Thundercrack!
Directed by Curt McDowell
Written by George Kuchar
USA, 1975
When one looks at the underground cult film scene of the 1960s and 1970s, the names Mike Kuchar and George Kuchar definitely come to mind. Twin-brothers who have spent the majority of their lives making short films, Mike and George utilized over-the-top titles and experimental storylines, all of the home movie variety shot on a rather “stylized” no-budget that Ed Wood would’ve been jealous of. Mike Kuchar’s work seemed to be inspired by pop genre films with a dash or two of wild fantasy: his best known film (well, best known in regards to the underground) is Sins of the Fleshapoids (1965), a trippy sci-fi/fantasy whatsit, all shot in color 16mm inside various rooms with limited art direction, utilizing dubbed-in narration and on-screen dialogue represented by optical cartoon-like speech-bubbles, and cribbing some music cues of Bernard Herrmann’s...
Directed by Curt McDowell
Written by George Kuchar
USA, 1975
When one looks at the underground cult film scene of the 1960s and 1970s, the names Mike Kuchar and George Kuchar definitely come to mind. Twin-brothers who have spent the majority of their lives making short films, Mike and George utilized over-the-top titles and experimental storylines, all of the home movie variety shot on a rather “stylized” no-budget that Ed Wood would’ve been jealous of. Mike Kuchar’s work seemed to be inspired by pop genre films with a dash or two of wild fantasy: his best known film (well, best known in regards to the underground) is Sins of the Fleshapoids (1965), a trippy sci-fi/fantasy whatsit, all shot in color 16mm inside various rooms with limited art direction, utilizing dubbed-in narration and on-screen dialogue represented by optical cartoon-like speech-bubbles, and cribbing some music cues of Bernard Herrmann’s...
- 1/20/2016
- by Christopher Koenig
- SoundOnSight
Curt McDowell and George Kuchar's comedy epic of oversexed sensationalists running amuck while trapped in a storm-battered house goes beyond strange. It's a legit experimental film but -- gasp! -- also 2.5 hours of hardcore porn and other forms of giddy depravity. A movie guaranteed to make conservative heads explode -- read with caution, please! Thundercrack! Blu-ray Synapse Films 1975 / B&W /1:33 flat full frame / 160 min. / Street Date December 8, 2015 / 39.95 Starring Marion Eaton, Melinda McDowell, George Kuchar, Mookie Blodgett, Ken Scudder, Bernie Boyle, Mark Ellinger, Laurie Hendricks, John Thomas. Cinematography & Film Editor Curt McDowell Makeup Mr. Dominic Original Music Mark Ellinger Written by Mark Ellinger, George Kuchar, Curt McDowell Produced by Charles Thomas, John Thomas Directed by Curt McDowell
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
*Not your usual Savant review.* As a student in the 1970s I worked as an usher at a couple of Filmex exhibitions at Grauman's Chinese. I then volunteered...
Reviewed by Glenn Erickson
*Not your usual Savant review.* As a student in the 1970s I worked as an usher at a couple of Filmex exhibitions at Grauman's Chinese. I then volunteered...
- 12/19/2015
- by Glenn Erickson
- Trailers from Hell
December 8th is a light week in terms of horror and sci-fi home entertainment releases, but for all you X-Philes out there, this Tuesday is pretty much like second Christmas, as 20th Century Fox is releasing The X-Files series in its entirety in a Collector’s Edition Blu-ray set (complete with a space for the upcoming TV event series in January).
Other notable titles being released this week include Knock Knock, Ant-Man, and the cult classics Thundercrack and Women’s Prison Massacre.
Knock Knock (Lionsgate Blu/Digital HD & DVD/Digital)
When a devoted husband and father is left home alone for the weekend, two stranded young women unexpectedly knock on his door for help. What starts out as a kind gesture results in a dangerous seduction and a deadly game of cat and mouse. A sexy new thriller from director Eli Roth, Knock Knock stars Keanu Reeves as the family...
Other notable titles being released this week include Knock Knock, Ant-Man, and the cult classics Thundercrack and Women’s Prison Massacre.
Knock Knock (Lionsgate Blu/Digital HD & DVD/Digital)
When a devoted husband and father is left home alone for the weekend, two stranded young women unexpectedly knock on his door for help. What starts out as a kind gesture results in a dangerous seduction and a deadly game of cat and mouse. A sexy new thriller from director Eli Roth, Knock Knock stars Keanu Reeves as the family...
- 12/8/2015
- by Heather Wixson
- DailyDead
There was a time when two veteran straight actors such as John Lithgow and Alfred Molina, taking on the roles of a gay couple and their subsequent travails at married life would have been the tabloid equivalent of shock and awe. It still might raise some eyebrows, but Ira Sachs’ Love Is Strange is a testimony to societal progress in terms of storytelling. Now it will face the box office as the Specialty title platforms this weekend via Sony Classics. A real-life gay marriage takes the spotlight this weekend courtesy of Starz Digital doc To Be Takei about the multi-faceted actor/activist and social media talent who is best known for playing Hikaru Sulu in TV’s original Star Trek. It will be joined by Millennium Entertainment’s Are You Here with Owen Wilson, Zach Galifianakis and Amy Poehler which will open day and date by Mad Men writer Matthew Weiner.
- 8/22/2014
- by Brian Brooks
- Deadline
To Be Takei is an entertaining and moving look at the many roles played by eclectic 76-year-old actor/activist George Takei whose wit, humor and grace has allowed him to become an internationally beloved figure.
It balances unprecedented access to the day-to-day life of George and his husband/business partner Brad Takei with George’s fascinating personal journey, from his childhood in a Japanese American internment camp, to his iconic and groundbreaking role as Sulu on “Star Trek,” through his rise as an internet phenomenon with over 6-million Facebook likes.
From director Jennifer M. Kroot, this insightful film features interviews with George Takei, Brad Takei, William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, Nichelle Nichols, Dan Savage, and Walter Koenig.
The documentary premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2014, played in St. Louis at Q Fest in April and opens in select cities, VOD platforms and iTunes on August 22nd.
Recently I spoke...
It balances unprecedented access to the day-to-day life of George and his husband/business partner Brad Takei with George’s fascinating personal journey, from his childhood in a Japanese American internment camp, to his iconic and groundbreaking role as Sulu on “Star Trek,” through his rise as an internet phenomenon with over 6-million Facebook likes.
From director Jennifer M. Kroot, this insightful film features interviews with George Takei, Brad Takei, William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, Nichelle Nichols, Dan Savage, and Walter Koenig.
The documentary premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2014, played in St. Louis at Q Fest in April and opens in select cities, VOD platforms and iTunes on August 22nd.
Recently I spoke...
- 8/20/2014
- by Michelle McCue
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Starz Digital Media announced Thursday the George Takei documentary To Be Takei will debut July 3 on DirecTV and will run exclusively on the platform until Aug. 5. On Aug. 22, To Be Takei will be released theatrically in the United States and Canada and will also be available on all major video on demand outlets on that date.
To Be Takei, which premiered at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival, offers “an entertaining and moving look at the many roles played by eclectic 77-year old actor/activist George Takei,” states a press release. Written and directed by Jennifer M. Kroot (It Came From Kuchar...
