News

If Kim Gordon’s first-ever Grammy nominations for her current album, The Collective, intrigued anyone enough to investigate her former band, Sonic Youth, they will be given the perfect opportunity to do so when a rare live recording is officially released next year.

Hold That Tiger, recorded at Chicago’s Cabaret Metro in October 1987, was first rolled out as a semi-bootleg on the long-ago Goofin’ indie. On February 7, the Superior Viaduct label will finally make the album more widely available (and on vinyl and CD to boot).

Featuring the band’s seminal lineup of Gordon,...

Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI.NEWSAbove: The Temenos screening in Lyssarea, Greece.Registration for Temenos 2022, which will premiere a new section of avant-garde master Gregory Markopoulos's epic Eniaios, is now open. This very special event, which usually takes place every four years, will be taking place June 9-19 in Lyssarea, Greece. For more information on the Temenos screenings and the ongoing restoration of Eniaios, visit here.Hou Hsiao-hsien has announced two new projects: the long-gestating, Shu Qi-led film Shulan River, an adaptation of the Hsieh Hai-meng novel about a river goddess; and a yet unnamed project starring Chang Chen about "an elderly father and his son." Filmmaker, painter, writer, Nick Zedd has died. In addition to his darkly funny no-budget films like They Eat Scum (1979) and his zine Underground Film Bulletin, Zedd is coining the term "Cinema of...

Most pictures are worth a thousand words. The shot of Lydia Lunch that graces the poster of her documentary, Lydia Lunch: The War Is Never Over, is worth a thousand and one atom bombs. It’s a famous Annie Sprinkle snapshot of her from 1986. The singer/provocateur/punk rock O.G. is facing slightly away from the camera. She’s sporting red hair and even redder lipstick, clad in a similarly colored brassiere and spandex skirt — everything falls somewhere on spectrum between firetruck and candy-apple. Her head is tilted back,...

Channeling the aesthetic and urgency of a driven multimedia creator, “Wojnarowicz” chronicles the too-short life of a determinedly “outsider” artist who was among the most furiously outspoken victims of the AIDS epidemic. Chris McKim’s documentary is largely composed of materials from the late subject’s archives, woven into a collage whole that is equal parts biography, vintage agitprop and objet d’art, plus surviving associates’ audio reminiscences.

While the confrontative nature suggested by the film’s full title is amply represented, there’s also considerable beauty and invention on display here, as often there was even in David Wojnarowicz’s most enraged work. Kino Lorber is currently distributing the feature to virtual cinemas via its Kino Marquee program, with home-formats release planned for May 18.

McKim starts in 1989, when his protagonist had already been diagnosed as HIV-positive, writing, “I realized I’d contracted a diseased society as well.” One symptom...

Dennis Hopper on Kenny Scharf, Keith Haring and Jean-Michel Basquiat in Malia Scharf and Max Basch’s documentary, produced with David Koh: “They brought a vitality and an energy to art that just hadn’t been there. The importance of those three artists, they just seemed to bring the eighties alive really.” Photo: Tseng Kwong Chi / Courtesy Muna Tseng Dance Projects, Inc.

Two of the 2020 Doc NYC highlights are on artists. The world premiere of Chris McKim’s hard-edged Wojnarowicz brings back to life the committed activist/artist/poet/performer David Wojnarowicz who died from AIDS in 1992 at age 37.

Malia Scharf on Kenny Scharf with Keith Haring: "He was and still is such an important part of Kenny and our lives."

And there is Malia Scharf and Max Basch’s intimate portrait, Kenny Scharf: When Worlds Collide (produced with David Koh), which features remembrances from Kenny of Keith Haring,...

Celine Danhier with Joel Coen and Ethan Coen at the table behind us at The Odeon on the evolution of Blank City: "James Nares said 'Let me call Jim Jarmusch.' It was really like that. And then at the same time I had the music scenes and I interviewed Pat Place." Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze

Celine Danhier's all-hands-on-deck Blank City, edited to perfection by Vanessa Roworth, enters the world of the No Wave and Cinema of Transgression. We see and hear about the work of Bette Gordon, Casandra Stark Mele, Charlie Ahearn, Michael Oblowitz, Nick Zedd, Sara Driver, Susan Seidelman, Maripol, Patti Astor, Eric Mitchell, Beth B, Vivienne Dick, Vincent Gallo, John Lurie, Steve Buscemi, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Lizzie Borden, Amos Poe, John Waters, James Nares, Jim Jarmusch, Anders Grafstrom, Richard Kern, Ann Magnuson, James Chance, Lydia Lunch, Pat Place, Becky Johnston, Adele Bertei, Scott B, Tommy Turner, Tessa Hughes-Freeland, Kemra Pfahler,...

In September 1985, Nick Zedd published the fourth issue of his zine The Underground Film Bulletin, which featured a drawing of punk musician Richard Hell on the cover. Zedd published the zine primarily as a promotional tool to promote the work of his fellow punk Lower East Side filmmakers. The fourth issue included articles on Cassandra Stark, Manuel Delanda and Jim Jarmusch.

