Skolimowski and Kinoteka: Celebrating the 14th edition of the Kinoteka festival, this month’s film show includes an interview with Oscar winning producer Jeremy Thomas and director Jerzy Skolimowski about the latter’s work on such films as The Shout, Essential Killing, and his latest movie 11 Minutes, while writer and filmmaker Daniel Bird talks about the late Polish filmmaker Andrzej Żuławski and his translation of the director’s latest film Cosmos.
This show was first broadcast on Wednesday 20 April 2016. The Electric Sheep Film Show is broadcast every third Wednesday of the month, 8-9pm at Resonance FM 104.4. Next date: Wednesday 19 May 2016.
Kinoteka continues at various London venues until 28 April, with Skolimowski’s autobiographical trilogy screening at Close-Up between 22 and 24 April.
Ballard and the Seventies: In March, the Electric Sheep Film Show focuses on J.G. Ballard. Virginie Sélavy talks to his daughter, the artist Fay Ballard, as well as director Harley Cokeliss, who made the first film version of Crash featuring J.G. Ballard for the BBC in 1971, and director Ben Wheatley, who discusses his long-awaited adaptation of High-Rise, which is out on general release in UK cinemas on 18 March 2016.
High-Rise is released in the UK on VOD on 11 July and will be available on DVD + Blu-ray from 18 July 2016.
Listen to an on-stage conversation between Alex Fitch and three members of the production team behind Ben Wheatley’s adaptation of J.G. Ballard’s High Rise.
The Electric Sheep Film Show is broadcast every third Wednesday of the month, 8-9pm at Resonance FM 104.4. Next date: Wednesday 20 April 2016.
This show was first broadcast on Wednesday 16 March 2016.
The 1960s-70s saw copious amounts of on-screen self-flagellation, brutal witch-hunting, delirious possessions and sadistic exorcisms, culminating into the so-called ‘nunsploitation’ genre. Beyond the desire to shock and titillate, many of these films, most notably Ken Russell’s The Devils (1971), were part of the time’s questioning of all power structures, pitching repressive, corrupt and hypocritical religious authorities against individual freedom and morality. In particular, films such as Gianfranco Mingozzi’s Flavia the Heretic (1974) denounced the oppression of women in patriarchal society, and pictured their revolt through disobedience and deviant sexuality. This deviant sexuality was also sometimes part of an alternative form of worship connected to natural forces, as in Juan López Moctezuma’s Alucarda (1977). For Moctezuma, as for his fellow Panique associate Alejandro Jodorowsky, spiritual initiation involved an element of violence, although not the same kind of violence as that of the Catholic Church, as depicted in many of these films. The lecture will explore the various ways in which desire, cruelty, power and religion are configured in the cinema of the period.
Please note there will be no admission after the lecture has started at 7.30pm.
About the instructor
Virginie Sélavy is the founder and editor of Electric Sheep, the online magazine for transgressive cinema. She has edited the collection of essays The End: An Electric Sheep Anthology, and has contributed to World Directory Cinema: Eastern Europe and written about Victorian London in Film Locations: Cities of the Imagination – London. Her work has appeared in various publications, including Sight&Sound, Rolling Stone France, Cineaste and Frieze.
About the Miskatonic Institute:
Named for the fictional university in H.P. Lovecraft’s literary mythos, The Miskatonic Institute of Horror Studies is a non-profit, community-based organization that started in Canada, founded by Kier-La Janisse in March of 2010. The school currently has branches in Montreal and London, with Miskatonic London operating under the co-direction of Kier-La Janisse and Electric Sheep Founder/Editor Virginie Sélavy.
All classes take place at the historic Horse Hospital, the heart of the city’s underground culture. Individual class tickets are £10 advance / £11 on the door / £8 concessions and will be available 30 days in advance of each class. Season tickets are £40.
The course dates of the Spring 2016 semester are 7 January, 11 February, 10 March, 14 April, 12 May. For the full details of the course please check the Miskatonic website. For all enquiries, please email Miskatonic.london[at]gmail.com.
Frankenstein revived, Superman Lives: In the February Film Show, Virginie Sélavy and Alex Fitch talk to Jasper Sharp, the artistic director of the Asia House Film Festival, which runs from 22 Feb to 5 March. Also on the show, the actor Tony Todd discusses Bernard Rose’s new adaptation of Frankenstein, while director (Jon Schnepp) and producers (Holly Payne, Robert Pierce) talk about their documentary The Death of Superman Lives.
The Electric Sheep Film Show is broadcast every third Wednesday of the month, 8-9pm at Resonance FM 104.4. Next date: Wednesday 16 March 2016.
This show was first broadcast on Wednesday 17 February 2016.
We continue our partnership with Rich Pickings for their series of science and film events, which bring together filmmakers and scientists to explore various aspects of the human experience. View a list of all events in this series here.
