Category Archives: USA

Abel Ferrara – 4:44 Last Day on Earth (2011)

By Anybody Posted in 2011-2020, Abel Ferrara, Drama, Sci-Fi, USA Leave a reply

Abel Ferrara 4:44 Last Day on Earth (2011)

logoimdbb Abel Ferrara 4:44 Last Day on Earth (2011)

4:44 is a look at how a painter and a successful actor spend their last day together before the world comes to an end.

Ferrara began shooting the film in April 2011 with his longtime cinematographer Ken Kelsch. 4:44 is Willem Dafoe’s third collaboration with Ferrara after 1998′s New Rose Hotel and his last feature film, 2007′s Go Go Tales. During Montclair State University’s film forum event in February 2011, Ferrara revealed that Ethan Hawke was slated to star originally. The film was shot in one location, an apartment, set during the course of the last 24 hours before the biblical apocalypse.

The film showed in competition at the 68th Venice International Film Festival in September 2011. It had a limited theatrical release on 25 March 2012. Continue reading →

James Benning – El Valley Centro (2000)

By Anybody Posted in 1991-2000, Documentary, Experimental, James Benning, USA Leave a reply

vlcsnap2013051420h58m18 James Benning El Valley Centro (2000)

logoimdbb James Benning El Valley Centro (2000)

Quote:
I began El Valley Centro in November of 1998; I was driving through the Great Central Valley looking for places to film. I wasn’t going to start shooting for at least six months; I wanted to just look and listen – to get to know the Valley well before I would make images. But almost immediately I came across an oil well fire with flames high into the sky. I returned home for my Bolex and Nagra. Determined that landscape is a function of time, I let a full roll of 16mm film (100 feet) run through the camera. At that moment I knew I would make a portrait of The Great Central Valley using 35 two and a half minute shots.

Nearing the completion of El Valley Centro, I began planning an urban companion piece, Los, that was to be a portrait of Los Angeles. It seemed logical, for the politics of water certainly run from the Valley to the City. Los would have the same structure as El Valley Centro and would look and listen with the same intensity. The two films would be connected with the last shot of El Valley Centro pumping water out of the Valley over Wheeler Ridge while the first shot of Los would show Mulholland’s first spillway (still in use) bringing water into LA.

James Benning, December 2001 Continue reading →

James Benning – Los (2001)

By Anybody Posted in 2001-2010, Documentary, Experimental, James Benning, USA Leave a reply

vlcsnap2013051521h19m29 James Benning Los (2001)

logoimdbb James Benning Los (2001)

Quote:
I began El Valley Centro in November of 1998; I was driving through the Great Central Valley looking for places to film. I wasn’t going to start shooting for at least six months; I wanted to just look and listen – to get to know the Valley well before I would make images. But almost immediately I came across an oil well fire with flames high into the sky. I returned home for my Bolex and Nagra. Determined that landscape is a function of time, I let a full roll of 16mm film (100 feet) run through the camera. At that moment I knew I would make a portrait of The Great Central Valley using 35 two and a half minute shots.

Nearing the completion of El Valley Centro, I began planning an urban companion piece, Los, that was to be a portrait of Los Angeles. It seemed logical, for the politics of water certainly run from the Valley to the City. Los would have the same structure as El Valley Centro and would look and listen with the same intensity. The two films would be connected with the last shot of El Valley Centro pumping water out of the Valley over Wheeler Ridge while the first shot of Los would show Mulholland’s first spillway (still in use) bringing water into LA.

James Benning, December 2001 Continue reading →

Gregg Araki – Nowhere (1997)

By Anybody Posted in 1991-2000, Drama, Gregg Araki, USA Leave a reply

Gregg Araki Nowhere (1997)

logoimdbb Gregg Araki Nowhere (1997)

Quote:
“Described by director Gregg Araki as “A Beverly Hills 90210 episode on acid” (with no suggestions of what it might be cut with), Nowhere is a companion piece with Araki’s previous meditations on youth gone wild in the 1990s, Totally F***ed Up and The Doom Generation — Araki’s self-described “teen apocalypse trilogy.” Nowhere follows 18-year-old Dark Smith (James Duval) as he goes through a fairly typical day in Los Angeles. Dark needs, but rarely gets, emotional support from his girlfriend Mel (Rachel True). Mel, however, is also involved with a girl named Lucifer (Kathleen Robertson), while Dark moons over hunky Montgomery (Nathan Bexton). Dark’s best friend Cowboy (Guillermo Diaz) has troubles of his own, as his boyfriend and bandmate Bart (Jeremy Jordan) is back on drugs and spending most of his time with his dealer. Mel’s friends include sugar junkie Dingbat (Christina Applegate), doomsday poetess Alyssa (Jordan Ladd), and Egg (Sarah Lassez), who is being unexpectedly wooed by a Famous Teen Idol (Jason Simmons). Egg’s brother Ducky (Scott Caan) has a crush on Alyssa, but she’s keeping company with a biker named Elvis (Thyme Lewis). Alyssa’s assignation with Elvis gets a psychic boost by her twin brother Shad (Ryan Phillippe) and his tryst with Lilith (Heather Graham). Continue reading →

Julian Hobbs – Memoirs of My Nervous Illness (2006)

By Anybody Posted in 2001-2010, Arthouse, Experimental, Julian Hobbs, USA Leave a reply

vlcsnap00007r Julian Hobbs Memoirs of My Nervous Illness (2006)

logoimdbb Julian Hobbs Memoirs of My Nervous Illness (2006)

Summary/Reviews (from Amazon.com):

Daniel Paul Schreber began Memoirs of my Nervous Illness in February 1900 while confined in an asylum, as part of
an appeal for release. Schreber, second son (the first committed suicide) of an abusive father, was at the peak of
a brilliant career in Leipzig when he was appointed Presiding Judge of the Saxon High Court of Appeals. Alas, the
stress of his new job proved too much for him, and before long he was hearing voices and feeling suicidal. Within
weeks he was committed, having rapidly descended into madness, and was placed under the care of Dr. Paul Emil
Flechsig. From the start, Schreber struggled to make sense of what he was seeing and hearing, and in fact Memoirs
is so lucid and self-aware, so internally consistent and insightful, that he was released on its strength. Still,
reading this man’s prose is a lesson in subjective reality, by turns funny and terrifying. Continue reading →

pixel Julian Hobbs Memoirs of My Nervous Illness (2006)