However, the most important article in this issue of the Underground Film Bulletin was Zedd’s “The Cinema of Transgression Manifesto,” which reads like a proclamation of war against avant-garde filmmaking and “academic snobbery.” You can read the full manifesto here. As Jeriko, Zedd proposed that “all film schools be blown up and all boring films never be made again” and declared that “any film which doesn’t shock isn’t worth looking at.”

According to an interview with Jack Sargeant in his book Deathtripping: The Extreme Underground, Zedd...

It wasn’t the usual start to an awards show, even if the award show was for the adult industry. Without any kind of announcement, a parade of porn stars, all wearing sheer monochromatic garments designed by Kanye West’s Yeezy brand, took the stage. The erotic photographer Richard Kern snapped their photos, ignoring the audience altogether. It wasn’t until minutes later that West himself strolled on stage, adding to the confusion rather than clarifying it. The rapper and fashion designer alternated between shouting directions at Kern (“Yo, Richard!

From Filmmaker‘s print issue archives comes this Fall, 2000 interview with director Asia Argento, who discusses her highly recommended and, today, even more vital feature debut Scarlet Diva with Travis Crawford. (Richard Kern did the original photos.) “Mixing humor and self-laceration, Tortoise and Nina Simone, Argento uses the tools of digital video to create a thoughtful aesthetic distance from her own semi-autobiographical lead character,” was our subhed for the piece, which we’re reposting today as the theatrical rerelease of the film opens at the Alamo Drafthouse Brooklyn. One could be forgiven for approaching Scarlet Diva with a healthy degree of […]...

From Filmmaker‘s print issue archives comes this Fall, 2000 interview with director Asia Argento, who discusses her highly recommended and, today, even more vital feature debut Scarlet Diva with Travis Crawford. (Richard Kern did the original photos.) “Mixing humor and self-laceration, Tortoise and Nina Simone, Argento uses the tools of digital video to create a thoughtful aesthetic distance from her own semi-autobiographical lead character,” was our subhed for the piece, which we’re reposting today as the theatrical rerelease of the film opens at the Alamo Drafthouse Brooklyn. One could be forgiven for approaching Scarlet Diva with a healthy degree of […]...

Her career keeps getting hotter, and Kylie Jenner is the March/April 2016 front page poser for Wonderland magazine.

The “Keeping Up with the Kardashians” star looks incredible in a Gucci top and briefs as she works her magic for Richard Kern’s camera.

As for her cosmetic procedures, Kylie explains, “People think that I’ve had everything done. I thought it was going to chill down when I said, ‘Ok, I admit it, I got my lips done, I never lied, I just wasn’t telling the whole truth’. And then people took that and were like, ‘Oh well, if she got her lips done she probably got everything done’. People don’t realize I just turned 18, so there’s no way my mom would ever let me undergo a nose job or a boob job.”...

"Return of the Secaucus Seven"

 Cinema Retro has received the following press release from Cinefamily, 611 N Fairfax, Los Angeles

*** For Immediate Release ***

The Cinefamily and Cinespia present

Underground USA: Indie Cinema Of The 80's

February 18-April 16

Opening Event February 18-20: Weekend tribute to indie film pioneer John Sayles

40+ film, two month retrospective celebrating iconic independent cinema

Guest filmmakers attending in person include:

John Sayles, Penelope Spheeris, Wayne Wang, Alex Cox, Allison Anders, Lizzie Borden, Ross McElwee, Robert Townsend, Richard Kern, John McNaughton

Numerous brand new restorations, including Paydirt, Born In Flames, and Last Night at The Alamo

Los Angeles, CA, February 15, 2016-Kicking off on February 18th with a rare in-person three-day tribute to independent film pioneer and legend John Sayles-including a master class on screenwriting co-presented by the WGA Foundation-and continuing through mid-April, The Cinefamily is proud to announce Underground USA: Indie Cinema Of The 80s-a guest-filled, two month,...

Stars: Ashley Lynn Caputo, Caitlyn Dailey, Lilly Dickenson, Eigh8t The Chosen One, Scott Gabbey, Lucio Giovannelli, David Hood, Curse Mackey, Rogan Russell Marshall, Jim Van Bebber | Written and Directed by Stephen Biro

“Japan’s darkest secret has become America’s newest nightmare.”

I am a massive fan of the original Guinea Pig series (ギニーピッグ Ginī Piggu). As an aspiring (yet ultimately procrastinating) filmmaker, I found the series of shockers to be crude, yet ultimately influential. I rank the series up their with the early films of Richard Kern (Thrust in Me). When I found out that we were getting an American revival of the series, I was skeptical. Then, as the Indiegogo campaign began and I started seeing names like cult director Jim Van Bebber (The Manson Family), special effects maestro Markus Koch (100 Tears) and Youtuber / acclaimed rapper Eigh8t The Chosen One attached to the project, I thought...

The National Film Preservation Foundation has announced their annual Avant-Garde Masters Grants winners — their list of organizations that have been awarded funds to preserve classic and important avant-garde, experimental and underground films.

