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1-23 of 23
- The history of Dawson City, the gold rush town that had a historical treasure of forgotten silent films buried in permafrost for decades until 1978.
- The Mississippi River Flood of 1927 was the most destructive river flood in American history. In the spring of 1927, the river broke out of its banks in 145 places and inundated 27,000 square miles to a depth of up to 30 feet. Part of it enduring legacy was the mass exodus of displaced sharecroppers. Musically, the Great Migration of rural southern blacks to Northern cities saw the Delta Blues electrified and reinterpreted as the Chicago Blues, Rhythm and Blues, and Rock and Roll. Using minimal text and no spoken dialog, filmmaker Bill Morrison and composer - guitarist Bill Frisell have created a powerful portrait of a seminal moment in American history through a collection of silent images matched to a searing original soundtrack.
- A Soviet film from 1969 is found in an Icelandic fisherman's net, and the filmography of its leading actor offers a portal into a history that has endured on celluloid.
- INCIDENT reconstructs a 2018 police shooting in Chicago, reassembling the event and its immediate aftermath from a variety of sources, including surveillance, CCTV, dashboard, and body-worn cameras, as a synchronized split-screen montage.
- During the early 1920s, a rare form of encephalitis lethargica swept the world, afflicting hundreds of thousands of people. Of those who survived, many were left in mysteriously frozen, nearly immobile states resembling catatonia, and presently remanded to long term institutions. By 1969, this odd illness--front page news in the 1920s--had been largely forgotten. But a young Dr. Oliver Sacks, coming to work at Beth Abraham, a 'home for incurables' in the Bronx, realized that among the hospital's inmates were eighty survivors of that original epidemic, still frozen in time, decades later. Using the new drug L-dopa, Sacks was able to 'awaken' many of them, but following an initially near-idyllic period, the patients began experiencing ever more tormenting responses to the drug.
- Sourcing original 35mm nitrate footage, filmmaker Bill Morrison pieces together a unique visual exploration of WWI from footage that has never been viewed by modern audiences, and will never be seen again outside of this film. Serbian composer Aleksandra Vrebalov created the haunting score, commissioned and performed by the Kronos Quartet.
- A man is shown his car, which he drives until it can be driven no more.
- In 1924, in collaboration with the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC), the Soviet government offered parcels of land in the Ukraine, Belarus, and Crimea to former merchants, whose work had been outlawed under Communist rule. The JDC provided financial, legal, and agricultural support. Jewish families left the ghettos, and resettled in these new rural colonies, where they learned how to farm. In May 1927 the colonies were documented by James H. Becker of Chicago, my grandfather, who shot the 1000 feet of 16mm film that comprise this film. By 1938, more than 250,000 Soviet Jews would settle in 215 colonies, across 2.5 million acres of land. Their fate has been well documented elsewhere. This is a story of their journey back to the soil.
- A scene from The Bells (1926) is optically reprinted and edited to Michael Gordon¹s 7 minute composition. A meditation on the fleeting nature of life and love, as seen through the roiling emulsion of an film.
- On March 17, 1930, a crowd assembled outside Philadelphia's Eastern State Penitentiary to witness Al Capone's transfer to Chicago, where he would stand trial. Filmmaker Bill Morrison and composer Vijay Iyer worked with a single panning shot, and accompanying soundtrack, to create this 12-minute film on the nature of spectacle.
- Explores Man's tendency to reduce the world into discrete intervals so that it might be more readily analyzed, even if not wholly understood.
- Made from decaying nitrate films from the 1920s, Bill Morrison built this short film around a large party scene where a woman finally meets a mysterious guest.
- A re-imagining of Mary Shelley's 'Frankenstein', using images culled from archives around the world.
- In 1899, a photographer at American Mutoscope and Biograph mounted his camera on the front of a trolley traveling over the Brooklyn Bridge. The three 90-foot rolls he created were edited together to complete the journey from Manhattan to Brooklyn, entitled Across the Brooklyn Bridge. As a commission by the Museum of Modern Art for the re-opening of their facility, American avant-garde filmmaker Bill Morrison took this remarkable footage and recombined it with itself to form a new split-screen extrapolation.
- Day and an Arabian Knight is as film about two needy people whose circumstances bring them together in a city that has left them lonely and stranded. In one day and a night, Mohammed, a Lebenese security guard, meets and woos Day, the new temp. We watch through Day's hopeful eyes and heart as Mo takes her out on a date and even proposes marriage only to reveal his real need... a visa to stay in the country.
- Film is a re-purposing of an early nitrate film, Pawns of Passion (Germany, 1928) which has begun deteriorating, into a new story, allowing us to preserve what still remains while also appreciating the beauty of its transformation. Music and lyrics have been added to enhance the storytelling.
- 'Just Ancient Loops' employs high resolution scans of ancient nitrate footage, as well as newly created CGI renderings of space to depict different views of heaven. Original musical score by Michael Harrison, performed by cellist Maya Beiser.
- An early Bill Morrison short, in this work he traverses an urban landscape utilizing high contrast black and white footage. The bustling nature of the setting is complimented by the energetic music by Michael Gordon.
- After hearing about Lindsay and Ryan's failed attempt at dinner with Caleb the night before, Kirsten arranges a dinner that she can supervise. But her presence makes no difference when the hot-tempered Ryan and the egotistical Caleb immediately butt heads and disaster strikes when Caleb collapses from a sudden heart attack. Meanwhile, Sandy keeps Rebecca's presence in Newport a secret from Kirsten after deciding to take her case to court. Marissa and Alex's relationship intensifies, while Seth and Summer spend a lot of time together at Zach's insistence.