Schedule of Events

Schedule of Events:

<< May 2012

[June 2012]

Celebrate ten years of cinematic bliss with your friendly neighborhood microcinema! EPFC is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization. Sell your TV and come to the cinema.

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SCREENINGS
Come watch beautiful images dance upon a screen in your own neighborhood!
Shows begin promptly @ 8 PM and are $5 suggested donation (unless otherwise noted).

Saturday, June 2 – JJ MURPHY’S PRINT GENERATION & STAN BRAKHAGE’S PASSAGE THROUGH: A RITUAL – 8 PM
Two newly restored masterworks of the American avant-garde, presented in brand new prints, from the restorations by the Academy Film Archive. Presented by Mark Toscano. PRINT GENERATION by J.J. Murphy (1973-74, 16mm, color, sound, 50min.) J.J. Murphy's film follows one minute (60 one-second shots) of unspectacular anecdotal footage through 50 film printing generations, as the imagery moves from distant abstraction, to extreme clarity, and back to abstraction again. The result is one of the most humane and moving achievements of so-called structuralist film, a breathtaking use of the inherent qualities of film to evoke complex notions of memory and loss. PASSAGE THROUGH: A RITUAL by Stan Brakhage (1990, 16mm, color, sound, 46min.) One of Stan Brakhage's few films to be cut precisely to an existing soundtrack, Passage Through: A Ritual emerged from an unexpected collaboration-by-mail between Brakhage and composer Philip Corner. Inspired by seeing Brakhage's 1972 film The Riddle of Lumen, Corner recorded a variation of a piano piece in progress, Through the Mysterious Barricades, and sent the resulting tape to Brakhage as a gift. Moved by the recording and the fact that one of his films had inspired it, Brakhage asked Corner if he could make a new film with this recording as its soundtrack. The resulting film is one of Brakhage's most restrained, sparse, and beautiful. A testament to the richness and ephemerality of the theatrical viewing experience, Passage Through is a rare film which gives expansive space to its soundtrack and image, the two melding rather than supporting each other, opening up vast areas of audiovisual musicality and expression.

Thursday, June 7 – OPEN SCREEN – 8 PM
Our cinematic free-for-all dares you to share your film with the feisty EPFC audience. Any genre! Any style! New, old, work-in-progress! First come, first screened; one film per filmmaker; 10-minute maximum. DVD, VHS, mini-DV, DV-CAM, Super 8, standard 8mm, 16mm. FILMMAKERS GET IN FREE!

Friday, June 8 – FILMMAKERS ALLIANCE – canceled
This event has been canceled.

Saturday, June 9 – CINEMA INDIGENE presents A GOOD DAY TO DIE – 8 PM
All over the world Indigenous people are picking up cameras and telling their stories. Join curator Eve LaFountain for this installment of the screening series that highlights the best and most exciting works of contemporary Native made cinema and see how Native people are representing themselves, their cultures and histories on screen. This month we present A GOOD DAY TO DIE, a documentary about Ojibwa activist Dennis Banks. Dennis Banks co-founded the American Indian Movement (A.I.M.) in 1968 to call attention to the plight of urban Indians in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The film presents an intimate look at Dennis Banks' life beginning with his early experience in boarding schools, through his military service in Japan, his transformative experience in Stillwater State Prison and subsequent founding of a movement that, through confrontational actions in Washington DC, Custer South Dakota and Wounded Knee, changed the lives of American Indians forever. Produced and directed by David Mueller and Lynn Salt (Choctaw). Discussion of the film to follow.

Thursday, June 14 – ROBERT NELSON TRIBUTE SCREENING #1 – 8 PM
To celebrate the passing of the inimitable Robert Nelson (1930–2012), Mark Toscano and Echo Park Film Center will be presenting multiple programs of Bob’s work, beginning with two Nelson films which have not been seen together in decades, despite that being Bob’s original intention. The Suite California films were originally intended as a much longer, multi-part travelog throughout California. Bob completed two parts, covering Southern California and the Bay Area, and the results are formally inventive and highly affecting, functioning as travelogs that ultimately trace the vast and unpredictable area between a rich personal reading of a place and the place itself. Although both works feature Bob’s characteristic brilliant humor throughout, they are also deeply reflective and rich with unexpected, revelatory insight about his own experience of his home state. SUITE CALIFORNIA STOPS & PASSES PART 1: TIJUANA TO HOLLYWOOD VIA DEATH VALLEY (1976, b/w & color, sound, 46min.) SUITE CALIFORNIA STOPS & PASSES PART 2: SAN FRANCISCO TO THE SIERRA NEVADAS & BACK AGAIN (1978, b/w & color, sound, 48min.)