This year, five organizations — Anthology Film Archives, Bard College, New York University, the UCLA Film & Television Archive and the Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research — have been awarded grants to preserve 10 films made by five different filmmakers.

The films include several made by significant figures in the ’60s underground film movement, such as Globe (1971) by Ken Jacobs and two by Shirley Clarke, Butterfly (1967) and 24 Frames Per Second (1977). Also from the ’60s is a rare film by artist Ed Ruscha, who is primarily known for his painting and photography, but did make some films, such as the to-be-preserved The Books of Ed Ruscha (ca. 1969).

Several more modern films will be preserved, such as four by pop culture remixer...

Following last week’s first wave of programming announcements, the Fantasia International Film Festival has revealed its second wave of programming, which includes a screening of Ju-On: The Beginning of the End and a 40th anniversary screening of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, where Tobe Hooper will be presented with a lifetime achievement award:

“Official Closing Film – Abel Ferrara’s Welcome To New York

Fantasia will close its 2014 edition with the North American Premiere of Abel Ferrara’s Welcome To New York, the controversial latest from the legendary filmmaker behind such landmarks as Bad Lieutenant, King Of New York, New Rose Hotel and the recently re-released Ms 45.

Welcome To New York is loosely based on the Dsk scandal and stars the iconic Gérard Depardieu in one of the bravest performances of his career. Co-starring is the equally sensational Jacqueline Bisset.

Abel Ferrara will be on hand to host this special evening,...

We're back with more titles heading to the 2014 Fantasia Film Festival as well as a few new images and word on a Lifetime Achievement Award for Tobe Hooper. Read on for all the details!

From the Press Release:

Following last week’s first wave of programming announcements, the Fantasia International Film Festival is proud to unveil additional highlights to rev you up for our July 10th Press Conference, where our full 2014 film lineup will be revealed.

Official Closing Film - Abel Ferrara’s Welcome To New York

Fantasia will close its 2014 edition with the North American Premiere of Abel Ferrara’s Welcome To New York, the controversial latest from the legendary filmmaker behind such landmarks as Bad Lieutenant, King Of New York, New Rose Hotel and the recently re-released Ms 45.

Welcome To New York is loosely based on the Dsk scandal and stars the iconic Gérard Depardieu in one of...

The 18th Fantasia International Film Festival’s second lineup of films was unveiled Thursday, and it features the closing night film on August 5, Welcome to New York directed by Abel Ferrara (Bad Lieutenant, Ms. 45).

Ferrara will be present to talk about his latest film, starring Gérard Depardieu and Jacqueline Bisset. The film was received with warm reviews after appearing out of competition at Cannes and at the Edinburgh International Film Festival.

The Fantasia Film Fest runs July 17 to August 5 in Montreal, and the full lineup of films, in addition to the ones already announced, will be released July 10.

View the whole press release of second wave lineup announcements below.

****

Fantasia Announces Second Wave

Of 2014 Programming Montreal, Thursday June 26, 2014 – Following last week’s first wave of programming announcements, the Fantasia International Film Festival is proud to unveil additional highlights to rev you up for our July 10th Press Conference, where...

Red Spirit Lake is psychotronic filmmaker Charles Pinion’s second feature film, shot entirely on video in the early ’90s and featuring several superstars of the Cinema of Transgression movement, such as Richard Kern and Tessa Hughes-Freeland.

The film — available on DVD from the filmmaker — is a wildly evolutionary step up from Pinion’s first feature, the raucous skater punk horror flick Twisted Issues. Below, we discuss Red Spirit Lake‘s production.

Underground Film Journal: Not to get ahead of ourselves, but it sounds like a lot of Killbillies eventually got transformed into We Await.

However, you must have been so soured on the Killbillies experience at the time that you wanted to move onto something completely different. But also, I would suppose that having been involved in at least attempting to mount a major production inspired you to make Red Spirit Lake more — well, it’s hard to find the right word for it,...

Charles Pinion exists at a unique transection of the modern underground film scene.

A pioneer of the Analog Video Feature Film movement. (That never materialized.) Interaction with the Cinema of Transgression, but not a part of it. Screened back-to-back features at the then-nascent Chicago Underground Film Festival.

He’s been there. He’s done that.

To date, he’s made just three feature films. (Although, hard at work on finishing up his fourth.) And all three — Twisted Issues, Red Spirit Lake and We Await — deserve to be freshly rediscovered and recontextualized. These films put out vibes that stretch out and can be felt in work by makers such as Calvin Lee Reeder, Bob Moricz, Waylon Bacon and others, whether they were specifically influenced by them or not.

All of Pinion’s films can be purchased on DVD from the filmmaker’s website. Gross. Surreal. Unsettling. If that’s your bag...

Hudson — the founder of the Feature Inc. gallery, who went by one name — was one of the greatest of his generation, a generation that was rich in art-dealer talent. Feature opened on April Fool's Day 1984 with a show of work by Richard Prince, and was eventually among the first to exhibit the art of Takashi Murakami, Raymond Pettibon, Tom Friedman, Charles Ray, B. Wurtz, Judy Linn, Richard Kern, Lisa Beck, Tom of Finland, and many others. Hudson was 63, but seemed timeless. He was one of the last of his kind, and among the smartest, wittiest, and most visionary gallerists I've ever known — old-school in that he almost seemed not to want to be a dealer. He just loved art and artists. The possessor of a sharp eye, an enormously fine-tuned bullshit detector, and an ability to disagree affably but firmly, he started in Chicago, then...