To Be Takei, which premiered at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival, offers “an entertaining and moving look at the many roles played by eclectic 77-year old actor/activist George Takei,” states a press release. Written and directed by Jennifer M. Kroot (It Came From Kuchar...
- 6/19/2014
- by Chancellor Agard
- EW.com - PopWatch
Once known only as the enterprising Mr. Sulu on the initial iteration of “Star Trek,” George Takei has since blossomed into so much more. Jennifer M. Kroot’s decently entertaining if somewhat one-note portrait “To Be Takei” tracks the Asian-American actor’s transition from supporting player to major pop culture figure, emphasizing his late career emergence as a modern gay icon. Though not as sophisticated look at creativity found in Kroot’s Kuchar brothers documentary “It Came From Kuchar,” the new movie similarly goes down easy by letting its affable subject lead the way. Now almost as popular for his amusing Facebook posts as his original “Star Trek” performances, Takei makes for a genial screen presence as Kroot’s movie capably acknowledges his contemporary appeal even while adding nothing new. Mainly pairing interviews with Takei, his family, friends and colleagues alongside footage from his recent public appearances, “To Be Takei...
- 1/19/2014
- by Eric Kohn
- Indiewire
This Week’s Must Read is actually a series of reads. If you haven’t been following the One+One Filmmakers Journal new blog, you’ve been missing some of the best new writing on underground film past and present on the web. They’re really turning themselves into an invaluable resource over there. This past week they’ve run a great primer on Barbara Hammer, a review of the documentary It Came From Kuchar, and a piece on dissident filmmaking.Brooklyn’s Light Industry screening room also has a new blog up, which is now required reading. Recently, they posted up the legendary 1971 issue of Artforum that was devoted to underground film.Robert Maier has an awesome story about a Baltimore-based underground film not directed by John Waters, but was to have featured Divine. Alas, the project fell through and it wasn’t to be. It was called Vacancy.
- 9/2/2012
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
Female filmmakers in the sci-fi and fantasy genre will be celebrated with the first ever Etheria Film Festival, to be held in September 2012.
Etheria is the brainchild of film journalist Heidi Honeycutt and the Viscera Organisation, a not-for-profit group dedicated to increasing the visibility of female genre filmmakers.
Last month, the Viscera Film Festival Carpet Ceremony put the spotlight on up-and-coming women directors in the horror genre with a programme of new short films and a celebrity judging panel of industry veterans.
A Viscera spokeswoman said: "The Viscera Film Festival has been showcasing the best in emerging female horror film talent since 2007.
"But why stop with horror? There are talented women filmmakers across every genre. The Etheria Film Festival is the only film festival in the world that screens, exclusively, the best new short science fiction and fantasy films directed by women from around the globe."
Etheria is co-presented by...
Etheria is the brainchild of film journalist Heidi Honeycutt and the Viscera Organisation, a not-for-profit group dedicated to increasing the visibility of female genre filmmakers.
Last month, the Viscera Film Festival Carpet Ceremony put the spotlight on up-and-coming women directors in the horror genre with a programme of new short films and a celebrity judging panel of industry veterans.
A Viscera spokeswoman said: "The Viscera Film Festival has been showcasing the best in emerging female horror film talent since 2007.
"But why stop with horror? There are talented women filmmakers across every genre. The Etheria Film Festival is the only film festival in the world that screens, exclusively, the best new short science fiction and fantasy films directed by women from around the globe."
Etheria is co-presented by...
- 7/23/2012
- by David Bentley
- The Geek Files
The name George Kuchar (right, with Marion Eaton in Thundercrack!) will probably not ring a bell to the vast majority of moviegoers anywhere in the world. Yet, Kuchar, who died of cancer last night, September 6, directed more than 200 movies — mostly shorts and video productions — from the mid-1950s to the late 2000s. The New York-born (Aug. 31, 1942) Kuchar brothers' penchant for experimental, micro-budget underground films with bizarre plots and characters would inspire the likes of John Waters in the '70s. “The Kuchar brothers,” Waters wrote in the introduction to the Kuchars' memoirs Reflections in a Cinematic Cesspool, “gave me the self confidence to believe in my own tawdry vision.” Of course, whether or not that's a good thing depends on whether or not you appreciate Waters' "tawdriness." As for George Kuchar, among his efforts, solo or with his twin brother Mike Kuchar, are A Bathtub Named Desire (1956), The Naked and...
- 9/7/2011
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
If you've never seen a movie by the Kuchar Brothers, you really should. When George and Mike Kuchar were in their heyday, their work was the epitome of 1960s underground cinema: 8mm, no budget, wild ideas, wilder content. Unless you went to film school or lived near a cool theater or museum? They were almost impossible to see. Now? They're a click away on YouTube. Which is the perfect forum for the Kuchars' work: it's short, low-fi, and bursting with energy and ideas. In a way, the Kuchars were YouTube before YouTube. They didn't go to film school. They got a camera as a gift when they were 12 and just started shooting.
Sadly, David Hudson over at The Daily reports that George Kuchar passed away last night at the age of 69. Kuchar made his first movies with his brother in the 1950s and basically never stopped. His Wikipedia page says he directed over 200 films,...
Sadly, David Hudson over at The Daily reports that George Kuchar passed away last night at the age of 69. Kuchar made his first movies with his brother in the 1950s and basically never stopped. His Wikipedia page says he directed over 200 films,...
- 9/7/2011
- by Matt Singer
- ifc.com
Above is a video intro George Kuchar made for a retrospective of his films in Los Angeles in 2008. The video does show off George’s offbeat humor, calling the piece “The Man Behind the Film” and then hiding his face behind the image of a filmstrip.
George Kuchar has, of course, been making underground films since the early 1950s. He began his career working with his twin brother Mike, making campy, but loving, spoofs of Hollywood melodramas when the two were teenagers growing up in NYC.
Eventually, the brothers went in their own directions and George moved to the West Coast to become a film professor at the San Francisco Art Institute. At the school, George began collaborating with his students to direct no-budget, largely improvised films. Outside the classroom, he would obsessively videotape events in his life, including the trips he would take regularly to the midwest to witness tornadoes and other weather phenomenon.
George Kuchar has, of course, been making underground films since the early 1950s. He began his career working with his twin brother Mike, making campy, but loving, spoofs of Hollywood melodramas when the two were teenagers growing up in NYC.
Eventually, the brothers went in their own directions and George moved to the West Coast to become a film professor at the San Francisco Art Institute. At the school, George began collaborating with his students to direct no-budget, largely improvised films. Outside the classroom, he would obsessively videotape events in his life, including the trips he would take regularly to the midwest to witness tornadoes and other weather phenomenon.
- 8/5/2011
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
Filmmaker Bob Moricz has reported that legendary underground film actor Bob Cowan has passed away. While Bad Lit: The Journal of Underground Film hasn’t completely confirmed the report, it appears that Cowan died on Tuesday, June 23, in his home in Toronto, Canada. He is survived by his wife Jane.
