Cesar GANANIAN, Alexandre MOURA
Brazil / 2014 / 00:09:17
In their encounter with the universe of musician Roberto Michelino, Cesar Gananian and Alexandre Moura offer a “synesthetic” short film, wavering between a musical recording and an urban film-poem.
“Film Som” first arouses a curiosity of forms, those of the musical instruments invented by Roberto Michelino. We discover them during moments of the artist’s live performances, which appear between frames of urban images with a distinct Wendersian accent. Mixing string instruments, percussion and various objects (an archer’s bow, billiard balls, etc…), the whole alludes more to kinetic art than to classical instruments, for it is above all the way these instruments are played that produces the originality of the sound. As a fitting contemporary of John Cage, Roberto works more in the sound than with the sound, adding a more playful dimension that resembles a musical staging.
A staging that extends as far as the city, often giving the impression that the music gives life to this urban space. A billiards ball that spins on strings, and then it is the camera – filming the city in the next shot – that begins turning like a washing machine. The connection between the music and the shots is more of an introduction than merely the effect of a music video. The illustration no longer has a place because the music is uncertain: the sound score, born from a dietegic impulse, gradually drowns in the distance of this city and becomes inseparable from the alternating experience of these two spaces.
The staging is in the avant-garde tradition, using plastic compositions, and plays on our usual point of view (Dutch angle, superimposition, inverted shots), troubling our perspective of this city.
Therefore, “Film Som” differentiates itself from a simple musical recording through its plastic compositions and its image-sound associations, all in eliciting in us, after the screening, the intense desire to create our own instruments.
Programme for viewing Filme Som: Lab Competition L1.
]]>Job ROGGEVEEN, Joris OPRINS, Marieke BLAAUW
Pays-bas / 2014 / 00:02:15
In the category of “very short” films selected this year, A Single Life provides an example of narrative effectiveness. In only 2’15”, this burlesque animation from the Dutch trio Job, Joris and Marieke brings us face to face with a young woman whose life is turned upside down the day she receives a mysterious vinyl album.
This seemingly ordinary record reveals itself as something more than just a simple musical object. By playing it, the young woman realizes that the record allows her to travel in time. A simple jump on the album results in a jump in time: the pizza she held in her hand is eaten, but regenerates if she plays the record backwards. That is all she needs to embark on a journey in time and transform herself into a quantum voyager!
And too bad if the melancholy music leads us to favor a trip back to the past à la Marty McFly. The character in fact prefers to explore the future. A less than joyous future where we see her end up definitively alone, even if a baby announces a change in fortune. But, it is with this birth, brought about by speeding up the record, that things begin to unravel. The young Mother, not really ready, tries to return to the past, between pizza and pregnancy. But a rewinding mistake sends her back far beyond her lunch break…
Each situation takes place in the closed environment of her apartment. The decors and the computer-generated animation, although simple, are detailed and colorful. The burlesque humor is present at each jump of the record, as our character is unable to handle each new jump in time. The numerous falls and the increasingly difficult obstacles lead to several repetitive gags and comical gestures.
At the end of this big mix, we will have a hard time applauding the performance of this young voyager as her destiny is reduced to ash in the blink of an eye. Moral of the story: by always wanting to go faster, we run the risk of losing everything. Luckily, given the film’s success, it seems that the directors took their time.
Programmes for viewing A Single Life: International Competition I12 and SCO.
]]>Sweden / 2014 / 00:12:42
Beneath a false air of Google Street panoramas, the third short film by Carl-Johan Westregard gradually weaves its post-apocalyptic fabric by playing on our nerves with a simple and effective concept.
Cams builds its story through 360° panoramic shots, immersing us in rural, seaside and urban landscapes. In the beginning, everything seems fairly normal. But we quickly realize that it is a no man’s land. No crowd or traffic noise. Instead, we hear a beautiful sonorous ambiance of a nature that reclaimed what was hers. Seemingly calm, we see the occasional appearance of a few animals as well as strange black creatures.
We don’t know much more behind the story of Cams except that all trace of the human race has disappeared. What happened? Did humanity migrate to another planet, or were humans eradicated? We will never know. Each portrait reveals more mysteries than answers, for the director is mainly interested in making us tremble.
To accomplish that, he sets an unrelenting rhythm, the rhythm of the camera, which makes 360° turns, pivoting on itself. Combined with an often alarming soundtrack, the slow speed of this movement becomes a source of anguish as we are anxious to see what is happening outside our field of vision more quickly.
The images gradually distill disturbingly strange signs, such as the dark, mysterious small domes scattered here and there in the décor, and whose nature and function remain unknown to us.
The idea is then born that something is going to happen, perhaps arriving at a screamer effect like in the viral video for K-fee (a huge success during the early days of YouTube). We will let you discover what happens next.
Programme for viewing Cams : Lab Competition L5.
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