Browse all the sections of the 57th London Film Festival (Oct 9-20) including the galas, competition titles and individual sections.

Alphabetical list of titles by section including feature premiere status

Wp = Wp

Ep = European Premiere

IP = International Premiere

UK = UK Premiere

Gala’s

Opening Night

Captain Phillips, Paul Greengrass (Us) Ep

Closing Night

Saving Mr Banks, John Lee Hancock (Us/UK) Ep

Philomena, Stephen Frears (UK) UK12 Years A Slave, Steve Mcqueen (UK) EPGravity, Alfonso Cuaron (Us) UKInside Llewyn Davis, Ethan Coen, Joel Coen (Us) UKLabor Day, Jason Reitman (Us) EPThe Invisible Woman, Ralph Fiennes (UK), EPThe Epic Of Everest, John Noel (UK) WPBlue Is The Warmest Colour, Abdellatif Kechiche (France) UKNight Moves, Kelly Reichardt (Us) UKStranger By The Lake, Alain Guiraudie (France) UKDon Jon, Joseph Gordon-Levitt (Us) UKMystery Road, Ivan Sen (Australia) UKOnly Lovers Left Alive, Jim Jarmusch (Us) UKNebraska, Alexander Payne (Us) UKWe Are The Best!, Lukas Moodysson (Sweden) EPFoosball 3D, Juan Jose Campanella (Argentina...

To call Nicolas Winding Refn's latest film "Only God Forgives" polarizing is an understatement. This sombre foray into the dark streets of Bangkok is an indulgent mess for some and an artistic take on the Oedipal myth for others. There was talk of equal parts booing and standing ovation at its Cannes screening, and the film is certain to divide general audiences even more.

With its lugubrious pace, stark lighting and taciturn performance by lead Ryan Gosling (their second collaboration after last year's "Drive"), I for one enjoyed the affected, effective piece, even if it didn't completely connect with me throughout.

Still, it's an impressive, often beautiful and provocative film worth considering, even for those that don't succumb to its stylish charm.

Moviefone spoke to director Winding Refn while he wandered the streets of a sweltering New York City.

Moviefone: I suggested on Twitter that my first question was...

"Drive," Ryan Gosling and director Nicolas Winding Refn's previous collaboration, was a moody tone piece punctuated with sudden, intense violence. Refn ups the ante in his new film "Only God Forgives," in which Gosling again stars as a troublingly ambiguous main character. As Refn told Moviefone, "If 'Drive' was good cocaine, this would be like great, old-school acid."

In the film, which is set in the criminal underground of Thailand, Gosling must stand up to his overbearing mother (an over-the-top Kristin Scott Thomas as you've never seen her before) and face off with a corrupt cop who acts as the ruthless "God" of the title.

Below, we speak with Refn about the movie's influences, his love of silence, and why he (no surprise) was fine when the movie got partially booed at the Cannes Film Festival.

Moviefone: The trailers for the film make it seem like this...

I was reading this interview in Vice about the Blu-ray reissue of Richard Kern’s short films from the ‘80s, and the names came flooding back to me. “Back in the day, Richard, along with buddies like Lydia Lunch, David Wojnarowicz, Lung Leg, Sonic Youth, and Henry Rollins, made some of the most bloody, sexually deviant, and generally fucked up short films ever,” writes Christian Storm in his intro. Lung Leg – I haven’t heard that name in a while. She was on the cover of Sonic Youth’s album Sister. I wonder what she’s up to. Lydia, of course, is still …...

Embedded above is the first music video ever produced for the legendary art rock band Sonic Youth, “Death Valley 69,” the eighth and final track on their 1985 album Bad Moon Rising. This is also the first music video that was co-directed by Richard Kern, one of the leading figures of the Cinema of Transgression movement. The song and the video are a perfect time capsule blend of audio and images from the raging punk scene coming out of NYC’s Lower East Side in the ’80s.

According to Jack Sargeant‘s definitive history of the Cinema of Transgression, Deathtripping, Judith Barry was originally hired to direct the video with Kern only hired to do the gore makeup special effects. However, Kern would end up co-directing along with Barry. (The video’s on-screen credits, listed in full below, also credit Sonic Youth as a co-director.)

The final video ends up being...

Jack Sargeant, director of the Revelation Perth International Film Festival, has co-curated a photography show with Linsey Gosper that will have its opening at the Alaska Projects gallery in Sydney, Australia on Tuesday, August 21 from 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.

While the show is untitled, it has been colloquially named “Atrocity Exhibitions” and will feature photographs by a number of underground filmmakers and other artists. The show will be on display from the 21st to the 26th.