Cowan was a regular performer and collaborator with the filmmakers George and Mike Kuchar, and is most well-known as starring as the robot Xar in the classic film Sins of the Fleshapoids. (Pictured) But, more than just acting in the movie, Cowan also served as the film’s narrator and assembled its memorable music score.
In the ’60s and ’70s, Cowan was one of a few underground film acting “superstars,” along with performers such as Taylor Mead, Jack Smith, Gerard Malanga, Mario Montez and Donna Kerness.
Other Kuchar films Cowan appeared in were George’s Lust for Ecstasy and The...
Cowan was a regular performer and collaborator with the filmmakers George and Mike Kuchar, and is most well-known as starring as the robot Xar in the classic film Sins of the Fleshapoids. (Pictured) But, more than just acting in the movie, Cowan also served as the film’s narrator and assembled its memorable music score.
In the ’60s and ’70s, Cowan was one of a few underground film acting “superstars,” along with performers such as Taylor Mead, Jack Smith, Gerard Malanga, Mario Montez and Donna Kerness.
Other Kuchar films Cowan appeared in were George’s Lust for Ecstasy and The...
- 6/23/2011
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
Tomorrow might be Valentine’s Day, but how about showing these great sites some love today?
To start things off on an inappropriately sleazy note: The Phantom of Pulp has several awesome — and one extra incredible — poster for one of my favorite horror movies, Maniac. “Underground film” means different things all over the world. In China, it just means government-repressed artists just trying to express themselves. Candlelight Stories has the full documentary Digital Underground in the People’s Republic by Rachel Tejada. Kimberly Chun as a lengthy dip into the current San Francisco experimental film scene on the site Bold Italic. Not sure what it is recently, but I keep digging up classic Chicago Underground Film Festival info. This week it’s the poster from their 4th edition designed by acclaimed graphic novelist Chris Ware. That’s from 1997 when the special guests were John Waters and Beth B. Also from...
To start things off on an inappropriately sleazy note: The Phantom of Pulp has several awesome — and one extra incredible — poster for one of my favorite horror movies, Maniac. “Underground film” means different things all over the world. In China, it just means government-repressed artists just trying to express themselves. Candlelight Stories has the full documentary Digital Underground in the People’s Republic by Rachel Tejada. Kimberly Chun as a lengthy dip into the current San Francisco experimental film scene on the site Bold Italic. Not sure what it is recently, but I keep digging up classic Chicago Underground Film Festival info. This week it’s the poster from their 4th edition designed by acclaimed graphic novelist Chris Ware. That’s from 1997 when the special guests were John Waters and Beth B. Also from...
- 2/13/2011
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
Meet the most dangerous man in America. Way before the Yes Men, Alan Abel was duping the media with all kinds of outrageous hoaxes. From trying to clothe animals to running a school for beggars to protesting against breast feeding, nobody, but nobody, could pull the wool over the public’s eyes like Abel. And, entering into his sunset years — he’s still at it! Calling radio stations, writing fake editorials, handing out outrageous flyers, Alan Abel couldn’t stop pulling hoaxes if he tried. His life and wacko career is intimately profiled in the documentary Abel Raises Cain by someone who knows his tricks and scams all too well: His daughter Jenny Abel.
This is a very loving documentary. Jenny is obviously very close to her father and her mother, so the documentary doesn’t really explore any negative aspects to Abel’s stunts, if there are any. Although...
This is a very loving documentary. Jenny is obviously very close to her father and her mother, so the documentary doesn’t really explore any negative aspects to Abel’s stunts, if there are any. Although...
- 1/30/2011
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
While there hasn’t been an explosion of documentaries made about the great underground filmmakers, the fact that any have been made about these groundbreaking, but still mostly obscure to the general public, directors seems like a great accomplishment.
Plus, these seven documentaries listed below are all available for easy viewing on DVD or VOD, which is more than can be said for many of the subjects’ actual movies.
Jack Smith and the Destruction of Atlantis, dir. Mary Jordan. (Amazon | Netflix) Jack Smith is one of the most complicated figures in underground film history, but Jordan’s documentary provides an in-depth portrait of this reclusive artist who ended up alienating his closest friends and ardent supporters. Turning his back on the film world after directing one of the most notorious movies ever made, Flaming Creatures, Smith would go on to be an admired performance artist who would act sporadically in others’ art films.
Plus, these seven documentaries listed below are all available for easy viewing on DVD or VOD, which is more than can be said for many of the subjects’ actual movies.
Jack Smith and the Destruction of Atlantis, dir. Mary Jordan. (Amazon | Netflix) Jack Smith is one of the most complicated figures in underground film history, but Jordan’s documentary provides an in-depth portrait of this reclusive artist who ended up alienating his closest friends and ardent supporters. Turning his back on the film world after directing one of the most notorious movies ever made, Flaming Creatures, Smith would go on to be an admired performance artist who would act sporadically in others’ art films.
- 1/10/2011
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
Dec. 7 & 8
7:30 p.m.
Clinton Street Theater
2522 Southeast Clinton Street
Portland, Or 97202
Hosted by: Cinema Project
For their last screening for 2010, Portland’s Cinema Project celebrates the art of melodrama with a selection of both new and classic underground films and videos curated by Cinema Project‘s co-founder Pablo De Ocampo.
Each of the five short films selected all “pursue the melodramatic and use it as the basis for exploring cinematic narrative,” according to De Ocampo. However, stylistically, the films couldn’t be more different.
The films range from Bruce Baillie‘s actor-less, single-take left-ward pan All My Life (1966) to the disconnected couple in Keren Cytter’s Four Seasons (2009) to Ming Wong’s Angst Essen / Eat Fear (2008), a recasting of Fassbinder’s Ali, Fear Eats the Soul; to Laida Lertxundi‘s desert-set Footnotes to a House of Love (2007) to George Kuchar‘s short musical Pussy on a Hot Tin Roof...
7:30 p.m.
Clinton Street Theater
2522 Southeast Clinton Street
Portland, Or 97202
Hosted by: Cinema Project
For their last screening for 2010, Portland’s Cinema Project celebrates the art of melodrama with a selection of both new and classic underground films and videos curated by Cinema Project‘s co-founder Pablo De Ocampo.
Each of the five short films selected all “pursue the melodramatic and use it as the basis for exploring cinematic narrative,” according to De Ocampo. However, stylistically, the films couldn’t be more different.
The films range from Bruce Baillie‘s actor-less, single-take left-ward pan All My Life (1966) to the disconnected couple in Keren Cytter’s Four Seasons (2009) to Ming Wong’s Angst Essen / Eat Fear (2008), a recasting of Fassbinder’s Ali, Fear Eats the Soul; to Laida Lertxundi‘s desert-set Footnotes to a House of Love (2007) to George Kuchar‘s short musical Pussy on a Hot Tin Roof...
- 12/7/2010
- by screenings
- Underground Film Journal
Ahh, if only all filmmakers retained the childlike enthusiasm for movie making like the Kuchar brothers do… Well, I guess if everybody did, then George and Mike wouldn’t be so unique. Jennifer M. Kroot profiles the underground film legends, who have been going strong for over 50 years now, in the engaging documentary It Came From Kuchar. Their story is an inspiring one, fulfilling their lifelong obsession with film not for fame or fortune, but just out of the sheer joy of making entertainment. You can watch the entire documentary embedded above.