Friday, June 15 – STREET DOGS OF SOUTH CENTRAL – 8 PM
Street Dogs Of South Central is a documentary by Bill Marin. It follows the every day happenings of a mother dog and her 4 pups in the urban jungle of South Central. An unflinching look at the life of street dogs and the hardships they endure every day but it also shows the willingness of the dogs to survive and the bond they share. Narrated by Queen Latifah. Go to http://www.streetdogsmovie.com/ to view the trailer and learn more. This event is being hosted by Blue Collar Working Dog Supplies in Echo Park.

Saturday, June 16 – HOW TO BE A HOMOSEXUAL: FILMS OF ROGER JACOBY – 8 PM
"HOW TO BE A HOMOSEXUAL began, said Jacoby, as 'excerpts from a compilation journal work begun in 1979. It is an ironic title - there's nothing sexually explicit about the film.' But the film is richly sensual.... In every scene, the emulsion captures the images, enhances, then betrays, overpowers and destroys them, as the patterns and color reshape the filmed reality into a different landscape." - Kathleen Tyner, Cinematograph. Works to be screened on 16mm: How to Be a Homosexual Parts 1 & 2 and Aged in Wood.

Thursday, June 21 – NEW WORKS SALON – 8 PM
Several local and visiting artists will present new in-progress or recently completed works on Super 8, standard 8mm, and 16mm. Matt Weathers will be showing ...and then they became spirits, a Super 8 film about two people posing their questions of life to the land and drawing closer to it in anticipation of a response. Mike Stoltz will show Give Me Shapes, a Super 8 dual projection collaboration with Hannah Lew, as well as a new 16mm work in progress called Sky Slicer. Erich Burci will show his 16mm Island Woman, inspired by a Cuban avant-garde photographer and his works, the film explores the composition just as much as it explores camera movement and the medium of film itself. Other filmmakers include Camille Reyes... and more. Program details coming soon.

Friday, June 22 – 8 REELS OF SEWAGE – 8 PM
On the cusp of 1970, adult film editor Belinda Brimhouse (Jacqueline Guzman) is exhausted with the ever-surmounting tasteless film reels, piling up under command of her seedy boss, Don Arrolls (Mystic Marlow). After being fired, Belinda sets out to produce a motion picture all her own, hoping to prove to business rivals like Mr. Whiteman (Art Roberts) that she has what it takes to finish a sophisticated erotic film, without all the crudity that’s quickly becoming prominent in mainstream adult cinema. But the reality of the field and pressure from peers turns Belinda into a corrupt casting couch director, coupled with seemingly pointless mind games, innocent actresses like Janet (Samantha Poole) can hardly handle, but allow. How will Belinda prevail, with such an insisting palate, soured by new batches of uncooperative girls, all while a hired hit man is out to put a quick end to her, and her blossoming career? It’s an untamed ride through the mishaps and brawls of a “bad” B movie production, ridded with all the trash you’d hope for; numerous negligées, greasy go-gos, playful pillow fights, starved, sex-trafficked slaves, and naughty, needle pricking nurses! Everything‘s exploited! A psychological comedy compiled of piles and piles of puns that parallel real life at large. A picture destined for demeaning critical review, meant to ultimately be lost in some sin-saturated cellar, for none to view, and few to remember!