A screening of ’70s masterpiece The Parallax View and discussion with experts in conspiracy theory psychology and cinema.
The Parallax View (Dir. Alan J Pakula, 1h38m, Cert 15)
Newspaper reporter Joe Frady (Warren Beatty) begins investigating the assassination of a presidential candidate from several years ago, and is drawn into a dangerous world of conspiracy and cover-up. Going undercover and assuming a new identity, he finds himself at the centre of a new and terrifying plot…
The screening is followed by a panel discussion on some of the themes in the film, and its political and creative context. Speakers include Prof. Karen Douglas, Professor of Social Psychology at the University of Kent, who studies the psychology of conspiracy theories and the social consequences of conspiracism as well as Dr David Archibald, Senior Lecturer in Theatre, Film and Television Studies at University of Glasgow.
Now in it’s 66th year, the Berlinale opens on 11 February 2016 with Hail, Caesar! , the latest offering by Joel and Ethan Coen, starring George Clooney and other Hollywood greats, which sets the tone for a star-studded festival that still promises to offer plenty of discoveries, some true gems and real treasures across the sidebars as well as in the main Competition line-up.
Screening in Competition, we particularly look forward to Midnight Special by Jeff Nichols, director of Mud and Take Shelter. Starring his long-time collaborator Michael Shannon in another leading role, the film centres on a father and son who go on the run after the dad learns his child possesses special powers. Also competing for a Golden Bear are Boris Without Béatrice, from Denis Côté, who presented his eccentric debut Vic + Flo Saw A Bear at the 2013 Berlinale, Bosnian director Danis Tanović’s Death In Sarajevo (aka Looking For Europe), a film based on the play by French philosopher and writer Bernard-Henri Levy, and Thomas Vinterberg’s The Commune, which centres on a Danish commune in the 1970s.
Spike Lee’s Chi-Raq, a modern day adaptation of the ancient Greek play Lysistrata by Aristophanes, will play out of competition, alogside Dominik Moll’s News From Planet Mars, his long-awaited follow-up to The Monk. Plus, we look forward to the latest from Kiyoshi Kurosawa, Creepy, which screens in the Berlinale Special strand.
Under the title “Hachimiri Madness – Japanese Indies from the Punk Years”, the Forum is showing a special programme of newly digitised and subtitled Japanese 8-mm films from 1977 to 1990 which breathe the rebellious spirit of that era, very few of them have ever been shown internationally. The series includes Sion Sono’s I am Sion Sono!!, in which the then 22-year-old introduced himself to audiences as a punk poet in nonchalant, self-confident style, and Shinya Tsukamoto’s The Adventure of Denchu-Kozo, a hugely creative, wild cyberpunk drama, while also taking in the largely unknown early works of directors such as Sogo Ishii (today Gakuryu Ishii) and Shinobu Yaguchi, alongside Masashi Yamamoto’s anarchic feature debut Saint Terrorism and Nobuhiro Suwa’s gangster ballad Hanasaseru Gang.
The Berlinale Classics section will open with Fritz Lang’s 1921 silent film classic Der müde Tod (Destiny), presented in a digitally restored version and with new music, which will be performed live by the Radio Symphony Orchestra Berlin. Also screening in the strand are John Huston’s classic Fat City (1972), The Road Back (1937) directed by James Whale, and Heiner Carow’s East German semi-autobiographical film Die Russen kommen (The Russians are Coming, 1968), which is set in the waning days of World War II and was originally banned before completion by the GDR authorities.
Pamela Jahn
For more information about the programme and how to book tickets visit the Berlinale website.
Brain Pickings and Cigarette Burns: Virginie Sélavy and Alex Fitch talk to Rich Pickings director Carla MacKinnon, about their new series of science and art events titled Inside Out, which explore the human experience through film and discussion. They also talk to Josh Saco, head of celluloid promotion outfit Cigarette Burns, about their Twisted Valentine screening of 1965 seedy gem Who Killed Teddy Bear at the Barbican Cinema. Plus, an interview with female-centred erotic filmmaker Erika Lust.
The Electric Sheep Film Show is broadcast every third Wednesday of the month, 8-9pm at Resonance FM 104.4. Next date: Wednesday 17 February 2016.
This show was first broadcast on Wednesday 20 January 2016.
Following on a sold-out class on the work of sci-fi author J.G. Ballard with visiting instructor Jack Sargeant earlier this month, the Miskatonic Institute of Horror Studies – London returns in February with a special instalment of ‘Live From Miskatonic’, featuring director John Hough in an extensive on-stage interview with Filmbar70 curator Justin Harries.