Kroot clearly favors George in the documentary, I think through both design and circumstance. Mike is clearly more reclusive, especially after a troublesome trip to the Himalayas, the story of which is covered in the film. George is the gregarious, outgoing type, which is what has led him to become such a beloved instructor at the San Francisco Art Institute.
Kroot clearly favors George in the documentary, I think through both design and circumstance. Mike is clearly more reclusive, especially after a troublesome trip to the Himalayas, the story of which is covered in the film. George is the gregarious, outgoing type, which is what has led him to become such a beloved instructor at the San Francisco Art Institute.
- 11/27/2010
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
The autobiographical documentary The Marina Experiment by Marina Lutz, which is embedded in full above, is extremely Nsfw and distills down into 17 minutes a lifetime of child abuse. This is a difficult, painful film to watch, but not in ways that are entirely obvious. When one thinks of abuse, two forms immediately come to mind: Physical and verbal. But, Lutz’s abuse by her father was entirely photographic.
The film opens with modern-day shots of the obsessive amount of photographs, audio recordings and home movies that professional photographer Abbot Lutz took of his daughter, Marina. The stacks of bins filled with this documentary evidence is astounding. Then, when the film begins to show exactly what that evidence is of, it becomes sickening.
While there are some standard holiday and vacation photographs that any father may take of his daughter, many others are wholly inappropriate, especially those of a young teenage...
The film opens with modern-day shots of the obsessive amount of photographs, audio recordings and home movies that professional photographer Abbot Lutz took of his daughter, Marina. The stacks of bins filled with this documentary evidence is astounding. Then, when the film begins to show exactly what that evidence is of, it becomes sickening.
While there are some standard holiday and vacation photographs that any father may take of his daughter, many others are wholly inappropriate, especially those of a young teenage...
- 11/22/2010
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
Over the last five years, it’s nice to have watched the Wndx Festival of Film and Video Art in Winnipeg grow into such a terrific powerhouse of showcasing the best Canadian avant-garde and experimental media. It’s fifth killer edition will run on Sept. 30 — Oct. 3.
There’s one great non-Canadian exception this year, though. Wndx honors the life and work of the legendary Brooklyn-bred underground filmmaker George Kuchar. There will be three retrospectives of his films, chronicling his career from his early ’60s Hollywood-inspired pastiches to his more recent autobiographical videos.
Also screening as part of the Kuchar celebration will be Jennifer M. Kroot’s hit documentary It Came From Kuchar about George and his twin filmmaking brother Mike. Of course, George will be there in person attending the festival and on Sunday, Oct. 3, he will join Winnipeg filmmaker Guy Maddin for a panel discussion that’s not to be missed.
There’s one great non-Canadian exception this year, though. Wndx honors the life and work of the legendary Brooklyn-bred underground filmmaker George Kuchar. There will be three retrospectives of his films, chronicling his career from his early ’60s Hollywood-inspired pastiches to his more recent autobiographical videos.
Also screening as part of the Kuchar celebration will be Jennifer M. Kroot’s hit documentary It Came From Kuchar about George and his twin filmmaking brother Mike. Of course, George will be there in person attending the festival and on Sunday, Oct. 3, he will join Winnipeg filmmaker Guy Maddin for a panel discussion that’s not to be missed.
- 9/23/2010
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
I ran across two links the other day that really reminded me of why I feel that writing about and sharing underground film on the Internet is absolutely essential — both within the confines of the limited film blogosphere and outside with real world consequences.
The first link was for a review of Jennifer M. Kroot’s It Came From Kuchar on the mainstream movie review website Bob and Jason. The documentary about underground filmmaking twin brothers George and Mike Kuchar has been reviewed on numerous film websites the past couple months since it’s small theatrical run and current availability on DVD.
Most of those sites are about independent film and are at least underground film friendly, but it’s really insightful to read the reviews on the non-underground-familiar sites. Some of them have been quite hostile, not to the documentary itself — most reviewers seem to dig it — but to...
The first link was for a review of Jennifer M. Kroot’s It Came From Kuchar on the mainstream movie review website Bob and Jason. The documentary about underground filmmaking twin brothers George and Mike Kuchar has been reviewed on numerous film websites the past couple months since it’s small theatrical run and current availability on DVD.
Most of those sites are about independent film and are at least underground film friendly, but it’s really insightful to read the reviews on the non-underground-familiar sites. Some of them have been quite hostile, not to the documentary itself — most reviewers seem to dig it — but to...
- 7/23/2010
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
Though the larger social purpose of a counterculture is still a little bit fuzzy (largely, it seems to exist to be plundered by more mainstream media when the larger audience is ready to accept), the more immediate need of providing an environment where people like George and Michael Kuchar have a forum to be heard is very clear. While Stan Brakhage was experimenting with form and light in highly experimental short films, the brothers Kuchar were producing films that seemed to absorb the iconography of the day and regurgitate it back out in a form halfway between parody and melodrama. Their progression from obscurity to underground fame, as well as their extracurricular activities and production methods, are chronicled in the documentary It Came From Kuchar, a film that is always interesting and amusing without being especially penetrating. But then again, that is probably reflective of the Kuchars themselves: their appeal...
- 7/13/2010
- by Anders Nelson
- JustPressPlay.net
As illustrated in Jennifer Kroot’s affectionate documentary It Came From Kuchar, brothers George and Mike Kuchar seem driven by an almost pathological need to create. Today, anyone with a cheap digital-video camera can claim to be a director, but when the twin brothers began making homemade mini-epics in the mid-’50s, the cost of entry for filmmaking was prohibitively high for all but the very wealthy. Yet the brothers soldiered on regardless, making bizarrely personal films across a variety of genres with minimal financial resources, production values, trained actors, or even the faintest semblance of professionalism. It Came From ...
- 7/7/2010
- avclub.com
Happy Fourth of July to all of Bad Lit’s U.S. readers! Celebrate Independence Day by reading all about great independent cinema. Loads of reviews and other surprises in the underground film link list this week:
It seems film festival notices have been going out: Kill Your Television, Hooka Face and the Virgin Boy and Wheels of Death all have been accepted into the Atlanta Underground Film Festival. And Hanging at Picnic Rock has been appropriately selected for the Melbourne Underground Film Festival. If you want a print of the 2010 Chicago Underground Film Festival poster, then indiePulse has the details. Art:21 has an absolutely fascinating history of an early “forgotten” film pioneer, Alice Guy-Blaché, the Head of Production of Gaumont from 1896 to 1906. Rhizome has video and images from Harun Farocki’s Deep Play installation, which is an artistic interpretation of the 2006 FIFA World Cup. j. j. murphy reviews the...