Saturday, June 23 – WE HATE EVERYTHING INCLUDING THIS FILM SERIES presents BREAKING GLASS – 8 PM
The We Hate Everything Including This Film Series continues with another night of punk rock rarities on 16mm film. First up is one of the many news magazine shows of the 1970’s that had “What is punk?” segments. This one, entitled Special Edition, is hosted by Get Smart’s Barbara Feldon and features brief clips of LA punk personalities Hellin Killer and Pleasant Gehman. The feature tonight is the relatively unknown Breaking Glass (1980), which follows performer Hazel O’Connor’s fictional rise from the UK punk dives to robotic New Wave superstar.

Thursday, June 28 – LA AIR: NANCY JEAN TUCKER – 8 PM
LA AIR is a new artist-in-residence program that invites Los Angeles filmmakers to utilize EPFC resources in creating a new work over a four-week period. Nancy Jean Tucker is a director and animator based in Los Angeles. She is originally from Louisville, Kentucky, and began making films at the California Institute of the Arts. Her films and music videos have shown around the world in such venues as the Rotterdam International Film Festival, Anthology Film Archives, Pitchfork.com,
and the Nova Scotia Museum of Art. She recently received a fellowship from Yaddo for her current film, We Let the Darkness In. For her residency at the film center, she will organize a collaborative animation project using some of her favorite Los Angeles filmmakers, as well as create new scenes for her current mixed media film. These will be screened along with the premiere of a music video she recently directed for Simone White.

Saturday, June 30 – PALMS – 8 PM
"Artur Aristakisyan’s 1993 documentary, Palms (Ladoni), has been a film cited more than seen; it’s an intensely poetic, provocative–even inspiring–account of the poor and destitute in Chisinau (formerly Kishinev), the capital of Moldova ... it was shot in handheld, black-and-white 16mm and enlarged to 35mm in an a way that makes it seem like a scratched, overly-contrasted artifact from ages past; a film about the purity of abjection that physically resembles its subject. The only soundtrack is Aristakisyan’s ruminating narration and brief snatches of Giuseppe Verdi’s soaring music. The footage was collected over the course of several years shortly after the fall of the Soviet Union and Moldova’s independence, and it could be said to be a baring of the country’s repressed soul through the tenuous lives of its vagabonds." --Doug Cummings, Film Journeys. With introduction by Ross Lipman. 1993, 139min, projected from DVD

UPCOMING CLASSES

Saturdays June 2 & 9 – STOP MOTION EXQUISITE CORPSE ANIMATION WORKSHOP! – 1 – 4 PM
Exquisite corpse is a method by which a collection of words or images is collectively assembled. Each collaborator adds to a composition in sequence, either by following a rule or by being allowed to see the end of what the previous person contributed.

During this two Saturday course, the class will create a collaborative animated work, using stop motion. Each student will be given the first and last frame of their animation, and then be able to create whatever they like within these two frames. Students should be prepared to shoot the first day, so bring anything you need with you to class. Supplies will be provided, so you don't have to bring anything, other than a desire to animate! Instructor: Nancy Jean Tucker $75/60 EPFC members. Class limited to 6 students.

Saturday, June 16– INTRO TO FINAL CUT PRO 7– 1 – 5 PM
This one-day class opens the door to the power and majesty of a digital editing program that is fast becoming the industry standard. All equipment and materials provided by EPFC. Instructor: Will O’Loughlen. Tuition: $60/$50 EPFC members.

Saturday, June 23– INTRO TO REGULAR (DOUBLE) 8MM FILMMAKING & HAND-PROCESSING – 12:30 – 5:30 PM
Using the classic home-movie format first introduced in 1932, students will explore the history, application and tender sophistication of small format filmmaking. This one-day workshop covers the basics of working with standard (or regular [or double]) 8mm film, from loading the camera, techniques for shooting, hand-processing, splicing/editing, projection, and practical information on where to get supplies for this format, which was officially discontinued in the early 1990's, but continues to be available thanks to the efforts of the devoted. No previous filmmaking experience necessary. All equipment and materials provided by EPFC.
Instructor: Rick Bahto. Tuition: $75/$60 EPFC MEMBERS.

FOLLOW US ON TWITTER: http://www.twitter.com/EPFCFilmmobile
FOLLOW US ON FACEBOOK: http://www.facebook.com/echoparkfilmcenter
http://www.facebook.com/filmmobile

Celebrate ten years of cinematic bliss with your friendly neighborhood microcinema! EPFC is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization. Sell your TV and come to the cinema.

