Aug - Sept - Oct 1998
Archived Program Index

Each and every program presented at the Blinding Light!! Cinema is detailed here. Click on the link to see that quarter's programming and an image of the programme guide cover.

2003
May - Jun - Jul '03
Feb - Mar - Apr '03
Nov - Dec - Jan '03
2002
Aug - Sept - Oct '02
May - Jun - Jul '02
Feb - Mar - Apr '02
Nov - Dec - Jan '02
2001
Aug - Sept - Oct '01
May - Jun - Jul '01
Feb - Mar - Apr '01
Nov - Dec - Jan '01

2000
Aug - Sept - Oct '00
May - Jun - Jul '00
Feb - Mar - Apr '00
Nov - Dec - Jan '00
1999-8
Aug - Sept - Oct '99
May - Jun - Jul '99
Feb - Mar - Apr '99
Nov - Dec - Jan '99
Aug - Sept - Oct '98

The Blinding Light!! SHOWS AUGUST 1998


Sat & Sun August 1/2
pixel peep show
With its low-res black and white pixel format, dreamy aesthetic, and propensity for extreme close-ups, Pixelvision seems the perfect format with which to examine our obsession and unending fascination for all things sexual and erotic. PIXEL PEEP SHOW was assembled from as far off as Japan and France, presenting some of the newest works in this format with a common bond to the pornographic... featuring OLD PEOPLE HAVE SEX - Tim Lennox's tip of the hat to David Greenberger's Duplex Planet, BITCH AND BUTCH - a lesbian plastic doll fantasy by Kelly and Dawn, Danny Weisman's STUPID PENIS TRICKS, and more!!

Tuesday & Wednesday August 4/5
schizoid effective: anne robertson's diary films
Anne Robertson's Super-8 diary films are among the most intimate, powerful, and revealing works in the history of independent film, providing an unflinching look at Robertson's life. Robertson has been diagnosed as a schizoid-affective manic-depressive, a conclusion she denies, preferring instead to think of herself as a typical anxiety neurotic of the obsessive-compulsive sort, with marked tendencies for fantasy, joy, and panic. She is no longer a depressive, and film has been the cure. (AR) For this show, we are pleased to present Five Year Diary: Reel 22: A Short Affair (and) Going Crazy (1982, 24 mins.), Reel 76: Fall to Spring (1991/2, 28 mins.) and Reel 80: Emily Died (1994, 27 min).

Thursday August 6
byo8
plus: mr. x's holidays
The first round of our ever-eclectic Bring Your Own Film Night! Anything goes: Super 8, Regular 8, 16mm and VHS - film school wank, home movie, personal diary - you name it, we'll all watch it! (10 mins max please!) PLUS: Immerse yourself in the real world of cinema's exiled history - the home movie. These perfectly preserved films dating from the early '50s & '60s are the sole record of an unnamed couple's world travels - topless dancers in Paris, the World Fair, live stage in NY, cruise ships & more - a perfectly preserved sociological record of fashion, style & trends of the mid-twentieth century. Bring a film, get in for $3!

Fri, Sat & Sun August 7/8/9
crispin glover in the orkly kid
+ other eccentric shorts
A rare screening of TRENT (Rubin & Ed, Plan 10) HARRIS' truly eccentric and uncategorizable short films, featuring the cult favourite THE ORKLY KID. Crispin has called this his favorite part of all time. In it, he plays the small town boy with big dreams of appearing on TV as his cross-dressing alias OLIVIA NEUTRON BOMB. (First Place USA Film Festival). Also THE BEAVER KID - Harris' personal favorite - a bizarre documentary featuring the inspiration for Glover's role in ORKLY - all the more strange because this time he's REAL! PLUS: In WILD GOOSE Trent Harris explores a bombing range while trying to find the guy responsible for writing joe's a nut licker on a sheep trough, and THE BURNING MAN, a short poetic record of the now well known Burning Man festival in the Nevada Desert.