It seems film festival notices have been going out: Kill Your Television, Hooka Face and the Virgin Boy and Wheels of Death all have been accepted into the Atlanta Underground Film Festival. And Hanging at Picnic Rock has been appropriately selected for the Melbourne Underground Film Festival. If you want a print of the 2010 Chicago Underground Film Festival poster, then indiePulse has the details. Art:21 has an absolutely fascinating history of an early “forgotten” film pioneer, Alice Guy-Blaché, the Head of Production of Gaumont from 1896 to 1906. Rhizome has video and images from Harun Farocki’s Deep Play installation, which is an artistic interpretation of the 2006 FIFA World Cup. j. j. murphy reviews the...
- 7/4/2010
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
Rating: 4/5
Director: Jennifer M. Kroot
Featuring: George Kuchar, Mike Kuchar, John Waters
As much as I am a fan and lover of the art form and medium that we call film, I’m (and I am sure all of you are) also a student of it; never quite getting enough of these pieces of art that are put to celluloid. That is why when a film like It Came From Kutchar falls into my lap (or lands in my mailbox to be exact), I have to close my laptop, set what I was doing on the backburner, and get lost in a world that frankly, I’m not at all familiar with.
Read more on DVD Review: It Came From Kuchar…...
Director: Jennifer M. Kroot
Featuring: George Kuchar, Mike Kuchar, John Waters
As much as I am a fan and lover of the art form and medium that we call film, I’m (and I am sure all of you are) also a student of it; never quite getting enough of these pieces of art that are put to celluloid. That is why when a film like It Came From Kutchar falls into my lap (or lands in my mailbox to be exact), I have to close my laptop, set what I was doing on the backburner, and get lost in a world that frankly, I’m not at all familiar with.
Read more on DVD Review: It Came From Kuchar…...
- 7/4/2010
- by Joshua Brunsting
- GordonandtheWhale
Is it a revelation or a revolution? It’s both! The Revelation Perth International Film Festival is tackling the theme of “Revolution” when its 13th annual edition begins violating Australia on July 8-18. Get set for 11 days filled French zombies, Belgian cowboys, outer space outlaws, Beat poets, cat ladies, gospel musicians and other revolutionaries.
Actually, one of the main features of the festival this year is a slew of music documentaries, mostly spotlighting both American and Australian music. On the U.S. side of things there’s Wheedle’s Groove, a look at the history of Seattle funk; Rejoice and Shout, which examines gospel music’s impact on African-American culture — and vice versa; Tom Dicillo’s Doors documentary When You’re Strange; plus The Family Jams and 72 Musicians. And, from Australia, there’s Megan Simpson-Hubberman’s classic concert film The Night of the Triffids.
There’s lots more than music docs,...
Actually, one of the main features of the festival this year is a slew of music documentaries, mostly spotlighting both American and Australian music. On the U.S. side of things there’s Wheedle’s Groove, a look at the history of Seattle funk; Rejoice and Shout, which examines gospel music’s impact on African-American culture — and vice versa; Tom Dicillo’s Doors documentary When You’re Strange; plus The Family Jams and 72 Musicians. And, from Australia, there’s Megan Simpson-Hubberman’s classic concert film The Night of the Triffids.
There’s lots more than music docs,...
- 7/2/2010
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
By Christopher Stipp
The Archives, Right Here
Check out my other column, This Week In Trailers, at SlashFilm.com and follow me on Twitter under the name: Stipp
Ice Road Truckers - DVD Review
I once had a job where it was my job to obtain truck freight.
As I made my way all across the Us I realized that everything that we get in this country is obtained by the trucking industry. Bottom line. From the keyboards that you and I write on, the chairs we sit in, the produce and food we eat, the clothes we wear, everything gets here by truck.
That’s why knowing this information makes for a good primer in understanding why Season Three of Ice Road Truckers is such a thrill to watch. While not necessarily family entertainment, some of these road dogs are a bit salty, the program continues to feed my...
The Archives, Right Here
Check out my other column, This Week In Trailers, at SlashFilm.com and follow me on Twitter under the name: Stipp
Ice Road Truckers - DVD Review
I once had a job where it was my job to obtain truck freight.
As I made my way all across the Us I realized that everything that we get in this country is obtained by the trucking industry. Bottom line. From the keyboards that you and I write on, the chairs we sit in, the produce and food we eat, the clothes we wear, everything gets here by truck.
That’s why knowing this information makes for a good primer in understanding why Season Three of Ice Road Truckers is such a thrill to watch. While not necessarily family entertainment, some of these road dogs are a bit salty, the program continues to feed my...
- 7/2/2010
- by Christopher Stipp
DVD Playhouse—June 2010
By
Allen Gardner
The White Ribbon (Sony) On the eve of Ww I, a small village in Germany is struck by a series of tragic, seemingly unconnected events until the townspeople, and the audience, start to connect the dots. Shot in stark, beautiful black & white, director Michael Haneke has fashioned a haunting metaphorical drama that is as coldly chilling as anything made by Ingmar Bergman, and darkly unsettling as anything from the canon of David Lynch. A rich, tough, brilliant cinematic experience you’re not likely to forget. Also available on Blu-ray disc. Bd bonuses: Interviews with cast and crew; featurettes. Widescreen Dolby and DTS 5.1 surround.
Alice In Wonderland (Disney) Tim Burton’s take on the Lewis Carroll classic finds young Alice (Mia Wasikowska), a 19th century girl who finds herself in an unhappy engagement to a boorish suitor, tumbling down the rabbit hole into Wonderland, where she encounters magical cakes,...
By
Allen Gardner
The White Ribbon (Sony) On the eve of Ww I, a small village in Germany is struck by a series of tragic, seemingly unconnected events until the townspeople, and the audience, start to connect the dots. Shot in stark, beautiful black & white, director Michael Haneke has fashioned a haunting metaphorical drama that is as coldly chilling as anything made by Ingmar Bergman, and darkly unsettling as anything from the canon of David Lynch. A rich, tough, brilliant cinematic experience you’re not likely to forget. Also available on Blu-ray disc. Bd bonuses: Interviews with cast and crew; featurettes. Widescreen Dolby and DTS 5.1 surround.
Alice In Wonderland (Disney) Tim Burton’s take on the Lewis Carroll classic finds young Alice (Mia Wasikowska), a 19th century girl who finds herself in an unhappy engagement to a boorish suitor, tumbling down the rabbit hole into Wonderland, where she encounters magical cakes,...
- 6/23/2010
- by The Hollywood Interview.com
- The Hollywood Interview
I really like the Kuchar Brothers, George and Mike, who I think are the wittiest and most palatable of the underground filmmakers from the heyday of 8/16mm filmmaking in the 1960s. Unlike the dreadfully boring exercises of the structuralists like Michael Snow and Hollis Frampton, the baffling images of experimental filmmakers like Andy Warhol or Stan Brakhage, or even the surreal and indecipherable films of directors like Maya Deren and Kenneth Anger, the Kuchar Brothers’ films are fun, crazy, and accessible. Most importantly, they don’t feel like a school lesson.
The above clip is the opening to one of my favorite, and one of the best loved, Kuchar Bros film, Sins Of The Fleshapoids. As you can see, their style is a meshing of a lot of diverse instincts; utilizing home-movie techniques and film stock, a satirical use of high-camp, a handful of bizarre science fiction musings and a...
