Social & External
The people behind it
Bella Bauer
A ritual of grids, reflections and chasms; a complete state of entropy; a space that devours itself; a vertigo that destroys the gravity of the Earth; a trap that captures us inside the voids of the screen of light: «That blank arena wherein converge at once the hundred spaces» (Hollis Frampton).
In one of those wonderful coincidences of history, lumière, the French word for “light,” was also the last name of brothers Auguste and Louis, whose brilliant invention, the cinematograph, helped to inaugurate the most beloved art form of the last 130 years. Institute Lumière director Thierry Frémaux uses Lumière, Le Cinema! to guide the viewer through over a hundred shorts—some famous, some forgotten, some never before seen—directed by Lumière and company. In the process, Frémaux illuminates how the brothers employed the camera as a creative instrument as they (and their operators) mastered framing, staging, and subject selection for quotidian and exotic microdocumentaries as well as the first ever fictional motion pictures. The result is not only a glorious re(telling) of the genesis of cinema but a profound meditation on the beautiful world captured—and the mysterious world imagined—by the Lumières.
The horses in Denys Colomb Daunant’s dream poem are the white beasts of the marshlands of the Camargue in South West France. Daunant was haunted by these creatures. His obsession was first visualized when he wrote the autobiographical script for Albert Lamorisse’s award-winning 1953 film White Mane. In this short the beauty of the horses is captured with a variety of film techniques and by Jacques Lasry’s beautiful electronic score.
A study of observations around the ancient monument of the temple of Augustus and Livia and to cities of Vienne, Chonas-l'Amballan and Saint-Prim. Firstly proposed as a sort of ghost hunting, the project seems to focus on a world of figures, the whispers of the roads, diegetic/non-diegetic sounds and a camera that tries to investigate under fragments of logic and articulating cuts.
A small exploration in the cemetery from the township of Sainte-Colombe throught a focus into the light, graveyards, flaggings and funerary plaques.
Then, now, where? how?
Twenty-four images of a camera running in the woods, a moonlight and a cemetery through improvised gestures, mechanical abstraction and saturated colors
Made with virtually no budget during COVID-19 quarantine in 2020, IRANIAN LIVES MATTER abstractly recounts the true story of what occurred in Iran during the November 2019 protests, sparked by a surprise hike in gasoline prices, which quickly spread across the entire nation and was subsequently crushed by the dictator's iron fist, resulting in the death of approximately 1500 protesters, as reported by Reuters. IRANIAN LIVES MATTER is an experimental documentary, an audio-visual endurance test that audibly takes its audience through the chaos in the streets of Iran as the brutal regime cracks down on Iranian protesters, while visually showing the hands of the dictatorship as it crosses out 1500 lives one by one to further emphasize the scale of the massacre and show to a world desensitized to news of mass killings in the Middle East what the term "1500 dead" truly means.
American cartoons are the starting point for Martin Arnold's new work. Sequences of short films form the basis of a process of fragmentation, deconstruction, dismantling and repetition. Arnold uses fun, family entertainment to create films with open-ended possibilities for association. His pieces, such as Hydra (2013), Charon (2013), Nix (2013) and Self Control (2011), feature characters whose anatomy is no longer recognizable as such, but rather resemble puppets, remotely controlled from the outside. Trembling hands, dancing tongues, blinking eyes and snoring mouths move like ghosts against an abyss-like deep black background, in which bodily elements constantly disappear, only to reappear once more.
Memory is a collaboration with musician Noah Lennox (Panda Bear), exploring the relationship between a musician and filmmaker and their personal reflection on memories. From Super 8 home movies and entirely handmade, this film explores familiar memories, the present moment combined with past experiences and how it all seems to evade from our present memory.
Experimental mash-up of circus and sideshow footage.
You go to hell, and it's Jacksonville.
A theoretical exercise can stem from a physical one: using the camera as if it was the vibrating device placed on the olive trees for the harvest of its fruit, the final result is a series of original and intriguing images. The camera shakes, gets in and out of focus, and we don’t exactly know what is happening. At first this is a strange disorientation, but then you get used to it through the cyclical mechanical noise that joins the images. The words of a peaceful female voice allows you to frame the film: a visual exercise after all can also be free.
Inspired by Lois Patiño's short movies project called "Paisaje-Duración" (Duration-Landscape) and Hiroshi Sugimoto's photo series "Seascapes", "Duração-Diferença" (Duration-Difference) reveals the difference through duration, through time; this short experimental movie seeks to capture, as Patiño and Sugimoto achived, the immanence as the entrance for something more - or something in between.