Tuesday & Wednesday August 11/12
guy debord's society of the spectacle
Legendary Situationist Guy Debord's long-impossible to see film is finally here! SOCIETY OF THE SPECTACLE is an intense montage assembled out of detourned images from feature films, pornography, commercials and news footage. Few groups have had as profound an impact on French culture as the Situationist Internationale with its unparalleled interrogation of political and cultural relations. (Keith Sanborn, translator/subtitles) Debord's analysis of a society suspended inside the free space of the commodity infiltrates every frame. (Steve Seid, PFA) Don't miss it! (1973, 87 mins)

Thursday August 13
the multiplex grand
The latest development. It uses three separate reproducers acting in absolute unison with three separate and distinct records, each one of which gives you the same loud, pure tone as that of the gramophone grand. The combination of all three in unison gives an intensity of volume and a sweetness and richness of tone which seem almost beyond belief! Witness the Multiplex Grand: an evening of splendid electronic music and visuals conducted and performed by: 5t3v3 (Steve Wood), 02 (Lester Smolenski) & loscil (Scott Morgan).

Fri, Sat & Sun August 14/15/16
craig baldwin's industrials amok!
From the private vaults of San Francisco's wildly aggressive documentarian Craig Baldwin (Sonic Outlaws, Tribulation 99) comes Industrials Amok!, a mixed/matched/spliced collection of one-of-a-kind informational, educational and cottage industrial film gems from the '50s and '60s, custom assembled by Mr. Baldwin especially for this screening. Includes: Psychorama - a trailer on the benefits of subliminal advertising; Angry Boy - a twisted child-psych abberation; The Delinquent, The Hipster and The Square - a prime-time religious ed which focusses on problem youth today (and features a smooth Max Roach Quintet jazz score!); Man's Search for Happiness - a classic from the Mormon Propaganda machine. PLUS: Exercycle Promo, 20th Century Breadmaking, Choosing a Classroom Film, Swim and Live and more!

Tuesday & Wednesday August 18/19
arthur lipsett's fluxes freefall, & others
Arthur Lipsett's works have been hailed as masterpieces of the cut and paste collagist model and stand as cutting indictments of modern mass culture. We present the masterworks of this legendary Canadian film artist: FLUXES is a disturbing reflection on the world around us, amalgamating an incredible arsenal of found images and sound to effectively foreshadow the coming Vietnam war as well as comment upon everything from space travel to Buddhism. VERY NICE, VERY NICE Lipsett's first and most well known film looks behind the monotone face we wear in life and exposes the anxieties we would rather forget. PLUS: FREE FALL and 21-87!

Thursday August 20
cartoon party!
An evening of films and performances from Vancouver's top cartoonists, featuring >Ted the inventor of Buy-Nothing-Day Dave!
>Pornomation!
>Scrambled Brains!
>The Light Fantastic!
>July Fourth Toilet!
.....and more!!
Cartoon Party! coincides with the cartoon supplement in Terminal City. This show is brought to you by Cosmopolis, (1009 Commercial Drive).

Friday August 21 to Sunday August 30
mary jane's not a virgin anymore
"An unpretentious, racy teen rite of passage" - Liza Bear (Sundance)
"Offhand unaffected freshness" - Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun Times
Sarah Queen of Underground Cinema Jacobson's debut feature is the rough-edged and brutally frank tale of a suburban girl's sexual initiation guided through the relationships she develops with a motley mix of urban hipster coworkers at the downtown local arthouse cinema. From an entirely anti-climactic and awkward de-flowering in a cemetery to a frank education on the ins and outs of orgasm and masturbation, Mary Jane weaves her way through more than a few personal crises and self-discoveries.
"A first feature that's as awkward, raucous and eager as its protagonist. Mary Jane is about a girl's first sexual experiences, and nothing farther from The Lover could be imagined." - Amy Taubin, Village Voice
"Sarah's funny and true portrayal of deflowered girldom has all the scary, awkward grace and hectic thrill of this most freaked out rite of passage." -Kim Gordon, Sonic Youth
Featuring cameos by George Kuchar & Jello Biafra. Music by Babes in Toyland, New Wet Kojak, Mudhoney, Red Aunts, Steel Pole Bathtub and others!