The above clip is the opening to one of my favorite, and one of the best loved, Kuchar Bros film, Sins Of The Fleshapoids. As you can see, their style is a meshing of a lot of diverse instincts; utilizing home-movie techniques and film stock, a satirical use of high-camp, a handful of bizarre science fiction musings and a...
- 6/16/2010
- by Daniel Metz
- OriginalAlamo.com
I think this is my longest collection of links yet. Enjoy!
Professor Chuck Tryon is working on a new book, which should be awesome since his first one was so great. In preparation, he’s interviewing indie filmmakers about their experiences working in our new digital culture and posting the results online. His first interview is up and it’s with fellow professor Chris Hansen, whose films are routinely reviewed on Bad Lit. Hansen provides some great, insightful answers about the challenges of still getting one’s films in front of viewer eyeballs amid the deluge of video online these days. The interview is up in two parts, and you should read them both: Part One and Part Two. In a vaguely related link, the Film Doctor linked to a superb article by Caitlin Kelly on True/Slant called appropriately enough “Why Crap Gets Read And Real News Doesn’t:...
Professor Chuck Tryon is working on a new book, which should be awesome since his first one was so great. In preparation, he’s interviewing indie filmmakers about their experiences working in our new digital culture and posting the results online. His first interview is up and it’s with fellow professor Chris Hansen, whose films are routinely reviewed on Bad Lit. Hansen provides some great, insightful answers about the challenges of still getting one’s films in front of viewer eyeballs amid the deluge of video online these days. The interview is up in two parts, and you should read them both: Part One and Part Two. In a vaguely related link, the Film Doctor linked to a superb article by Caitlin Kelly on True/Slant called appropriately enough “Why Crap Gets Read And Real News Doesn’t:...
- 6/6/2010
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
It Came From Kuchar
Directed by Jennifer M. Kroot
Not Rated
The work of twin filmmakers George and Mike Kuchar has never won an Oscar or been a must-see movie on opening weekend. For 50 years, the Kuchars have made underground short films; George, the more prolific of the two, has directed over 200 shorts with titles like Baldies of Burgermeister Bungalow and Passage to Wetness.
Through their strange, unfiltered productions, the brothers have influenced John Waters, which ought to already be obvious, and even Atom Egoyan, who actually has been nominated for a couple Academy Awards.
It Came from Kuchar retraces the brothers' steps from their youth in New York, through the period where they were actually studied and revered by the avant garde film community, and up to the present day, in which George and Mike no longer work together but still seem hopelessly hooked to the same apparatus, even for twins.
Directed by Jennifer M. Kroot
Not Rated
The work of twin filmmakers George and Mike Kuchar has never won an Oscar or been a must-see movie on opening weekend. For 50 years, the Kuchars have made underground short films; George, the more prolific of the two, has directed over 200 shorts with titles like Baldies of Burgermeister Bungalow and Passage to Wetness.
Through their strange, unfiltered productions, the brothers have influenced John Waters, which ought to already be obvious, and even Atom Egoyan, who actually has been nominated for a couple Academy Awards.
It Came from Kuchar retraces the brothers' steps from their youth in New York, through the period where they were actually studied and revered by the avant garde film community, and up to the present day, in which George and Mike no longer work together but still seem hopelessly hooked to the same apparatus, even for twins.
- 6/4/2010
- by Colin Boyd
- GetTheBigPicture.net
It Came From Kuchar
Directed by: Jennifer M. Kroot
Cast: George Kuchar, Mike Kuchar, John Waters
Running Time: 1 hr 25 mins
Rating: Unrated
Release Date: May 21, 2010 (limited)
Plot: The life and work of prolific underground filmmakers George and Mike Kuchar is explored with interviews from the filmmakers as well as the people they influenced.
Who’S It For? Definitely people who love film, but also anyone who likes really quirky docs like Crumb or American Movie.
Expectations: I’d never heard of the Kuchar Brothers, so I didn’t know what to expect.
Scorecard (0-10)
Actors:
George Kuchar as himself: The brother who makes the biggest impression, possibly because he’s the first brother we meet. He teaches at The San Francisco Art Institute where he continues to make the bizarre films he’s known for. Though the film makes the case that he was an experimental filmmaker along the lines of Warhol and Kenneth Anger,...
Directed by: Jennifer M. Kroot
Cast: George Kuchar, Mike Kuchar, John Waters
Running Time: 1 hr 25 mins
Rating: Unrated
Release Date: May 21, 2010 (limited)
Plot: The life and work of prolific underground filmmakers George and Mike Kuchar is explored with interviews from the filmmakers as well as the people they influenced.
Who’S It For? Definitely people who love film, but also anyone who likes really quirky docs like Crumb or American Movie.
Expectations: I’d never heard of the Kuchar Brothers, so I didn’t know what to expect.
Scorecard (0-10)
Actors:
George Kuchar as himself: The brother who makes the biggest impression, possibly because he’s the first brother we meet. He teaches at The San Francisco Art Institute where he continues to make the bizarre films he’s known for. Though the film makes the case that he was an experimental filmmaker along the lines of Warhol and Kenneth Anger,...
- 5/21/2010
- by Megan Lehar
- The Scorecard Review
Movie lovers who are familiar with the ’60s underground film scene are at least aware of and may have seen some work by twin filmmaking brothers George and Mike Kuchar, but general movie audiences are not.
It’s probably a good bet that there are more people who are unfamiliar with the Kuchars than there are people who are committed fans. Happily, Jennifer Kroot’s documentary profile of these unique movie directors, It Came From Kuchar, should appeal to both die-hard and casual fans, as well as to virgin initiates.
Kroot begins with a quick introduction to the ’60s underground film world where the Kuchars occupied a totally unique space. While most other avant-garde and experimental filmmakers were concerned with making art or creating a cinematic revolution, the Kuchars made goofy, impassioned parodies of the Hollywood melodramas that they were obsessed with as kids. However, their attempts at humor were not to ridicule Hollywood conventions,...
It’s probably a good bet that there are more people who are unfamiliar with the Kuchars than there are people who are committed fans. Happily, Jennifer Kroot’s documentary profile of these unique movie directors, It Came From Kuchar, should appeal to both die-hard and casual fans, as well as to virgin initiates.
Kroot begins with a quick introduction to the ’60s underground film world where the Kuchars occupied a totally unique space. While most other avant-garde and experimental filmmakers were concerned with making art or creating a cinematic revolution, the Kuchars made goofy, impassioned parodies of the Hollywood melodramas that they were obsessed with as kids. However, their attempts at humor were not to ridicule Hollywood conventions,...
- 5/21/2010
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
First, I know I’m probably setting myself up for disaster by putting up an Underground Film Links post three Sundays in a row. There’s going to come a Sunday — I predict at some point — when I don’t have time to do this, people will come expecting a links post and … nothing. And they will be mad and disappointed. But, until that day, here’ some more links for you, including a few I forgot to post last week:
Mike Plante of Cinemad fame has created a Google map pinpointing all of the microcinemas and oddball screening locations he knows of from around the world. There’s a few on there I need to add to Bad Lit’s own theater, non-map list. And if you have a location that you want added, you can contact Plante at Cinemad. I meant to do a full post on this bit o’ news,...