SCREENINGS
Come watch beautiful images dance upon a screen in your own neighborhood!
Shows begin promptly @ 8 PM and are $5 suggested donation (unless otherwise noted).

Saturday, June 2 – JJ MURPHY’S PRINT GENERATION & STAN BRAKHAGE’S PASSAGE THROUGH: A RITUAL – 8 PM
Two newly restored masterworks of the American avant-garde, presented in brand new prints, from the restorations by the Academy Film Archive. Presented by Mark Toscano. PRINT GENERATION by J.J. Murphy (1973-74, 16mm, color, sound, 50min.) J.J. Murphy's film follows one minute (60 one-second shots) of unspectacular anecdotal footage through 50 film printing generations, as the imagery moves from distant abstraction, to extreme clarity, and back to abstraction again. The result is one of the most humane and moving achievements of so-called structuralist film, a breathtaking use of the inherent qualities of film to evoke complex notions of memory and loss. PASSAGE THROUGH: A RITUAL by Stan Brakhage (1990, 16mm, color, sound, 46min.) One of Stan Brakhage's few films to be cut precisely to an existing soundtrack, Passage Through: A Ritual emerged from an unexpected collaboration-by-mail between Brakhage and composer Philip Corner. Inspired by seeing Brakhage's 1972 film The Riddle of Lumen, Corner recorded a variation of a piano piece in progress, Through the Mysterious Barricades, and sent the resulting tape to Brakhage as a gift. Moved by the recording and the fact that one of his films had inspired it, Brakhage asked Corner if he could make a new film with this recording as its soundtrack. The resulting film is one of Brakhage's most restrained, sparse, and beautiful. A testament to the richness and ephemerality of the theatrical viewing experience, Passage Through is a rare film which gives expansive space to its soundtrack and image, the two melding rather than supporting each other, opening up vast areas of audiovisual musicality and expression.

Thursday, June 7 – OPEN SCREEN – 8 PM
Our cinematic free-for-all dares you to share your film with the feisty EPFC audience. Any genre! Any style! New, old, work-in-progress! First come, first screened; one film per filmmaker; 10-minute maximum. DVD, VHS, mini-DV, DV-CAM, Super 8, standard 8mm, 16mm. FILMMAKERS GET IN FREE!

Friday, June 8 – FILMMAKERS ALLIANCE – canceled
This event has been canceled.

Saturday, June 9 – CINEMA INDIGENE presents A GOOD DAY TO DIE – 8 PM
All over the world Indigenous people are picking up cameras and telling their stories. Join curator Eve LaFountain for this installment of the screening series that highlights the best and most exciting works of contemporary Native made cinema and see how Native people are representing themselves, their cultures and histories on screen. This month we present A GOOD DAY TO DIE, a documentary about Ojibwa activist Dennis Banks. Dennis Banks co-founded the American Indian Movement (A.I.M.) in 1968 to call attention to the plight of urban Indians in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The film presents an intimate look at Dennis Banks' life beginning with his early experience in boarding schools, through his military service in Japan, his transformative experience in Stillwater State Prison and subsequent founding of a movement that, through confrontational actions in Washington DC, Custer South Dakota and Wounded Knee, changed the lives of American Indians forever. Produced and directed by David Mueller and Lynn Salt (Choctaw). Discussion of the film to follow.

Thursday, June 14 – ROBERT NELSON TRIBUTE SCREENING #1 – 8 PM
To celebrate the passing of the inimitable Robert Nelson (1930–2012), Mark Toscano and Echo Park Film Center will be presenting multiple programs of Bob’s work, beginning with two Nelson films which have not been seen together in decades, despite that being Bob’s original intention. The Suite California films were originally intended as a much longer, multi-part travelog throughout California. Bob completed two parts, covering Southern California and the Bay Area, and the results are formally inventive and highly affecting, functioning as travelogs that ultimately trace the vast and unpredictable area between a rich personal reading of a place and the place itself. Although both works feature Bob’s characteristic brilliant humor throughout, they are also deeply reflective and rich with unexpected, revelatory insight about his own experience of his home state. SUITE CALIFORNIA STOPS & PASSES PART 1: TIJUANA TO HOLLYWOOD VIA DEATH VALLEY (1976, b/w & color, sound, 46min.) SUITE CALIFORNIA STOPS & PASSES PART 2: SAN FRANCISCO TO THE SIERRA NEVADAS & BACK AGAIN (1978, b/w & color, sound, 48min.)