SEPTEMBER 1998

Tuesday & Wednesday September 1/2
old and naked: videos by donigan cumming
Montreal-based artist Donigan Cumming is principally known for his large format photographic works of the old, ugly, neglected, sick, demented, and drunk. Simultaneously criticized as exploitative and celebrated as genuinely in touch with his subjects, Cumming's repellant and engaging video work brings sordid existences to life. Presented are four of his most powerful and disturbing works, recently featured at the Museum of Modern Art New Documentaries series.
Tuesday
A Prayer for Nettie An elegy on the passing of Cummings most frequent and striking model.
Cut the Parrot Sex for rent, unclaimed bodies, cigarettes burns and other monuments of life long run from wall to wall. 3 grotesque comedies in one.
Wednesday
After Brenda Pierre is a fifty-something male who loses everything in the name of love. Homeless and adrift, an unwanted guest with nothing to offer but a tale.
Erratic Angel In his 50th year, Colin looks back on a life of drug and alcohol abuse. In the chaos and claustrophobia of the ice storm he waits to be reborn...

Thursday September 3
cineworks presents: living in suburbia
A program of short films about the agony and banality of suburbia. A surreal slice of life from a world where nothing is quite as it seems, and all kinds of weirdness seethes just below the surface of apparent sterility. John Paizs' kitsch classic SPRINGTIME IN GREENLAND examines the sophomoric inhabitants of a fictional utopia; BBQ MUSLIMS is Zarqa Nawaz' backyard mistaken identites ; MY MOM WORKS AT SEARS is Maria Drazilov's unsentimental look at her mother's struggle for independence; & Craig Wallace's PRINCIPLES OF KARMA is a tongue-in-cheek portrait of teen boredom and angst.

Friday & Saturday September 4/5
medicinal compounds
A hodgepodge of ludicrous and oddball films never meant to be seen by the likes of you and I, instructing both patient and doctor on the ins and outs of hospital etiquette, PLUS a handful of graphic and disturbing shorts teaching a variety of life saving techniques! LEARN how to properly care for your patient in MYOCARDIAL INFARCTION: THE NURSE'S ROLE (winner: most unwieldy title), a film which encourages nurses to take on the role of the wife - to hazardous results! ACCOMPANY sickly sweet little Jimmy to the hospital for the first time in A VISIT TO THE HOSPITAL! SEE a live heart beating in PRESCRIPTION FOR LIFE! OBSERVE an actual vivisected cadavre in a CPR demonstration...AND MORE!!

Sept 6-20 - Vancouver Fringe Theater Festival Rents out our space!

Tuesday & Wednesday September 22/23
the view from here: new local works!
This striking collection of local shorts runs the gamut of hand-processed, time-lapse and scratch animation, combining personal introspection with highly original formal and physical filmic technique - these are the up and coming image makers in your town - check ëem out! Includes John Price's gorgeous hand-made VIEW NEVER CHANGES, the Ellam/Lear / Taylor mind meld end transmitter, on the way to Istigkeit, Jorge Yanez Urreta's moody far, Jessica Joy Wise's cage-breaker INSIDE OUT, Julian Lawrence's scratch-manic ATOM AND HEAVE, Julia Burns' restlessly deviant IMMOTISFY, Andrew Ranford's time-lapsing Pulse Part 77, Brett Gaylor's spun-out RECORD and Corey Adams' strange and engaging redneck wrestling fantasy TURNBUCKLE.

Thursday September 24th
cineworks presents: saskatchewan filmpool 20th anniversary tour
The 10 short films presented here personify the spirit of independent filmmaking from a uniquely Saskatchewan perspective, and celebrate 20 years of incredible prairie celluloid. Included are: SONS AND DAUGHTERS Robin Shlat's sensitive exploration of childhood; REMEMBER IN BETWEEN THE FORGET Tobi Lampard's visually rich and intricate portrait of an artist as seen by her daughter; (STORIES FROM) THE LAND OF CAIN Mark Wihak's pan-Canadian odyssey; T.V. STORIES Brian Stockton's unconventional narrative featuring a lone character connected to the world through machines.

september 25 - October 11
The Vancouver International Film Fest is on - we will be presenting panels and workshops - in conjunction with and separately from - Cineworks at this time - stay tuned for more info!