Mike Plante of Cinemad fame has created a Google map pinpointing all of the microcinemas and oddball screening locations he knows of from around the world. There’s a few on there I need to add to Bad Lit’s own theater, non-map list. And if you have a location that you want added, you can contact Plante at Cinemad. I meant to do a full post on this bit o’ news,...
- 4/18/2010
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
Start: 04/16/2010 End: 04/23/2010 Start: 04/16/2010 End: 04/23/2010
Jennifer Kroot's documentary about horror filmmakers The Kuchar Brothers, It Came From Kuchar, is opening for a week in San Francisco and Berkeley starting Friday April 16th, 2010! Director Jennifer Kroot and subject Mike Kuchar will be in attendence at several screenings.
Long before YouTube, there were the brilliantly insane, no-budget movies of underground, filmmaking twins George and Mike Kuchar. It Came From Kuchar is a character driven documentary about the legendary, underground filmmaking twins, the Kuchar brothers. As kids in the 1950s, George and Mike Kuchar borrowed their aunt’s 8mm home movie camera and began making no-budget epics in their Bronx neighborhood starring friends and family. They innocently parodied the popular Hollywood melodramas they saw in the theatres....
In the 1960s the Kuchars became part of Warhol’s New York, underground film scene. Their most popular titles were “Hold Me While I’m Naked...
Jennifer Kroot's documentary about horror filmmakers The Kuchar Brothers, It Came From Kuchar, is opening for a week in San Francisco and Berkeley starting Friday April 16th, 2010! Director Jennifer Kroot and subject Mike Kuchar will be in attendence at several screenings.
Long before YouTube, there were the brilliantly insane, no-budget movies of underground, filmmaking twins George and Mike Kuchar. It Came From Kuchar is a character driven documentary about the legendary, underground filmmaking twins, the Kuchar brothers. As kids in the 1950s, George and Mike Kuchar borrowed their aunt’s 8mm home movie camera and began making no-budget epics in their Bronx neighborhood starring friends and family. They innocently parodied the popular Hollywood melodramas they saw in the theatres....
In the 1960s the Kuchars became part of Warhol’s New York, underground film scene. Their most popular titles were “Hold Me While I’m Naked...
- 4/17/2010
- by Superheidi
- Planet Fury
Bad Lit’s inaugural Underground Film Links post last week proved to be pretty popular, so here’s a second edition with hopes to keep it going:
In case you missed it, Jonas Mekas has a spiffy new website after splitting with the Stedhal Gallery last year. His old website is now completely dead. The new site has an RSS feed and he’s already put up a couple blog posts already with video clips. It’s a really nice site befitting the man and his work. Bookmark or subscribe! Also in case you missed it, I’ve made the Jonas Mekas entry on my own Underground Film Guide much more detailed with tons of links, book and DVD references and a YouTube video player with lots of videos. If I missed something that should be included — and I’m sure I have, feel free to let me know. Not...
In case you missed it, Jonas Mekas has a spiffy new website after splitting with the Stedhal Gallery last year. His old website is now completely dead. The new site has an RSS feed and he’s already put up a couple blog posts already with video clips. It’s a really nice site befitting the man and his work. Bookmark or subscribe! Also in case you missed it, I’ve made the Jonas Mekas entry on my own Underground Film Guide much more detailed with tons of links, book and DVD references and a YouTube video player with lots of videos. If I missed something that should be included — and I’m sure I have, feel free to let me know. Not...
- 4/11/2010
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
The 12th annual Boston Underground Film Festival, which began on March 25 and ends on April 1, has released their list of award winners for this year that also includes Buff’s first ever lifetime achievement award.
There are six winners, listed below, in the categories of narrative, documentary, short, director’s choice and the always popular Most Effectively Offensive, which had some real competition this year thanks to the fest’s concentration on exploitation, or “grindhouse,” films for this edition. The winners are:
Best of Fest Narrative
Red White & Blue, dir. Simon Rumley
Best of Fest Documentary
It Came From Kuchar, dir. Jennifer M. Kroot
Best of Fest Short
Happily Ever After, dir. Jamie Heinrich
Director’s Choice
Someone’s Knocking at the Door, dir. Chad Ferrin
Most Effectively Offensive
The Life and Death of a Porno Gang, dir. Mladen Djordjevic
Lifetime Achievement Award
Mink Stole
The Best of Fest winners...
There are six winners, listed below, in the categories of narrative, documentary, short, director’s choice and the always popular Most Effectively Offensive, which had some real competition this year thanks to the fest’s concentration on exploitation, or “grindhouse,” films for this edition. The winners are:
Best of Fest Narrative
Red White & Blue, dir. Simon Rumley
Best of Fest Documentary
It Came From Kuchar, dir. Jennifer M. Kroot
Best of Fest Short
Happily Ever After, dir. Jamie Heinrich
Director’s Choice
Someone’s Knocking at the Door, dir. Chad Ferrin
Most Effectively Offensive
The Life and Death of a Porno Gang, dir. Mladen Djordjevic
Lifetime Achievement Award
Mink Stole
The Best of Fest winners...
- 3/31/2010
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
The teasing is over! This here is the real deal. The moment we wait all year for: The lineup for the powerful, the mighty Boston Underground Film Festival, which is set to run March 25 to April 1. Now in its 12th year, Buff shows no sign of slowing down or taking it easy. In fact, this might be their most demented and transgressive edition yet.
There are homages to Giallo horror, tributes to the grand grindhouse tradition of sleaze and exploitation, sex and violence galore — both separately and together — plus, a resurrected ’80s slasher classic that all combine into an epic celebration of everything that is vicious and twisted in this world. But, in a fun way, ya know.
Alas, I haven’t seen any of the feature films that are playing this year, so I can’t offer any special recommendations of those. Although, there are many (most) that I...
There are homages to Giallo horror, tributes to the grand grindhouse tradition of sleaze and exploitation, sex and violence galore — both separately and together — plus, a resurrected ’80s slasher classic that all combine into an epic celebration of everything that is vicious and twisted in this world. But, in a fun way, ya know.
Alas, I haven’t seen any of the feature films that are playing this year, so I can’t offer any special recommendations of those. Although, there are many (most) that I...
- 3/12/2010
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
The 12th annual Boston Underground Film Festival isn’t set to start until March 25 — and will run until April 1 — but they’ve leaked a couple of early picks to Bad Lit. Even with just this little tease to start whetting New England underground film fans’ appetites, it looks like the venerable fest is in for another real doozy of a year.
The festival kicks off in high riotous fashion with the Opening Night feature Love Exposure (Ai no mukidashi), a four-hour Japanese whirlwind of sinful transgression by Sion Sono about a good Christian schoolboy who’s obsessed with taking pictures of girls’ panties — while they’re wearing them. Eventually, he meets the love of his young life, who doesn’t much like being his object of obsession.
Then, after the Love Exposure screening on March 25 at 7:00 p.m. at the Kendall Square Cinema in Cambridge, Ma — where the entire...