Friday, June 15 – STREET DOGS OF SOUTH CENTRAL – 8 PM
Street Dogs Of South Central is a documentary by Bill Marin. It follows the every day happenings of a mother dog and her 4 pups in the urban jungle of South Central. An unflinching look at the life of street dogs and the hardships they endure every day but it also shows the willingness of the dogs to survive and the bond they share. Narrated by Queen Latifah. Go to http://www.streetdogsmovie.com/ to view the trailer and learn more. This event is being hosted by Blue Collar Working Dog Supplies in Echo Park.

Saturday, June 16 – HOW TO BE A HOMOSEXUAL: FILMS OF ROGER JACOBY – 8 PM
"HOW TO BE A HOMOSEXUAL began, said Jacoby, as 'excerpts from a compilation journal work begun in 1979. It is an ironic title - there's nothing sexually explicit about the film.' But the film is richly sensual.... In every scene, the emulsion captures the images, enhances, then betrays, overpowers and destroys them, as the patterns and color reshape the filmed reality into a different landscape." - Kathleen Tyner, Cinematograph. Works to be screened on 16mm: How to Be a Homosexual Parts 1 & 2 and Aged in Wood.

Thursday, June 21 – NEW WORKS SALON – 8 PM
Several local and visiting artists will present new in-progress or recently completed works on Super 8, standard 8mm, and 16mm. Matt Weathers will be showing ...and then they became spirits, a Super 8 film about two people posing their questions of life to the land and drawing closer to it in anticipation of a response. Mike Stoltz will show Give Me Shapes, a Super 8 dual projection collaboration with Hannah Lew, as well as a new 16mm work in progress called Sky Slicer. Erich Burci will show his 16mm Island Woman, inspired by a Cuban avant-garde photographer and his works, the film explores the composition just as much as it explores camera movement and the medium of film itself. Other filmmakers include Camille Reyes... and more. Program details coming soon.

Friday, June 22 – 8 REELS OF SEWAGE – 8 PM
On the cusp of 1970, adult film editor Belinda Brimhouse (Jacqueline Guzman) is exhausted with the ever-surmounting tasteless film reels, piling up under command of her seedy boss, Don Arrolls (Mystic Marlow). After being fired, Belinda sets out to produce a motion picture all her own, hoping to prove to business rivals like Mr. Whiteman (Art Roberts) that she has what it takes to finish a sophisticated erotic film, without all the crudity that’s quickly becoming prominent in mainstream adult cinema. But the reality of the field and pressure from peers turns Belinda into a corrupt casting couch director, coupled with seemingly pointless mind games, innocent actresses like Janet (Samantha Poole) can hardly handle, but allow. How will Belinda prevail, with such an insisting palate, soured by new batches of uncooperative girls, all while a hired hit man is out to put a quick end to her, and her blossoming career? It’s an untamed ride through the mishaps and brawls of a “bad” B movie production, ridded with all the trash you’d hope for; numerous negligées, greasy go-gos, playful pillow fights, starved, sex-trafficked slaves, and naughty, needle pricking nurses! Everything‘s exploited! A psychological comedy compiled of piles and piles of puns that parallel real life at large. A picture destined for demeaning critical review, meant to ultimately be lost in some sin-saturated cellar, for none to view, and few to remember!

