste-test, a few shining stars for hungry eyes and starving minds. Come and see what a 15-year-old girl from Louisiana or a 34-year-old mom from Wisconsin has to say. We think it’s more interesting than whatever next big thing is playing the multiplexes or on TV. Joanie and Jackie is forever. (90 mins.)

SEP 17 18 FRI 7 & 9:15 PM, SAT 8 PM
GUILD THEATRE
COWARDS BEND THE KNEE
CANADA 2003
DIRECTOR: GUY MADDIN Maddin’s signature homages to silent cinema (THE SADDEST MUSIC IN THE WORLD, CAREFUL, DRACULA, PAGES FROM A VIRGIN’S DIARY) take a twisted, faux-autobiographical turn in this roiling, sexually perverse melodrama about entrapment, obsession, love and revenge. First presented as a 10-part peep show installation at the Rotterdam Film Festival, Maddin has fashioned his lurid vignettes into a delirious, voyeuristic minifeature, in which he, casting himself (played by Darcy Fehr) as a lascivious hockey player, falls under the spell of irrantional motherand daughter femmes fatales. Set in their hair salon/brother/abortion clinic accessorized with two-way mirrors, Maddin’s naughty titallating visions disturbingly roam in a world somewhere between (and perhaps beyond) DR. MABUSE and BLUE VELVET, providing, according to Maddin, “a lovingly self-loathing peek at myself, but only as I would have enough courage to look through a cracked glass made foggy by hairspray.” Yes, this is one to miss, or not to miss. (60 mins.)
WITH
HEART OF THE WORLD
CANADA 2000
DIRECTOR: GUY MADDIN
In Maddin’s brilliant, breathless parody of silent Soviet propaganda films two brothers are in love with the same woman while a scientist discovers that the world is at serious risk of death by heart failure.
(6 mins.)
AND
THE PHANTOM MUSEUM
UK 2003
DIRECTORS: THE BROTHERS QUAY A surreal inventory of medical technology from the past and the unnerving and eternal geometric precision of architecture. (13 mins.)

SEP 18 SAT 4 PM
GUILD THEATRE
JANIE GEISER: EMOTIONAL LIVES OF INANIMATE OBJECTS
US 1997–2004
DIRECTOR: JANIE GEISER Set in the intimate spaces of dollhouses with antique figurines and paper cutouts, Janie Geiser’s films create mysterious “noir-ish” worlds of cryptic narratives, nostalgia, and half-remembered dreams. Drawing upon personal narratives and histories, their loose stories rarely provide us the dtails of what is happening—rather Geiser uses these miniature worlds to evoke emotional currents played out through archetypal “characters.” While these worlds that she creates are often blatantly artificial, her images are exquisitely composed, with perfectly layered superimpositions, subtle lighting and dense spaces. Geiser introduces the program and presents a selection of work from the past several years, including SPIRAL VESSEL, LOST MOTION, THE FOURTH WATCH, ULTIMA THULE, as well as her brand new film TERRACE 49. (90 mins.)

SEP 19 SUN 4 PM
GUILD THEATRE
LEWIS KLAHR: ENGRAM SEPALS
(MELODRAMAS 1994–2000)
US 1994/2000
DIRECTOR: LEWIS KLAHR Dubbed “the reigning proponent of cut and paste animation,” by J. Hoberman in the VILLAGE VOICE, Lewis Klahr is often placed in the pantheon of collage filmmakers such as Harry Smith, Larry Jordan, and Stan Vanderbeek. But Klahr’s films are much more closely influenced by his affinity for classic Hollywood, specifically the melodramas of Douglas Sirk and Vincente Minnelli. Klahr presents his feature length series ENGRAM SEPALS, which “traces a trajectory of American intoxication—both sexually and substance-wise—from World War II into the ‘70s.” Primarily composed of cutouts from old magazines and comics, his films occupy a flat space enlivened through Klahr’s mysterious and seductive stories. With this extensive vocabulary of appropriated imagery and characters, Klahr’s films lead the viewer through a rich and dense cloud of pop culture dreams. (80 mins.)