The Mona Lisa Myth

Tales of the American

Seemayer Studios presents a new documentary about the American Hotel in downtown Los Angeles and the Arts District that surrounds it. Since 1979, the American Hotel has been the beating heart of a rich community of artists who began moving into the deserted factory buildings between Alameda and the Los Angeles River.

Your War (I'm One of You): 20 Years of Joan of Arc

Your War (I'm One Of You) chronicles the life and career of Chicago's Tim Kinsella, frontman of ever-shifting band Joan of Arc and '90's pioneers Cap'n Jazz. With appearances from Tim's friends, family, and admirers, we learn what has made his legacy so unique and enduring for more than 20 years.

Altamira: el origen del arte

A documentary to 'rediscover' the so called Sistine Chapel of Rock Art and to tell the story of the discovery of a cave and some paintings that astonished the world 138 years ago. Filming this documentary lead its director, José Luis López Linares, through many rock caves around the world, grasping information about the life of the Magdalenian man -who lived twenty thousand years ago- and about an art form, the paintings, that make Altamira "the Prado museum of prehistory".

Faces Places

Director Agnès Varda and photographer/muralist JR journey through rural France and form an unlikely friendship.

Kandinsky

Colour, form, area - this is the formula of the greatest pioneer of abstract painting. Kandinsky came to art late in life, but his impact through Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider) and Bauhaus paved the way for modern art. In 1913, he created one of the first abstract pictures, the theoretical basis of which was inspired by his essay Uber das Geistige in der Kunst (On the Spiritual in Art). Accompanied by Mussorgsky's Pictures From An Exhibition Labarthe goes on a sensual journey which makes the soul resound with colours and forms. "A picture has to resound and must be bathed in an inner glow." Kandinsky

Rafael França: obra como testamento

National Gallery

A portrait of the day-to-day operations of the National Gallery of London, that reveals the role of the employees and the experiences of the Gallery's visitors. The film portrays the role of the curators and conservators; the education, scientific, and conservation departments; and the audience of all kinds of people who come to experience it.

Philippe-Alain Michaud, le réel traversé par la fiction

To be in Venice and see the architecture of New York, to perceive in a painting by Tintoretto the birth of animated images, to look at the burlesque Cretinetti as the ancestor of montage - so many shifts, displacements, and striking telescopings that Philippe-Alain Michaud proposes in this film dedicated to him. To follow this art historian, curator of the cinema collections at the Centre Pompidou, is to go from the oriental carpet to the film, or from the first fireworks to the cinema. And everywhere the animation of the images - projections of Antony McCall, or of Paul Sharits, Column without end of Brancusi, Pasolini's Accatone - everything moves! Under the tutelage of Aby Warburg, the great art historian of the early twentieth century, precursor of iconology and image comparison, to whom Philippe-Alain Michaud was the first in France to devote an important essay, eleven images are placed on the table to describe the singular journey of this art historian.

Magritte: The False Mirror

Introduces the world of painter René Magritte through an assemblage of the painter's images. Includes statements by Magritte about his intentions and anecdotes from his friends Mesens and Scutenaire.

Les chiens-loups

Electronic Poem

Poème Électronique is an 8-minute piece of electronic music by composer Edgard Varèse, written for the Philips Pavilion at the 1958 Brussels World’s Fair. The Philips corporation commissioned Le Corbusier to design the pavilion, which was intended as a showcase of their engineering progress. The pavilion was shaped like a stomach, with a narrow entrance and exit on either side of a large central space. As the audience entered and exited the pavilion, the electronic composition Concret PH by Iannis Xenakis (who also acted as Le Corbusier's architectural assistant for the pavilion's design) was heard. Poème électronique was synchronized to a film of black and white photographs selected by Le Corbusier which touched on vague themes of human existence.

Joseph Cornell: Worlds in a Box

This is a 1991 documentary film about the legendary artist and filmmaker, Joseph Cornell, who made those magnificent and strange collage boxes. He was also one of our great experimental filmmakers and once apparently made Salvador Dali extremely jealous at a screening of his masterpiece, Rose Hobart. In this film we get to hear people like Susan Sontag, Stan Brakhage, and Tony Curtis talk about their friendships with the artist. It turns out that Curtis was quite a collector and he seemed to have a very deep understanding of what Cornell was doing in his work.

Cindy Sherman: Nobody's Here But Me

New York based artist, Cindy Sherman, is famous for her photographs of women in which she is not only the photographer, but also the subject. She has contributed her own footage to the programme by recording her studio and herself at work with her Hi-8 video camera. It reveals a range of unexpected sources from visceral horror to medical catalogues and exploitation movies, and explores her real interests and enthusiasms. She shows an intuitive and often humorous approach to her work, and reflects on the themes of her work since the late 1970s. She talks about her pivotal series known as the `Sex Pictures' in which she addresses the theme of sexuality in the light of AIDS and the arts censorship debate in the United States.

In the face of...

Two dolls accidentally meet in the middle of nowhere. They dwell on life in the country where nature, love, and humans face the cruelty of war, loneliness, and separation. What can keep us all together during this uneasy time? What do we really want and need? How can our country and love in its various manifestations pave their way to something immortal and encouraging? Feel it and experience it through the reportage of the unknown man.

Elliott Erwitt - Silence Sounds Good

Elliott Erwitt has spent his entire adult life taking photographs, of presidents, popes and movie stars, as well as regular people and their pets. His work is iconic in world culture while his life is largely unknown.

