Wherever the diagnosis came from, numerous critics and writers have recently been responding to the proclamation that film is dead. As of late, A.O. Scott, Roger Ebert, The Onion‘sScott Tobias, Salon.com‘s Matt Zoller Seitz, IFC’s Matt Singer, Jean-Luc Godard (about 40 years after his initial apocalyptic prophecy), director Peter Greenaway, cinematographer Roger Deakins, British artist Tacita Dean…

Martha Rosler’s 6-minute 1975 video Semiotics of the Kitchen, opens with a medium shot in which Rosler is mostly hidden behind a title chalkboard, her expressionless eyes visible just above the board.  She blinks several times.  The camera backs up until we see that she stands in a kitchen behind a small table, which is laden with various kitchen instruments.  A stove and refrigerator are visible in…

Last night, at the local premiere of Women Art Revolution, the general feeling in the Walker Theater was not one of blissful nostalgia but rather one of an uncontrollable desire to move forward. Lynn Hershman Leeson noted in the post-screening question-and-answer period that the assembled footage was but a small fraction of what she had shot over a long period of time. Given the interest in…

Since this blog-post is about the last film we have watched in this series, many of the discussions that have happened during the last two weeks will find resonance here. The film form is an issue that has kept coming back in the discussions about all the films we have been viewing. And keeping that in  mind, it is only befitting that the last film we viewed in this series is a film that is as much…

Lynn Hershman Leeson’s documentary!Women Art Revolutionpremieres this weekend, November 18-20, at the Walker Art Center. (An installation based on material collected for the film is also on display at the University of Minnesota’s Katherine E. Nash Gallery until December 3.) Over the next week, three area female artists, all members of the local arts organization mnartists.org, will be contributing…

Lynn Hershman Leeson’s documentary!Women Art Revolutionpremieres this weekend, November 18-20, at the Walker Art Center. (An installation based on material collected for the film is also on display at the University of Minnesota’s Katherine E. Nash Gallery until December 3.) Over the next week, three area female artists, all members of the local arts organization mnartists.org, will be contributing…

I always find anything on other Indigenous cultures extremely interesting. The issues surrounding what a lot of us consider to be invasion or as in this short film, whitewashing, can be intense. As always there is the premise that the indigenous population needs to be saved from their dirty, heathen ways. How can we be sure that these are the true words of the people viewed in the film? Just as there…

I really feel that the message was effectively translated by having the director, Bette Gordon, talk about it before and after. It seems to be a feminist film to display the internal power women have if they want to utilize it rather than a politically feminist film. The fact that this is film is not politically motivating makes for a more inspiring narrative. In two separate sessions of listening…

Jeanne Dielmanis a film about everyday life, yet as Hegel said, “the familiar is not necessarily the known.” Delphine Seyrig’s performance in the title role, Chantal Akerman’s script and direction, and Babette Mangolte’s cinematography recapitulate real time for the audience of the film, but the familiarity of this time never gives us clear knowledge of the psychology of the main character. I think…