OCTOBER 1998

Tuesday & Wednesday October 13/14
george & mike kuchar's reflections from a cinematic cesspool book launch screening!
Join us for the EXCLUSIVE Canadian Book Launch/Screening for George and Mike Kuchar's Reflections From a Cinematic Cesspool (Zanja Press), and find ot why John Waters calls these underground gods directors I could idolize - complete crackpots without an ounce of pretension...who gave me the self-confidence to believe in my own tawdry vision. Filled with original illustrations by George and Mike Kuchar, a selection of never-before-seen photos, extensive filmographies and an introduction by John Waters himself, Reflections will be available only at this this show and in limited quantities. Don't miss this rare chance to see a healthy sampling of their absurdist, campy, diaristic tapes, produced with nothing but a consumer 8mm camcorder, dime store props, neighborhood actors and the pageant that is life as their studio. Works to be screened include Tryst, Statue in the Park and The Bristled Dagger, Mike Kuchar's most recent turgid teleplay and Tales of a Twilight Typist, George Kuchar's paranormal visit with famed horror and UFO author WHITLEY STRIEBER (Communion). PLUS a LIVE SIMULCAST INTRO to the book from the brothers themselves in San Francisco exclusively for this show!

Thursday October 15
byo8 plus: eisteddfod super 8
Moving pictures that you can call your own! We happily accept all styles and flavours for this, our second official open screening, including home movies, found films, and your pet projects: 16mm, Super 8, Regular 8, VHS! Our special added attraction tonight is Super 8 from the Eisteddfod Film Festival a strange band of madcap creative-types who assemble crackpot films with titles like: THE MYRMIDONS OF ACK-ACK, TRAP OF SINISTER EVIL, SQUEAKY SPEAKS, THE DINER OF JAMES BOND, and the Suharto slamming RADIO ROUNDUP. Mandatory viewing. Bring a film and get in for $3! (10 mins max please).

Friday, Saturday and Sunday October 16/17/18
euro underground
Three distinct and fully engaging evenings of the latest work from the European underground. This collection has been painstakingly compiled to bring you the cream of the crop in new and radical European film and video. (Curated by Mark Siska)
Friday: London Calling - a collection of stylish, beautiful and gripping short subjects from the UK, featuring Benstock/Losey's fast-paced The Box, Andrew Kotting's frightening Smart Alek, Mathew Glamorre's exploration of the club scene in A Smashing Night Out, Tim Webb's heartbreaking 15th February, Kathy Stevens's steamy Heatwave, and more!
Saturday: The New Bulgarians - the Bulgarian underground is alive and well and living in Bulgaria! Ivaylo Simidchiev's MUD, recently selected to the Cannes Film Festival, tells the emotional tale of a gypsy boy who stabs a tourist and then tries to save him. The Journey to Whistling Beach is Victor Bozhinov's tale of bored youth who rob a store to take a ride in a cab to the Sea... Valentin Valtchev's REEL MIX - reels of old Soviet negative film stock mixed with: The American dream, Bulgarian superstition, drugs, motorbikes, Elvis Presley, Jesus Christ, NBA stars, a Ghost and a porcupine!
Sunday: Euromix - A cross-section of stunning work from Switzerland, Serbia, Italy and Bulgaria. Stefan Steiner's Clothes For Moving is a hamster monster movie, D. Zivancevic's Jump 13 was filmed at the solitaire in Novi Sad known as the suicide building, Susan Schoenberg's ABC features a minute of memories for each letter of the alphabet, The Salt Works puts us in the role of saltshaker over a lively discussion, and Freedy and Victor Blind Date portrays the first meeting between a poet father and filmmaking daughter with devastating results.

Tuesday & Wednesday October 20/21
buried in light:: films by jem cohen
New York-based film/video maker Jem Cohen is known for blurring distinctions between documentary, narrative and experimental genres, (citing photographer Robert Frank as a major influence). Cohen often shoots for several years in hundreds of locations before finally transforming his footage into a film. His work has won awards at festivals around the world and he has screened throughout Europe and at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Here we present three of his most arresting works:DRINK DEEP (1991) A pastoral about friendship and hidden desires. THIS IS A HISTORY OF NEW YORK (1988) A chronicling of the seven ages of civilization from Prehistory to the Space Age using the five boroughs of New York City as inspiration...stray dogs patrol the streets while the homeless forage for food...crazed street preachers pace frantically before ominous gothic architecture. The thriving city of New York seen as the accumulation of humanity's failures, as well as its greatness. BURIED IN LIGHT: EASTERN EUROPE IN PASSING (1994) A meditation on history, memory, and change in Central and Eastern Europe, BURIED IN LIGHT is a non-narrative journey, a cinematic collage. Cohen's "search for images" began at a time of extraordinary flux, as the Berlin Wall was dismantled, opening borders yet ushering in a nascent wave of consumer capitalism. What he saw struck him as a profound paradox: the moment Eastern Europe was revealed wasalso the moment it was hidden by commercialism. Cohen masterfully focusses on details, ordinary objects, and forgotten places, filming daily life as seen on the street.