Saturday, June 23 – WE HATE EVERYTHING INCLUDING THIS FILM SERIES presents BREAKING GLASS – 8 PM
The We Hate Everything Including This Film Series continues with another night of punk rock rarities on 16mm film. First up is one of the many news magazine shows of the 1970’s that had “What is punk?” segments. This one, entitled Special Edition, is hosted by Get Smart’s Barbara Feldon and features brief clips of LA punk personalities Hellin Killer and Pleasant Gehman. The feature tonight is the relatively unknown Breaking Glass (1980), which follows performer Hazel O’Connor’s fictional rise from the UK punk dives to robotic New Wave superstar.

Thursday, June 28 – LA AIR: NANCY JEAN TUCKER – 8 PM
LA AIR is a new artist-in-residence program that invites Los Angeles filmmakers to utilize EPFC resources in creating a new work over a four-week period. Nancy Jean Tucker is a director and animator based in Los Angeles. She is originally from Louisville, Kentucky, and began making films at the California Institute of the Arts. Her films and music videos have shown around the world in such venues as the Rotterdam International Film Festival, Anthology Film Archives, Pitchfork.com,
and the Nova Scotia Museum of Art. She recently received a fellowship from Yaddo for her current film, We Let the Darkness In. For her residency at the film center, she will organize a collaborative animation project using some of her favorite Los Angeles filmmakers, as well as create new scenes for her current mixed media film. These will be screened along with the premiere of a music video she recently directed for Simone White.

Saturday, June 30 – PALMS – 8 PM
"Artur Aristakisyan’s 1993 documentary, Palms (Ladoni), has been a film cited more than seen; it’s an intensely poetic, provocative–even inspiring–account of the poor and destitute in Chisinau (formerly Kishinev), the capital of Moldova ... it was shot in handheld, black-and-white 16mm and enlarged to 35mm in an a way that makes it seem like a scratched, overly-contrasted artifact from ages past; a film about the purity of abjection that physically resembles its subject. The only soundtrack is Aristakisyan’s ruminating narration and brief snatches of Giuseppe Verdi’s soaring music. The footage was collected over the course of several years shortly after the fall of the Soviet Union and Moldova’s independence, and it could be said to be a baring of the country’s repressed soul through the tenuous lives of its vagabonds." --Doug Cummings, Film Journeys. With introduction by Ross Lipman. 1993, 139min, projected from DVD

UPCOMING CLASSES

Saturdays June 2 & 9 – STOP MOTION EXQUISITE CORPSE ANIMATION WORKSHOP! – 1 – 4 PM
Exquisite corpse is a method by which a collection of words or images is collectively assembled. Each collaborator adds to a composition in sequence, either by following a rule or by being allowed to see the end of what the previous person contributed.

During this two Saturday course, the class will create a collaborative animated work, using stop motion. Each student will be given the first and last frame of their animation, and then be able to create whatever they like within these two frames. Students should be prepared to shoot the first day, so bring anything you need with you to class. Supplies will be provided, so you don't have to bring anything, other than a desire to animate! Instructor: Nancy Jean Tucker $75/60 EPFC members. Class limited to 6 students.

Saturday, June 16– INTRO TO FINAL CUT PRO 7– 1 – 5 PM
This one-day class opens the door to the power and majesty of a digital editing program that is fast becoming the industry standard. All equipment and materials provided by EPFC. Instructor: Will O’Loughlen. Tuition: $60/$50 EPFC members.

Saturday, June 23– INTRO TO REGULAR (DOUBLE) 8MM FILMMAKING & HAND-PROCESSING – 12:30 – 5:30 PM
Using the classic home-movie format first introduced in 1932, students will explore the history, application and tender sophistication of small format filmmaking. This one-day workshop covers the basics of working with standard (or regular [or double]) 8mm film, from loading the camera, techniques for shooting, hand-processing, splicing/editing, projection, and practical information on where to get supplies for this format, which was officially discontinued in the early 1990's, but continues to be available thanks to the efforts of the devoted. No previous filmmaking experience necessary. All equipment and materials provided by EPFC.
Instructor: Rick Bahto. Tuition: $75/$60 EPFC MEMBERS.

FOLLOW US ON TWITTER: http://www.twitter.com/EPFCFilmmobile
FOLLOW US ON FACEBOOK: http://www.facebook.com/echoparkfilmcenter
http://www.facebook.com/filmmobile