From 60s TV series The Avangers and salacious Hammer Horror Twins of Evil to 70s gearhead staple Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry and children’s classics Escape to Witch Mountain and The Watcher in the Woods, British filmmaker John Hough has had an eclectic and storied career behind the camera. He considers himself a craftsman rather than an auteur, but is responsible for some of the most beloved films in horror history – most notably his 1973 adaptation of Richard Matheson’s novel Hell House.
In this special instalment of ‘Live from Miskatonic’, Hough will participate in a lengthy on-stage conversation with our guest interviewer Justin Harries, the curator of London’s popular FILMBAR70. The conversation will cover Hough’s early television career, his work with Hammer Films and Disney, his interactions with 1970s renegade Hollywood and his work with screen giants such as Orson Welles, Roddy McDowell, John Cassavetes, Max Von Sydow, Sophia Loren, Rod Steiger and so many more. The talk will be punctuated by film clips and there will be a Q+A period following the formal discussion.
Watch the trailer for Miskatonic London’s Spring 2016 semester:
About the instructor
Justin Harries is the co-creator and curator of Filmbar70, a London based film-club that specialises in screening anomalies drawn from the last gasp of European genre cinema, and has contributed visual and written essays to a number of DVD releases – especially those that lean toward the more glamourous side of the giallo genre. He also makes up approximately 50% of ‘The Carpenters’ (a John Carpenter tribute band) and is a member of ‘The Begotten’, a collective providing improvised sonics to E. Elias Merhige’s avant-splatter flick.
About the Miskatonic Institute:
Named for the fictional university in H.P. Lovecraft’s literary mythos, The Miskatonic Institute of Horror Studies is a non-profit, community-based organization that started in Canada, founded by Kier-La Janisse in March of 2010. The school currently has branches in Montreal and London, with Miskatonic London operating under the co-direction of Kier-La Janisse and Electric Sheep Founder/Editor Virginie Sélavy.
All classes take place at the historic Horse Hospital, the heart of the city’s underground culture. Individual class tickets are £10 advance / £11 on the door / £8 concessions and will be available 30 days in advance of each class. Season tickets are £40 and will be available shortly.
The course dates of the Spring semester are 7 January, 11 February, 10 March, 14 April, 12 May. For the full details of the course please check the Miskatonic website. For all enquiries, please email Miskatonic.london[at]gmail.com.
We are proud to announce an exciting new partnership with Rich Pickings for their new series of science and film events, Inside Out, which brings together filmmakers and scientists to explore various aspects of the human experience. Each event will be announced and documented on the Electric Sheep website. The first event in the series, Life After Life, was presented as part of this year’s London Short Film Festival. Below is Rich Pickings’ report of the event.
View a list of all events in this series here.
Life after Life was a short film and discussion event presented by Rich Pickings at London Short Film Festival 2016 on 16 January 2016 at the ICA.
The event examined the phenomenon of Near Death Experiences (NDEs) and how they can affect people’s lives. The programme featured a programme of short poetic films about life, death and what may or may not lie beyond. This was a jumping off point into a discussion with two guests with very different approaches to the subject.
Christopher French is Professor of Psychology and Co-coordinator of the Anomalistic Psychology Research Unit at Goldsmiths, University of London. Chris presented some of the scientific research that has been done around NDEs, looking at recurring patterns in people’s accounts and biological explanations for the experiences people report. French particularly focused on the out-of-body elements of the NDE, as this is one of the more measurable and replicable components common to the experience.
Raymond O’Brien experienced a NDE during a cardiac arrest five years ago, an incident that profoundly affected him. In the years since, Raymond has experienced huge highs and huge lows, and the emotional journey he has taken since his NDE mean that his experience has become a core part of his identity and his understanding of the world. O’Brien was generous enough to share his experience and interpretation of it with us, offering a unique insight into both his experience of an NDE and life following it.
The short films were a diverse mix of live action, animation, documentary and experimental moving image. They explored one man’s desire to confront the wilderness and conquer a mountain, and another’s powerful connection with the giant redwoods of California following a brush with death. Real life and fictional accounts of NDEs painted a vivid picture of the fear, regret, acceptance, love and transcendence that a person may experience in the moment of their death.
One theme that emerged strongly throughout the event was the human drive to hold onto life. Whether an NDE has a traumatic or positive effect on an individual’s identity, it seems that the impact is universally life-altering. The encounters with death that were presented were visceral and affecting, and while elements of the experience were repeated, each at its core was utterly unique.
Watch an edited video of the discussion with Christopher French and Raymond O’Brien:
Skolimowski and Kinoteka: Celebrating the 14th edition of the Kinoteka festival, this month’s film show includes an interview with Oscar winning producer Jeremy Thomas and director Jerzy Skolimowski about the latter’s work on such films as The Shout, Essential Killing, and his latest movie 11 Minutes, while writer and filmmaker Daniel Bird talks about the late Polish filmmaker Andrzej Żuławski and his translation of the director’s latest film Cosmos. 
