european short films - experimental, set 1
Ersatz
In an exchange around the meaning of the word Ersatz, the film’s protagonists engage in an absurd and poetical discussion, revealing the basic existential condition of feeling oneself to be a simulacrum. Their pictorial dialogue about the idea of replace ability turns into a humorous and philosophical meditation
Elodie Pong
Born in the United States, artist Elodie Pong makes her home in Zurich, Switzerland. Her work focuses on relationships, and the influence of cultural codes on social interactions. Her films have been shown around the world, including at festivals in Warsaw, London, New York, Hong Kong and Tokyo.
2003 Five Years Later (short)
2004 A certain general (short)
2005 Script (short)
2011 Namiastka / Ersatz (short)
The Ghost of Happiness
An unspoken, powerful film set to a masterful soundtrack – a small masterpiece is how a Basel jury described Max Philipp Schmid’s film in naming it best short feature. The Ghost of Happiness’ striking musical score underlines a couples' attempts to emulate the stars of big-screen musicals. A vignette from the life of two people who can’t quite live up to classic Hollywood dreams.
Max Philipp
Max Philipp Schmid wasborn in 1962 in Switzerland. Schmid is an independent director and video artist. After studies in art he qualified as a visual arts teacher at Basel University of Arts and Design. Since 1990, he has dedicated himself to making experimental films and videos. His works have been shown at numerous international festivals. Exhibitions in museums and galleries in Switzerland and Germany have shown his video installations. Several works of Max Philipp Schmid have been awarded.
1990 Privat (short)
1996 Sad Song (anim., short)
1998 Scanner (short)
2007 Der Imitator (short)
2011 Widmo szczęścia / Das Gespents des Glück / The Ghost of Happiness (short)
The Tracks of My Tears 2
Saddam Hussein’s palace is looted in Baghdad 2003. A red Ferrari Testarossa disappears from his garage. Years pass by and cars from the same garage are found around the world; some crashed, some in mint condition. The Testarossa is still out there, ghostriding through the neverending desert.
Axel Petersén
Axel Petersén was born 1979 in Sweden. Petersen is trained at the Czech film school FAMU and the Royal Swedish Academy of Arts. He is the director of several acclaimed short films and his latest film The Track of My Tears 2 (2011) had its premiere in Venice Orrizonti 2011. Avalon (2011) is Axel's first feature.
2008 Deep Fried Dawn (short)
2008 Slumber Past Zenith (short)
2009 Close to God / Far From Home (short)
2009 A Good Friend of Mr. World (short)
2011 Ślady moich łez 2 / The Tracks of My Tears 2 (short)
2011 Avalon
The Shadow
Daniel Burkhardt controlled every step of the production process on this film, making it an unfiltered expression of his artistic vision. In The Shadow, the artist and director samples 23 of his previous works in film to produce a piece that is an at once eclectic and coherent whole.
Daniel Burkhardt
Daniel Burkhardt was born in 1977 in Bochum, Germany. He studied Media Art at the Academy of Media Arts in Cologne where he is still working and living. Since 1998 he develops and realizes experimental videos, visual performances and video installations. His works are shown in the context of cinema at international film festivals as well as in exhibitions where they are projected on sight specific installation architecture.
2012 Cień / Schatten / The Shadow (short)
Flimmer
Flimmer is the vehicle for a woman’s monologue about her one-week romance with a man who attempts fruitlessly to keep in contact after she breaks things off. The minimalist, almost completely static, imagery works in fluid unison with the narration, in which the woman gives a cathartic testimony of her inability to form anything but superficial emotional bonds – a fact she imposes from the very beginning, describing herself as a cactus.
Line Klungseth Johansen
Line Klungseth Johansenwas born in 1980. She is a Norwegian writer and director.
2011 Flimmer (short)
Arcana
Arcana is a sequence of loosely connected film excerpts. Director Henry Hills is not so much concerned with any narrative continuity as he is with the montage and editing of film as artistic material. Indeed, he deliberately eschews linear storytelling. American avant-garde master John Zorn provides the soundtrack to Hills’ imagery – the fragmentary qualities of both artists’ work feed of each other to produce a strangely harmonious collage.
Henry Hills
A native of Atlanta, Georgia, Henry Hills graduated in filmmaking from the San Francisco Art Institute in 1978. He was an editor at Cinemanews magazine and later a curator and administrator at various film institutions, including Anthology Film Archives, Millennium, Collective for Living Cinema, Roulette, Film-Makers’ Cooperative and the Segue Foundation. In 1990, he directed and edited Elektra 40 Years, a compilation documentary about the famed record label. He was an editor on Al Pacino’s Looking For Richard and on numerous music videos, including for compositions by Patti Smith and Kronos Quartet. He has taught at the Pratt Institute in New York, the San Francisco Art Institute, and the FAMU film academy in Prague.
1975 Balieire (short)
1981 Kino Da! (short)
1988 SSS (short)
1997 Mechanics of the Brain (short)
2004 King Richard (short)
2011 Arkana / Arcana (short)