Inspired by the experimental novel by J G Ballard The Atrocity Exhibition, this photography show will explore “the emergence of new manifestations of the psychosexual unconscious.” The images document unusual fetishes and unleashed urges that emerge “from the collusion of urban zones and economics, amputated urges and personal explorations of seduction and desire.”

Artists represented in the show include transgressive filmmaker Usama Alshaibi and underground icon Lydia Lunch, as well as work by Romain Slocombe,...

by Steve Dollar

I remember the first time I visited the Mars Bar. It was 1997, and a friend dragged me there very late one night. It was the kind of East Village dive, just a block off the Bowery, that seemed like a hallucination: dank, dark, walls covered in graffiti and gonzo artwork, lots of cheap canned beer, a jukebox stuffed with Stooges, Motorhead and local scum-rock acts, and a clientele from... Mars. There were only three people in the place, besides us and the bartender, a young woman who looked exactly like the kind of neighborhood siren who you saw, naked, in an R. Kern photo collection: a dwarf, a blind man and a Native American. Was this a Tom Waits song? Somehow two of them got into a fight. And then someone was forcibly locked into the bathroom. More drinks were served, and eventually everyone was back at the bar,...

While always a city bursting with creative and artistic talent, there was probably no time more fertile in New York City than than '70s and '80s. Avant-garde art, hip hop, punk, no-wave, disco and more all clashed and mingled, leaving a lasting impression on pop culture, politics and the city itself. Among that noise and ruckus, independent filmmakers were also making a big wave, capturing New York's vibrancy in stories that inspired a new generation of directors. And that time has been captured in the documentary "Blank City."

Directed by Celine Danhier, the film explores the artists of the "No Wave Cinema" and "Cinema of Transgression" movements who shattered existing notions of Diy and underground art, and paved the way for today's independent film scene. Through interviews with Steve Buscemi, Debbie Harry, Jim Jarmusch, Fab 5 Freddy and John Waters and many more, the film presents a revealing...

You have to be 18 or older to see You Killed Me First, which, according to the Kw Institute of Contemporary Art, is the first exhibition on the Cinema of Transgression. There'll be a talk with Nick Zedd on Tuesday evening, followed by another with Richard Kern on Wednesday. The exhibition's opened this weekend and will be on view through April 9.

Also in Berlin, and starting tomorrow, the Arsenal will be screening a selection of titles from the Forum program at this year's just-wrapped Berlinale. Eleven films over eleven evenings, beginning with the three films by Yuzo Kawashima, The Sun in the Last Days of the Shogunate (1957), Suzaki Paradise: Red Light (1956) and Between Yesterday and Tomorrow (1954), and ending with the two restorations of films by Shirley Clarke, Ornette: Made in America (1984) and The Connection (1961).

Next week, the Arsenal wraps its series of films by Ulrike Ottinger by screening her Berlin Trilogy...

Feb. 18 & 19

6:30 p.m. (18th) & 12:00 noon (19th)

Vivid

140 Heath Mill Lane

Birmingham, West Midlands, B9 4Ar, U.K.

Hosted by: The Garage

This two-day event curated by Bernadette Louise features films and performances both direct from and inspired by the Cinema of Transgression movement of the 1980s..

On Feb. 18, Transgression vixen Lydia Lunch will headline a night of spoken word performances. Lunch herself will read excerpts from Paradoxia, her memoir of working within the Transgression scene where she starred in numerous films produced in Manhattan’s Lower East Side.

Following Lunch, there will be selection of performances by artists such as Joss Carter, Paula Davy, Emergent Behaviour, Evangelia Christakou, Yolanda de los Bueis, Isabelle Schiltz, Benjamin Fox, Andrew Moscardo-Parker and a DJ set by Greg Bird.

Then, on Feb. 19, spend an afternoon watching films by the founder of the Cinema of Transgression movement, Nick Zedd, and one of the movement’s major contributors,...

Although it's an unfortunate turn of phrase given the era, the best way to describe the documentary "Blank City" is still as something of a gateway drug when it comes to the late '70s, early '80s underground film scene in New York. It's easy to tell this since it's obvious French director Celine Danhier recreates her own experience of discovering the no-budget avant garde movement known as "No Wave" cinema in her documentary, presenting one snippet of rare footage after another, teasing the audience with clips of Michael Holman's self-descriptive "Vincent Gallo as Flying Christ" and Charlie Ahearn's groundbreaking hip-hop flick "Wild Style" and having such personalities as Deborah Harry and Steve Buscemi talk about what a wild and crazy time it was.

It's the shortcoming of "Blank City" that it isn't as adventurous in mirroring the era the film documents, settling into a style where...

Reviewed by Randee Dawn

(from the 2009 Tribeca Film Festival)

Directed by: Celine Danhier

Produced by: Avivia Wishnow

Starring: Jim Jarmusch, Steve Buscemi, Lydia Lunch, Richard Kern, Nick Zedd, John Waters

Go to a New York film festival, you risk running into the same people. Go to the Tribeca Film Festival in 2009, and you risk running into the same movie.

