All Films

Part of the Struggle: Art and Politics in the Weimar Republic

1985 • 36 min

Early last century, many German artists like George Grosz, Emil Nolde and Otto Dix became politically involved. This film uses their art and their own words to explore a volatile period in Germany.

An Expression

1985 • 9 min • Japan

This is a work that measures the brightness of an image from a photodetector and generates music from that brightness while sampling various facial expressions automatically.

Ringrada

1985 • 17 min • Soviet Union

About men whose lives and work are motorcycles, racing to the brink of risk. We watch them on the circuit, in a pit box and in workshops together with teammates and mechanics preparing their competition bikes.

Battle of the Guitars

1985 • 16 min

This is one of three short films in the Living Texas Blues series. Battle of the Guitars shows the ranging influence of Aaron "T-Bone" Walker throught the performance of Pete Mayes and Joe Hughes at the Doll House Club in Houston.

Aktion Ganymed

1985 • 23 min • East Germany

A short sci-fi youth project film.

Maestro bez frakas

1985 • 57 min • Soviet Union

The composer Raimonds Pauls, the artist of the USSR People's Stage, shares his thoughts on life and work. The authors focus on the difficult daily work of a talented artist.

Tale Enclosure

1985 • 6 min

Returning to the primal source of language, Hill explores the physical and subconscious origins of speech. In a continuous shot of a rhythmic, linguistically inspired chant-performance by George Quasha and George Stein, the camera wanders from mouth to face to hands to figure in an open-ended visual search. The performers use the body as an acoustic instrument of sound and abstract utterances.

Galapagos

1985 • 10 min • Poland

Short ecological satire animation.

The Great Chastity Experiment

1985 • 23 min

Focuses on teenage relations and sex and suggests that real closeness and intimacy can be achieved through shared experiences other than sexual intercourse.

Trong Thư Viện

1985 • 7 min • Vietnam

A day at the library

I Like To Read While I'm Drivin

1985 • 2 min

Animated short with music, the title says it all

Journey to the Wall

1985 • 25 min

Travelogue depicting a road trip from Stockholm to the Berlin wall. The film is mostly shot from a car window but includes found footage as well.

If This Ain't Heaven

1985 • 28 min

If This Ain’t Heaven introduces us to Mr. G, a 50-year-old Black man, and his cat, Africa, he both talks to and talks for, alleviating his loneliness through these conversations and deep friendship.

Neglītais pīlēns-cilvēka bērns

1985 • 20 min • Soviet Union

About Andris Grīnbergs, a drawing teacher at Mazirbe Boarding School, and his students.

Jiazi Saves the Deer

1985 • 20 min

The young boy who lived in the deep mountains since his childhood is kind-hearted. He not only respects his parents very much, but also loves the small animals in the forest like a family. One day, the king took a hunting team into the mountain to hunt. He couldn't bear to see the peaceful forest being destroyed and quickly helped the birds, squirrels, deer and other animals escape.

Fantasy Transmission

1985 • 2 min

Before cell phones, modems, and the internet, some folks tapped their sexual fantasies in Morse Code.

Rock Heart Fire

1985 • 17 min • Australia

Shot mostly at Uluru, the rock in the heart of Australia. The extreme heat damaged the emulsion of the film which is subsequently incised by the filmmaker. A ceremonial death and rebirth. The soundtrack was made by the Orchestra of Skin and Bone comprising of Ollie Olsen and John Murphy. The aborigines were from Narwietooma Station. 16mm.

Winds

1985 • 6 min • Japan

16mm to digital, 6'00

What Is This

1985 • 9 min • United States of America

With the aid of the Computer Department at Rutgers University, Montañez Ortiz devised a software interface that allowed him to digitize a videotape by scratching it forward and backward, completely disrupting its temporality.

Shimmer

1985 • 9 min • United States of America

"This work was recorded during a live performance (1985) in front of an audience. It was created with custom built hardware and software in "real time" using a single b/w live camera input. The props used were retro-reflective sticks and wrist bands that were "waved" or "manipulated" [...] The music "Hikari" was not performed live. We worked live to the prerecorded track by Maggi Payne. She created it specifically for these performances." -ET

The Magic Box

1985 • 1 min • Norway

The vignette Tryllekassen (1985) by Inside Karine Melbye was in use for so many years that it is probably Norway's most watched animated film.

Dusk

1985 • 4 min • Japan

A uniquely psychedelic animation of sordid and chaotic images.

Ocular

1985 • 5 min

In close proximity, through slow movements of the camera, the eye becomes an unknown organic planet floating in black space. The delicate double exposure does not disturb the clarity of its patient, strictly black-and-white gaze, which works its way through hairs and eyelashes, through pores and wrinkles, crevices, and craters.

Vision

1985 • 3 min

"...No photographed images. All handmade. It's all these squares, lines. The main techniques were bleaching and dyeing and sticking letraset material to the film strip. The images don't rush: they much more fold over the top of one another. Palimpsest. Using the pos/neg flickering helps to sustain the images..." – D.B. from "Where's Our Satellite," Melbourne, Australia (1985)