The Genius of Leonardo Da Vinci

Janina Ramirez explores the BBC archives to create a TV history of Leonardo Da Vinci, discovering what lies beneath the Mona Lisa and even how he acquired his anatomical knowledge.

Manet: Portraying Life

Manet’s portraits are rarely afforded such close attention as they are given in this exquisitely crafted and insightful film presented by art expert Tim Marlow. Manet’s portraiture comprised about half his work, giving life on canvas to family, friends and the literary, political and artistic figures of the day.

Pierre Bonnard : les couleurs de l'intime

How did Bonnard, one of the great masters of 20th-century painting, a secretive, anxious man with an ordinary everyday life, become this undisputed painter of intimacy, capable of transforming reality into a unique and incandescent world? Through his paintings, but also his private journals, his correspondence with Matisse and Vuillard, the photographs he loved, and the places where he lived, the film immerses us in the world of this master of color.

Semi Colin

Challenging all notions of genre, Semi Colin is a living, breathing art installation. Part performance, part art, part social comment, Colin philosophizes on his life's obsessive work as an erotic artist.

Screen Test: Ethel Scull

16mm, black and white film, silent, 4:30 min.

Don't Blink

A young man talks to his psychiatrist about strange visions he has been having in his dreams.

Senritsu Kaiki File Super Kowa Too! Fear Adventure: Kokkuri-san

Based on the previous 'Final Chapter', world history has now been modified and reconstructed. Although Kudo was able to release himself from the curse caused by demon soldiers, he now has no money. Despite losing the memory of the previous world, Kudo, Ichikawa and Tashiro continue to work together in producing a horror documentary.

Theatre 1

Theatre 1 (Observational Film Series #3) is a feature length documentary, which closely depicts the world of Oriza Hirata, Japan's leading playwright and director, and his theatrical company, Seinendan. By depicting them, the film leads the audience to revisit fundamental but timely questions: What is theatre? Why do human beings act?

Rain

A Woman's perfect day takes a turn for the worst. When a disaster hits her city. Will she be able to survive what comes next and find her husband?

Prometheus

Tony Harrison's poetic essay on the working class - in particular the British miners -, its struggles, its dreams and its icononography - at the very end of the 20th century, as interpreted through the myth of Prometheus.

Burstup Homes' Murder Case

A spoof of Sherlock Holmes. Directed by Alice Guy-Blache for Solax Film Company.

In Lies We Trust: The CIA, Hollywood, and Bioterrorism

Its hard to explain the full depth and breadth of the depravity of the pharmaceutical industry, the medical research industry, and the federal government. This film does a pretty good job. Hang on to your hat. The model for modern biological warfare was "discovered" during the conquest of the Americas and has been repeated over and over again.

Bottle Cap

A ‘Treasure-Carcass’ foretells of a dark dystopian future but Shelton, the underdeveloped fiddler crab, is oblivious — his attention is absorbed by the shiny, new bottle cap he hopes will elevate him to the rank of “god” among his colony.

Rikscha Girl

Fourteen-year-old Naima longs to earn money for her poor Bangladeshi family, but her unrivaled artistic talent is of little use. When her ailing father is at risk of losing his prized bicycle rickshaw to loan sharks, she disguises herself as a boy and attempts to drive the rickshaw herself. Naima crashes the rickshaw, threatening the family's sole livelihood.

Los Beverly de Peralvillo

El Borras marries La Pecas, unaware of her mother's (Doña Chole) scheme against Borras. That of Borras to provide for all her family members who are a lazy bunch composed of her father and brothers.

A Broken Earth - The Documentary

When an oil company moves in next door to a family farm, the residents challenge not only the oil company but the entire industry. All over the world Fossil Fuel industries have undermined communities and severely impacted the health of people and the planet. In Taranaki, New Zealand the hunt is on for easy oil and gas. The benign rural pastures that surround the base of Mt Taranaki, where people have carved out a quiet living, are riddled with the scars of Fossil Fuel extraction. Sarah Roberts and David Morrison are environmental award winning farmers who have worked the land for generations. When an oil company moves in next door to their family farm, they are forced to deal with the effects of uncontrolled fracking and oil drilling along their quiet country road. ​

Internal Dialogue

Financial investigator Juan interrogates the employee José the prime suspect of internal fraud. José reveals the fraud and the people involved.

It's Time to Decide

A young kid, now burdened with adulthood, has to make the hardest decision of his life.

Zimmer mit Tante

Juvenile detention or retirement home: That's the choice 17-year-old Malu is faced with after she's been caught stealing again. In order to save the girl from imprisonment, her aunt Johanna agrees to take Malu in with her until she has completed her social service in a retirement home. The rebellious half-orphan, whose single father Paul has hardly any time for her as a pilot, initially finds being placed with her aunt just as restrictive as a stay in prison.

Dames and Dreams

Four beautiful young women are foretold of mysterious adventures that will have them each take advantage of men with their enchanting looks. But, will they survive their escapade? And, in the end, are things really as they seem?

Blame

A reflection on the relationship between science, politics and the media. And on how we as humans tend to look for scapegoats and screaming narratives.

Reframe THEATER EXPERIENCE with you

Perfume's Reframe 2019 concert, performed to great effect in the newly reconstructed LINE Cube Shibuya, is recreated as a high-tech concert film.