True, Blank City and Burning Down the House: The Story of Cbgb (reviewed Here) are not really the same film. While one focuses on the rise and fall of New York’s punk music scene as seen through the lens of a legendary, infamous club, Blank City instead turns its lens on the independent film scene of much of the same period – a time before “independent film” barely even had a name, and was called anything from “No Wave” to “The Cinema of Transgression.”

But there is a wide area of...

Reviewed by Randee Dawn

(from the 2009 Tribeca Film Festival)

Directed by: Celine Danhier

Produced by: Avivia Wishnow

Starring: Jim Jarmusch, Steve Buscemi, Lydia Lunch, Richard Kern, Nick Zedd, John Waters

Go to a New York film festival, you risk running into the same people. Go to the Tribeca Film Festival in 2009, and you risk running into the same movie.

True, Blank City and Burning Down the House: The Story of Cbgb (reviewed Here) are not really the same film. While one focuses on the rise and fall of New York’s punk music scene as seen through the lens of a legendary, infamous club, Blank City instead turns its lens on the independent film scene of much of the same period – a time before “independent film” barely even had a name, and was called anything from “No Wave” to “The Cinema of Transgression.”

But there is a wide area of...

Compared to today, you wouldn’t recognize New York City in the ’70s. Back then, drugs, poverty and urban decay ruled the streets, especially in the economically depressed Lower East Side. This gritty environment gave birth to an underground group of experimental filmmakers, including Jim Jarmusch, Richard Kern, Charlie Ahearn and Nick Zed, whose bizarre Geek Maggot Bingo (top) featured former Fango editor Bob Martin. These transgressive films, dubbed No Wave, took no prisoners just from some of their titles alone (Go To Hell, Submit To Me Now, They Eat Scum, etc.) and soon began gathering a cult following in grungy dive theaters and through VHS bootlegs. This Cinema of Transgression is celebrated in filmmaker Celine Danhier’s exhaustive and fascinating documentary Blank City (opening April 6 at NYC’s IFC Center from Insurgent Media), which offers revealing interviews with Jarmusch, Kern, Zedd, actor Steve Buscemi (who made his acting debut...

Featuring Jim Jarmusch, Debbie Harry, Steve Buscemi, John Lurie, Fab 5 Freddy, Thurston Moore,

Richard Kern, Lydia Lunch, Amos Poe, Eric Mitchell, James Nares, Maripol, Ann Magnuson,

James Chance, Beth B, Scott B and John Waters

A Film By

Opening at the IFC Center in New York on Friday, April 6

Before there was HD there was Super 8. Before Independent film there was Underground Cinema. And before New York there was.well, New York. Once upon a pre-Facebook time, before creative communities became virtual and viral, cultural movements were firmly grounded in geography. And the undisputed center of American . some would say international . art and film was New York City. In particular, downtown Manhattan in the late 1970.s and 80.s was the anchor of vanguard filmmaking.

Blank City tells the long-overdue tale of the motley crew of renegade filmmakers that emerged from an economically bankrupt and dangerous period of New York History.

Featuring Jim Jarmusch, Debbie Harry, Steve Buscemi, John Lurie, Fab 5 Freddy, Thurston Moore,

Richard Kern, Lydia Lunch, Amos Poe, Eric Mitchell, James Nares, Maripol, Ann Magnuson,

James Chance, Beth B, Scott B and John Waters

A Film By

Opening at the IFC Center in New York on Friday, April 6

Before there was HD there was Super 8. Before Independent film there was Underground Cinema. And before New York there was.well, New York. Once upon a pre-Facebook time, before creative communities became virtual and viral, cultural movements were firmly grounded in geography. And the undisputed center of American . some would say international . art and film was New York City. In particular, downtown Manhattan in the late 1970.s and 80.s was the anchor of vanguard filmmaking.

Blank City tells the long-overdue tale of the motley crew of renegade filmmakers that emerged from an economically bankrupt and dangerous period of New York History.

Back in the day, Richard Kern did many of our covers — Robert Duvall, Kim Pierce/Chloe Sevigny/Hilary Swank, and Michelle Rodriguez, for example. Recently he gave us a shot of Sasha Grey for The Girlfriend Experience that is only in our print edition. But the truly well-viewed will remember Kern’s string of New York underground and transgressive films from the 1980s, movies like The Right Side of My Brain, Submit to Me, and Goodbye 42nd St. This new Kern music video of the band Dentata is more straight-up performance, but it still boasts his great eye and specific vibe.

Dentata “Earwig” (2011) from Richard Kern on Vimeo.

Jan. 25

7:00 p.m.

Microscope Gallery

4 Charles Place

Brooklyn, NY 11221

Hosted by: Microscope Gallery

The creator and leading figure of the Cinema of Transgression movement, Nick Zedd, will appear in person to present his most controversial films, from 1984′s collaboration with Richard Kern, Thrust in Me, to several of his multiple-projector films.

Back in the early ’80s, Zedd captured the zeitgeist of a style of filmmaking that was emerging in NYC’s Lower East Side. He thus created the Cinema of Transgression, a loose connection of low-budget independent filmmakers who were making work that rebelled against traditional social norms. Some of these filmmakers included Richard Kern, Tessa Hughes-Freeland, Tommy Turner and David Wojnarowicz. You can read Zedd’s Transgression manifesto here.