In 1999, 11-year-old Nisha Platzer lost her older brother, Josh, to suicide. Twenty years later, her search for a specialized medical treatment leads her to the door of someone who was once exceptionally close to Josh. And so it is that she finally has the chance to truly know her brother through his chosen family. Captured over five years in which synchronicities continually manifested, Platzer’s documentation of these encounters gently asserts that both grieving and healing are meant to be communal experiences.
Light Pharmacy: 4.1 is part of a series of 'film haiku' concerned primarily with the reflection and refraction of sunlight, and dream representation.---AGN "A surreal fantasy - almost a homage to Maya Deren. Nigrin has a fine feeling for imagery and pacing."---William Sloan, Museum of Modern Art, New York City, 1988.
A train moves through winter as a superimposed image of the same route in spring gradually emerges. Both moments coexist within a single frame, revealing two seasons happening at once.
Lupita Nyong'o narrates a documentary about Peanuts and its creator, Charles M. Schulz. Famous fans—including Drew Barrymore, Kevin Smith, and Al Roker—share its influence on them, and a new animated story finds Charlie Brown on a quest.
A unique cinematic experience that invites audiences on a vibrant journey through the life of cultural icon Pharrell Williams. Told through the lens of LEGO® animation, turn up the volume on your imagination and witness the evolution of one of music's most innovative minds.
A look behind the lens of Christopher Nolan's space epic.
SEDUCED AND ABANDONED combines acting legend Alec Baldwin with director James Toback as they lead us on a troublesome and often hilarious journey of raising financing for their next feature film. Moving from director to financier to star actor, the two players provide us with a unique look behind the curtain at the world's biggest and most glamourous film festival, shining a light on the bitter-sweet relationship filmmakers have with Cannes and the film business. Featuring insights from directors Martin Scorsese, 'Bernando Bertolucci' and Roman Polanski; actors Ryan Gosling and Jessica Chastain and a host of film distribution luminaries.
Explore the evolution of Buzz Lightyear from toy to human in the making of Pixar’s Lightyear. Dive into the origin and cultural impact of everyone’s favorite Space Ranger, the art of designing a new “human Buzz,” and the challenges faced by the Lightyear crew along the way.
A group of British children aged 7 from widely ranging backgrounds are interviewed about a range of subjects. The filmmakers plan to re-interview them at 7 year intervals to track how their lives and attitudes change as they age.
Capturing Avatar is a feature length behind-the-scenes documentary about the making of Avatar. It uses footage from the film's development, as well as stock footage from as far back as the production of Titanic in 1995. Also included are numerous interviews with cast, artists, and other crew members. The documentary was released as a bonus feature on the extended collector's edition of Avatar.
The Making-of James Cameron's Avatar. It shows interesting parts of the work on the set.
A documentary chronicling Queen and Lambert's incredible journey since they first shared the stage together on "American Idol" in 2009.
Daniel Craig candidly reflects on his 15 year adventure as James Bond. Including never-before-seen archival footage from Casino Royale to the upcoming 25th film No Time To Die, Craig shares his personal memories in conversation with 007 producers, Michael G Wilson and Barbara Broccoli.
Amber Heard and Nicole Kidman discuss their characters Mera and Atlanna.
A feature length documentary about the all-women team at the helm of Pixar's original feature, Turning Red. With unprecedented behind-the-scenes access to Director Domee Shi and her core leadership crew, this story shines a light on the powerful professional and personal journeys that brought this incredibly comical, utterly relatable, and deeply heartfelt story to the screen.
A documentary about the making of David Fincher's 2008 film THE CURIOUS CASE OF BENJAMIN BUTTON. Virtually every element in the evolution of the Fincher's film is documented here, from the project's attachment to numerous other directors during the 1990s, to its shoot in 2006 and 2007 in New Orleans, to its complex, CGI-intensive postproduction process.
Roddy McDowall takes you, film by film, from production meetings to make-up sessions, then right onto the movie set to see the actual filming of the science fiction masterpiece. The most comprehensive history of Planet of the Apes ever created, this fascinating 127-minute documentary explores one of the most imaginative and influential series in movie history.
Captured during Billie Eilish's sold-out world tour, a concert experience from one of the most celebrated and successful artists of her generation, presented in immersive 3D.
The film follows adventurer Jeff Johnson as he retraces the epic 1968 journey of his heroes Yvon Chouinard and Doug Tompkins to Patagonia.
Cast, crew and fans explore the "Back to the Future" time-travel trilogy's resonance throughout our culture, thirty years after Marty McFly went back in time.
An inside look at one of the most anticipated movie sequels ever with James Cameron and cast.
With mesmerizing footage and time lapses of animators at work, this behind-the-scenes special captures the artistry of a unique tale years in the making.
Combining archival footage with rotoscopic animation, Tower reveals the action-packed untold stories of the witnesses, heroes and survivors of America's first mass school shooting, when the worst in one man brought out the best in so many others.