Thursday October 22
phosphene live: escape velocity
Escape in all its metaphorical variations is at work in this highly visual experimental performance piece which asserts Harry Houdini and the escape artist as a central metaphor while seeking to address the circularity and inconclusive nature of escape. A transformative film performance piece by PHOSPHENE, a rotating Vancouver audio-visual collective.



Friday, Saturday & Sunday October 23/24/25
max & dave fleischer's classic hoppity goes to town
A rare opportunity to see one of the last great animated features produced and directed by Max & Dave Fleischer in 1941. Best known for their Betty Boop and Popeye cartoons, the Fleischer brothers are considered the true masters of both animation technique and style. And now, to the story: Hoppity the grasshopper finds that all is not well when he returns home to Bugville, a vacant lot just 45 inches from Broadway. A skyscraper is scheduled to be built on the site, throwing all his friends and relatives from their homes. Not only that, his girlfriend Honey Bee is being forced to marry the villainous C. Bagley Beetle! All will be saved if only Dick and Mary, the songwriting humans who own the land, can find the money to build the home of their dreams. But Beetle has other ideas and, with the help of his bumbling but hearts-of-gold henchmen Swat and Smack, intercepts Dick's hefty royalty check... Special prices for kids! ($3 - Sunday matinee) SUNDAY MATINEE at 2pm only!

Tuesday & Wednesday October 27/28
king of super 8 john porter in person!
John Porter has made over 200 Super 8 films in the last three decades. While neither a careerist nor an aggressive self-promoter, John's work has been created largely with fun in mind as he moves comfortably between time-lapse public event records, wild camera dance and structural experiments, and his unforgettable live interactive Super 8 performances. His modesty of means - working exclusively in Super 8 and with no budget - has created an incredibly imaginative arsenal of work. We are truly thrilled to present (in collaboration with Pleasure Dome in Toronto), two nights of work with John Porter here in person. Tuesday night will feature John presenting a range of his finest films, many of which incorporate everything from a bicycle on stage to a hand-held projector panning around the room. Titles to be featured include Animal in Motion, Scanning, Revolving Restaurant, Shootout with Rebecca, Cinefuge, 3 Speed Gear and the fascinating show-and-tell record of Porter's plastic toy collection Toy Catalogue. Wednesday night will feature a whole slew of brand new works produced in the last year and highlighted by How To Make A Movie, a performance involving the live shooting, developing and projecting of a Super 8 film in typical Porter style (only ever performed twice before!) with full audience participation. If you come to the first night you'll definitely be back on Wednesday - if you come to the second night only, you'll be sorry you missed the first! (Thanks to Tom Taylor at Pleasure Dome, John Porter and The Canada Council.)

Thursday October 29
cineworks presents: boys to men
A program of short films exploring the lives of boys and men, and the ways contemporary society shapes and constricts how boys are allowed to grow up. On the program: THE SMELL OF BURNING ANTS, Jay Rosenblatt's haunting documentary on the pains of growing up male; WHEN WORLDS COLLIDE, a droll profile of the Winnipeg World's Hockey Team with police intervention and Stompin' Tom Connors; EVERYBODY LOVES NOTHING: EMPATHIC EXERCISES, Steve Reinke's irreverent stock footage look at what's required to become a man in the modern world; and P.M.S. (POSITIONING MY SEXUALITY), Vince Colyer's challenge to the conventions affecting all males.

Fri, Sat & Sun October 30/31 & November 1
rene laloux's classic
the fantastic planet
This is the astounding fully animated French/Czech science-fiction adventure based on the drawings of Roland Topor. The Fantastic Planet tells the tale of an alien world where diminutive humanoids are enslaved and kept as housepets and playthings by a race of giants. Eventually a humanoid decides to revolt... Originally brought to America in the early '70s through Roger Corman s New World Pictures European Acquisitions, the film was wildly successful on the B-movie circuit with the post-hippy trippers, seen as a metaphor for class struggle but best remembered for its eerie and beautiful animation and mesmerizing soundtrack. (1974)

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