Public posting, to keep up the thread... Dear Rolf, I have just been to a media festival in Luzern called Viper where I saw many interesting films and videos, of which two really stand out in my mind as being interesting for a documentary class. The first is a short available from Canadian Filmmakers' Distribution (address follows) by Philip Hoffman called "?O Zoo! (The Making of a Fiction Film)" (1986). Hoffman was invited onto the set of Peter Greenaway's "A Zed and Two Naughts" to film a documentary. He proceeds to do so in the style of a film journal, documenting his trip. However, some things just don't seem right. Who shot those scenes of him winding his bolex? Why does he nonchalantly abandon the film set to shoot seemingly random sights in Holland? We see his shooting reports, but why is there someone else's name on them? At one point, the screen goes black as he describes the following in voice-over: an elephant fell over. As the zookeepers tried to help him up using bails of hay, Hoffman wondered if he should film this. Finally he films, the elephant stands up but falls over again. This time he rolls over motionless. The zookeeper explains that the elephant has had a heart-attack. Hoffman; shaken, decides not to develop what he has shot, and leaves it in his freezer. End of black. However, after the final credits we see a silent black and white shot of a fallen elephant; zookeepers stuff bails of hay under the animal until it is able to stand, at which point...it walks away unharmed! We realize finally that this "fiction film" is "?O Zoo!". The film works very well and questions in a very subtle way exactly what is documentary, is it not the exact same construct as a fiction. The other film, also Canadian, is called "Picture of Light" by Peter Mettler. "Picture of Light" (1994) documents Mettler's trip to the arctic circle in Manitoba, Canada, to film the Northern Lights in time lapse. The preparations and voyage are filmed, but when the crew arrives, a blizzard prevents them from filming the night sky. They wait, and they interview the inuit. The film begins to talk about the desire to capture ephemeral light (such as is film), about the need of media to record, to prove the existence, in the face of such wilderness and nature. We also see scientific images explaining what the Northern Lights are composed of. Finally we see the haunting lights. At one point, while panning across barren snowdrifts, Mettler's ironic monotone (almost making fun of his country's film heritage) tells us that the first film showed a train pulling into a station, "people jumped out of their seats in fear of being hit by the train. Are you cold yet?". The film becomes a crystal ball, a simple film, complexly depicting a complex subject. Mettler's need to film is finally justified in face of the beauty of the events, and the people, filmed with such sensitivity, for example a montage of people's hand gestures as they describe the lights. The Croatian hotel owner has an artificial fireplace glowing electric orange, and he sits sprawled on his couch underneath dead animal skins pinned sprawling up on his wall. This film is moving, interesting, cold and warm, tightly edited, and beautiful. It lies halfway between a personal documentary and an experimental fiction. I was very inspired by this kind of filmmaking. Both films seem to be a reaction against the traditional Canadian Film Board style of documentary, ironic parodies. They are both intensely personal, and lead us to realize that all films are documents, to question constructed veracity, to question media itself. -Pip Chodorov, Light Cone, Paris <[log in to unmask]> The distributors: Canadian Filmmakers Distribution 67-A Portland Street Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M5V 2M9 tel: 416 593 1808 fax: 416 593 8661 Peter Mettler/Grimthorpe Film 91, Brunswick Avenue Toronto, Ontario, Canada, M5S 2L8 tel: 416 923 4206 fax: 416 923 4043 ---- To signoff SCREEN-L, e-mail [log in to unmask] and put SIGNOFF SCREEN-L in the message. Problems? Contact [log in to unmask]