The festival kicks off in high riotous fashion with the Opening Night feature Love Exposure (Ai no mukidashi), a four-hour Japanese whirlwind of sinful transgression by Sion Sono about a good Christian schoolboy who’s obsessed with taking pictures of girls’ panties — while they’re wearing them. Eventually, he meets the love of his young life, who doesn’t much like being his object of obsession.
Then, after the Love Exposure screening on March 25 at 7:00 p.m. at the Kendall Square Cinema in Cambridge, Ma — where the entire...
- 2/5/2010
- by Mike Everleth
- Underground Film Journal
One of the best parts of SXSW this year was catching glimpses of legendary filmmaker George Kuchar, who, along with his brother Mike, is profiled in Jennifer Kroot's documentary It Came From Kuchar. The Kuchar Brother's wild, campy underground films were a major influence on a whole generation of filmmakers, some of whom -- John Waters, Atom Egoyan, Guy Maddin, Wayne Wang, Buck Henry -- are interviewed in the movie. The Kuchars were contemporaries of Andy Warhol and Kenneth Anger, but their films are much more funny-sexy-weird; they were obsessed with Hollywood melodrama and seemingly immune from any hipster aspirations or demimonde acceptance. To really understand the history of underground film, check out It Came From Kuchar this weekend...
- 6/5/2009
- by Alicia Van Couvering
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
Ghosted (Directed by Monica Treut and written by Astrid Stroner), It Came From Kuchar by Jennifer Kroot, and El Niño Pez (The Fish Child) are stand-out genre films by women playing at the 2009 Outfest Film Festival.
These award-winning women directors deal with subjects like murder, revenge, twisted love, unsolved murders, and the absolutely awesome B-movie industry in their films...
Writer-director Lucía Puenzo won awards - including two prizes at Cannes - and critical acclaim all over the world for Xxy, and now the Argentine filmmaker returns with a lesbian romance that’s also a Chabrol-esque mystery thriller and a scathing examination of class differences in the South American nation. Lala (Inés Efron, whose performance has inspired comparisons to the early film roles of both Sissy Spacek and Chloë Sevigny), the privileged daughter of a powerful judge, wants to run off with her Paraguayan lover La Guayi (Mariela Vitale), a maid...
These award-winning women directors deal with subjects like murder, revenge, twisted love, unsolved murders, and the absolutely awesome B-movie industry in their films...
Writer-director Lucía Puenzo won awards - including two prizes at Cannes - and critical acclaim all over the world for Xxy, and now the Argentine filmmaker returns with a lesbian romance that’s also a Chabrol-esque mystery thriller and a scathing examination of class differences in the South American nation. Lala (Inés Efron, whose performance has inspired comparisons to the early film roles of both Sissy Spacek and Chloë Sevigny), the privileged daughter of a powerful judge, wants to run off with her Paraguayan lover La Guayi (Mariela Vitale), a maid...
- 6/3/2009
- by Superheidi
- Planet Fury
As we recently reported, Horror director Rania Ajami (Katalog, And The Earth Fell Silent Again) is world-premiering her latest horror/fantasy/comedy movie, Asylum Seekers, at the 2009 CineVegas Film festival. She's being joined by several other women and their genre films, like The Ghost and Us by Emily Carmichael and the documentary about underground filmmakers The Kuchar brothers It Came From Kuchar directed by Jennifer Kroot. Included in the lineup is the work-in-progress documentary Beautiful Darling about Andy Warhol superstar Candy Darling... read more...
- 4/16/2009
- by Superheidi
- Planet Fury
When it comes to It Came From Kuchar, Jennifer M. Kroot’s deceptively breezy documentary about experimental filmmaker brothers George and Mike, I am without a doubt a member of the choir. George Kuchar was my independent study advisor when I was an undergraduate at the San Francisco Art Institute, and much of Kroot’s film documents his life and times at that alma mater of mine. George is seen clomping through the bayside, architectural masterpiece of a campus, slightly hunched, with appreciative students trailing off him like some kind of handycam-weilding, Bronx-accented, beautiful schlock-peddling pied piper. George isn’t the right professor for everyone — as John Waters puts it in the film, “I think some of his students are probably horrified and leave” — but for me, as a very, very serious studier of cinema who took my own attempts at filmmaking very, very seriously, George gave me a much-needed...
- 3/15/2009
- by Karina Longworth
- Spout
One of the titles to look out for at the 2009 SXSW Film Festival and Conference is Jennifer Kroot’s documentary It Came from Kuchar. The film examines the lives of the twin pioneers of experimental films: George and Mike Kuchar. Kroot’s film, which will have its world premiere at SXSW on March 14th, 2009, is described as follows:
The documentary tells the story of legendary underground film pioneers George and Mike Kuchar. In addition to compelling interviews with the twins themselves, It Came From Kuchar features conversations with celebrated personalities of independent and underground film that were influenced by the Kuchars including John Waters, who himself claims, “George and Mike Kuchar’s films were my first inspiration,” B. Ruby Rich, Buck Henry, Atom Egoyan, Guy Maddin and Wayne Wang.
A documentary about the people behind films such as Thundercrack and Sins of the Fleshapoids seems like a sure bet. However,...
The documentary tells the story of legendary underground film pioneers George and Mike Kuchar. In addition to compelling interviews with the twins themselves, It Came From Kuchar features conversations with celebrated personalities of independent and underground film that were influenced by the Kuchars including John Waters, who himself claims, “George and Mike Kuchar’s films were my first inspiration,” B. Ruby Rich, Buck Henry, Atom Egoyan, Guy Maddin and Wayne Wang.
A documentary about the people behind films such as Thundercrack and Sins of the Fleshapoids seems like a sure bet. However,...
- 3/8/2009
- by Rodney Perkins
- Screen Anarchy
SXSW is one of my favorite festivals of the year as it showcases some of the best and most innovative real independent films, and with this host of world premiers, it's also playing alot of Sundance material as well as genre fare from all over the world, many of which we've covered heavily in these pages.
From the Sundance lineup, we have films like Moon, The Immaculate Conception of Little Dizzle, You Won't Miss Me, Grace, and Humpday, among others.
For the world genre material we've covered, there's Lake Mungo, The Square, Zift, and Awaydays.
I think you get the point that lots of great looking film will be playing. I'll leave a bit of the exploration to you..
Lineup after the break.
Narrative Features Competition
Artois the Goat
Director: Kyle Bogart. Writer: Cliff and Kyle Bogart
Lab technician Virgil Gurdies embarks on an epic quest to craft the greatest...
From the Sundance lineup, we have films like Moon, The Immaculate Conception of Little Dizzle, You Won't Miss Me, Grace, and Humpday, among others.
For the world genre material we've covered, there's Lake Mungo, The Square, Zift, and Awaydays.
I think you get the point that lots of great looking film will be playing. I'll leave a bit of the exploration to you..
Lineup after the break.
Narrative Features Competition
Artois the Goat
Director: Kyle Bogart. Writer: Cliff and Kyle Bogart
Lab technician Virgil Gurdies embarks on an epic quest to craft the greatest...
- 2/2/2009
- QuietEarth.us
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