Films screening at this particular event include Thrust in Me, a 1984 Super 8 collaboration with Richard Kern in which Zedd plays two characters, basically himself and a woman with whom he sexually molests.

 

Director Adam Rehmeier has this cool film called The Bunny Game coming to film festivals this year. The Bunny Game follows a prostitute looking for her next meal hitches a ride with a trucker that leaves her praying for her next breath. This film isn't for everyone but for the fans who love shocking moments  and torture scenes this will be a treat for you.  The cast and crew took this film past the limits. Actress Rodleen Getsic gives a standout performance and shows just how much she'll "Really Do" for a project she believes in! Check out my latest "Versus" with Adam Rehmeier as he gives GeekTyrant the first sneak peak at the making of The Bunny Game. Film Festival don't pass up this cool film!

 

Brian  S- Hey Adam, first off how did you get into the film making biz?

Adam Rehmeier- I've always been interested in storytelling.

From the bowels of 1986 comes this regurgitated interview with two titans of the Cinema of Transgression, Cassandra Stark and Richard Kern. While the two are clearly posing trying to act as transgressive as possible — only Stark smiling for a brief second breaks the performance — this is actually an interesting interview as Kern details the production of one of the seminal films of the Transgression movement, Fingered, starring Lydia Lunch and Marty Nations. Plus, there are extremely brief clips of some of Kern’s films opening the interview. And things Kern discussing are absolutely Nsfw if the sound is up.

This interview is apparently from something called Sublapse Video Magazine, which, according to this bootleg video site ran for about 100 minutes and featured music and short films by Morbid Opera, Redd Kross, Richard Kern, Psycho Daisies, Nick Zedd, Half Japanese, Sonic Youth, White Flag and Casandra Stark. I’ve never heard of Sublapse,...

The Gold Rush With The Philarmonic Orchestra, London

What better time than now for a juxtaposition of high culture and hard-bitten poverty? Charlie Chaplin's prospecting adventure is best remembered for its "dancing bread rolls" routine, but it's a heartmelting portrait of cold, tough times, greatly informed by Chaplin's own lean years in London. We're not down to eating boiled shoe just yet, but it should resonate with our belt-tightened era – especially when it's presented in the nice, warm Royal Festival Hall, backed by the Philharmonia Orchestra. Working to Chaplin's own notes, this is conductor Carl Davis's reconstruction of the score for the original 1925 version, reinstating scenes cut for a 1942 version.

Royal Festival Hall, SE1, Mon

The King's Speech & Tom Hooper, Nationwide

Arriving on a swell of awards buzz and critical adulation, this humane tale of royal awkwardness is sure to clean up with the home crowd, but to make sure,...

Dark Stars Rising, featuring conversations between Shade Rupe (Funeral Party) and 27 of the leading lights of the transgressive arts (including Peter Sotos, Teller, Chas Ballun, Gaspar Noe, William Lustig and Floria Sigismondi, to name a few), is more than a mere book. Clocking in at 558 teeming pages, featuring over 500 jaw dropping images, many rare or unseen, and sporting a design of mind bending intricacy, each chapter boasting its very own lavish layout, Dark Stars Rising is a cross between a carnival, a massacre, and everyone’s ideal dinner party… At Headpress The Players 1. Richard Kern 2. Alejandro Jodorowksy 3. Buddy Giovinazzo 4. Udo Kier 5. Jim VanBebber 6. Dennis Paoli 7. Tura Satana 8. Teller 9. Brother Theodore 10. Peter Sotos 11. Johannes Schonherr 12. Chas. Balun 13. Divine 14. Floria Sigismondi 15. Hermann Nitsch 16. Genesis P-Orridge 17. William Lustig 18. Dennis Cooper 19. Gaspar Noe [...]...

Heading into its 18th year in 2011, the Chicago Underground Film Festival is the longest-running underground film festival in the world. It used to be tied with the New York Underground Film Festival — both were started in 1994 — until Nyuff closed up shop in 2008.

In 1994, the Internet wasn’t the big promotional tool it is today so neither Nyuff nor Cuff that year had a website; or, if they did, those pages have since vanished off the web. So, details about what these fests screened in their first years have been sketchy. Well, until now for Cuff.

I’m not sure how I stumbled upon it, but I recently discovered that the alternative newsweekly the Chicago Reader had posted up the entire, full lineup of the first annual Chicago Underground Film Festival.

So, I copied that info and reformatted it into the style of Bad Lit’s traditional film festival lineups, which...

As part of our ongoing effort to expose our readers to all the latest and greatest genre-related projects in the literary realm, today we present to you Shade Rupe's Dark Stars Rising, a collection of 27 candid interviews spanning 24 years with unique and free-thinking artists from America to Austria and beyond.

From the Press Release:

Working in different media, countries, constraints, and freedoms, the vortex here is created by New York film writer Shade Rupe, known for his avant interests and the cultural realm he inhabits with his Funeral Party books. Everyone in this collection has produced artifacts that affect the heart, mind, soul, and future.

The smaller half of Penn & Teller ends the silence for a lengthy discussion of magic and falsehoods; Divine opens the closet for his transition to playing male roles; Crispin Glover discusses his love for the films of Fassbinder and other greats; Faster Pussycat! Kill,...

Given yesterday's story of an Australian film festival director who had his home raided and charges pressed against him following a screening of Bruce Labruce's La Zombie this seems particularly appropriate:

Director Angelique Bosio is currently wrapping things up on The Advocate For Fagdom, a feature length documentary on Canada's gay art punk provocateur featuring interview segments with John Waters, Harmony Korine, Gus Van Sant and others. Here's the official synopsis:

At turns, a transgressive artist in the purest sense of the term, the spiritual son of Kenneth Anger and John Waters, or leader of the Queercore movement, one thing is certain : Bruce Labruce makes small budget movies full of hardcore sex, political messages and containing as much violence as tenderness, in which he happily crushes any gay attitude clichés while practicing ironic self glorification, mocks any horror movie or dramatic set ups, and avoids all fashionable art trends.

The 2010 Hot Docs International Documentary Festival starts on Friday, April 29th. Showcasing the best in documentary filmmaking from Canada and around the world, Hot Docs is playing some really wonderful films this year. Like last year, Dork Shelf has compiled a list of the suitably dorky films that we’re planning to see at this years festival. These are just our picks, Hot Docs is playing so many amazing documentary films this year. We encourage you to check out the full Hot Docs Film Fest Schedule.

Dork Shelf’s Hot Docs 2010 Picks after the jump.

American: The Bill Hicks Story

Click here to view the embedded video.

American: The Bill Hicks story is a documentary about the life and times of comedian Bill Hicks, easily one of the funniest and most important comedians to ever take the stage. Hicks passed away in 1994, but his influence continues to be felt. Bill Hicks...

Halo-8 Entertainment has unveiled the box art for Episode 2 of its "Godkiller: Walk Among Us" 'illustrated film' series, written and directed by award-winning filmmaker Matt Pizzolo and starring Danielle Harris ("Halloween II"), Lance Henriksen ("Alien Vs Predator"), Justin Pierre (singer of Motion City Soundtrack), Tiffany Shepis ("Night Of The Demons"), Bill Moseley ("The Devil's Rejects"), Nicki Clyne ("Battlestar Galactica"), Katie Nisa ("Threat"), Lydia Lunch (Richard Kern's "Hardcore"), and Davey Havok (singer of A.F.I.). The film comes to DVD on October 6th, 2009 and is available for pre-order here. The trailer is posted on Halo8.tv and available for easy embedding. Godkiller Episode 2 is a limited-edition shortform DVD that makes innovative use of the transmedia...

Halo-8 Entertainment has unveiled the box art for Episode 1 of its "Godkiller: Walk Among Us" 'illustrated film' series, written and directed by award-winning filmmaker Matt Pizzolo and starring Danielle Harris ("Halloween II"), Lance Henriksen ("Alien Vs Predator"), Justin Pierre (singer of Motion City Soundtrack), Tiffany Shepis ("Night Of The Demons"), Bill Moseley ("The Devil's Rejects"), Nicki Clyne ("Battlestar Galactica"), Katie Nisa ("Threat"), Lydia Lunch (Richard Kern's "Hardcore"), and Davey Havok (singer of A.F.I.). The film comes to DVD on October 6th, 2009 and is available for pre-order here. The trailer is posted on Halo8.tv and available for easy embedding. The DVD Includes: - A beautifully mastered widescreen presentation of "Godkiller: Walk Among Us" Episode 1...

Halo-8 Entertainment has announced that Pop Skull will be its first "day and date" DVD/digital film release, timed with the official launch of Halo-8's VOD website Televandalism (in beta since 2008), which offers VOD-streaming subscriptions (all streaming titles for a total subscription of $.99 per month) or DVD-quality downloads ($9.99 each, with instructions for porting them to your TV) of films, comics, fitness/lifestyle videos, webisodes, and video games.

Pop Skull (review) will make its debut both on DVD and on Televandalism July 28, 2009. "Pop Skull is the kind of groundbreakingly different film that needs to be seen to be believed, so we want it seen by as many people as possible," said Halo-8 president Matt Pizzolo. "We know how our audience wants instant access to the newest coolest media, so we're very excited that Televandalism offers a way for us to get new films, comics, and games to our audience even...

Interview by Andrew Shearer

“If she’s a bitch, I don’t want to know.” That’s what I said to a friend of mine who shot a movie with Ruby Larocca last summer. Having been a fan of her work for several years, a champion of the goofy erotic spoofs like Sexy Sixth Sense and Erotic Werewolf In London, I couldn’t handle knowing I owned so many DVDs starring some stuck-up diva asshole. As it turned out, not only did she receive high praise from everyone involved with the shoot, but she proved to be much more than just a skilled performer. Not only did she fulfill her obligations as an actor, but she helped the crew pack up the gear and even volunteered to provide transportation at the last minute. With a decade of low-budget film making experience under her belt, it’s no wonder Ruby Larocca...