Mixing elements of narrative, experimental, pseudo-documentary and essayist cinema, Sophisticated Acquaintance tells the story of a tormented individual whose short life and long death were affected by a great many factors. Klaus Mann (John Gross), a present-day Philadelphia avatar of the real-life European author of Mephisto, lives in the shadow of his father, the eminent intellectual, novelist and Nobel Laureate Thomas Mann (Ernst Hohmann). When Klaus pens a controversial essay on "revolutionary suicide" and then acts on it, in protest of the world's selfishness, a group of his contemporaries speak up in filmed interviews about what led him down that path. It is a film about the creative process, the tragic depiction of a strained father-son relationship and, most of all, it is a film about individuality.
Klaus Mann
Gia
Thomas Mann
Bruce Jummaquin
Malcontent
Girl on Bus
Andrew
Mixing elements of narrative, experimental, pseudo-documentary and essayist cinema, Sophisticated Acquaintance tells the story of a tormented individual whose short life and long death were affected by a great many factors. Klaus Mann (John Gross), a present-day Philadelphia avatar of the real-life European author of Mephisto, lives in the shadow of his father, the eminent intellectual, novelist and Nobel Laureate Thomas Mann (Ernst Hohmann). When Klaus pens a controversial essay on "revolutionary suicide" and then acts on it, in protest of the world's selfishness, a group of his contemporaries speak up in filmed interviews about what led him down that path. It is a film about the creative process, the tragic depiction of a strained father-son relationship and, most of all, it is a film about individuality.
2007-10-01
8
Klaus Mann had a short life...and a long death.
Max Plugin is a jaded but flamboyant relic of the 1960s. In his teens, Max ran away to California, where he met Teschlock, a charismatic ascetic and guru renowned among a small group of young followers. At that time, when Teschlock asked Max to join him and his disciples on an ashram in India, Max declined and returned home. Now, forty years later, at age 57, Max takes a journey to India to find Teschlock's grave-site, and also himself. His adventures in India, and his Castaneda-esque experiences back home, form the heart of this very unusual road movie.
Filmed April 12, 2003 at a benefit concert held at and for The Anthology Film Archives, the international center for the preservation, study, and exhibition of avant-garde and independent cinema. In addition to screening films for the public, AFA houses a film museum, research library and art gallery. The event, which raised money for the Archives and celebrated the life and work of avant-garde film maker Stan Brakhage, featured Sonic Youth providing an improvised instrumental collaboration with silent Brakhage’s films. The band performed with drummer/percussionist Tim Barnes (Essex Green, Jukeboxer, Silver Jews).
Two rival friends guide a young man through the Colombian jungle, hunting for, and finding a tribe of (not so) wild Amazons and a cache of (not so) bright emeralds.
Street vendors in Korea are almost like a national institution, they are so widespread and relied upon. In Little Pond in Main Street a group of vendors band together to create a community radio station but come into conflict with other groups, as well as the government trying to shut them down.
Juana moves with her son Juan from the country to Caracas in search of better work and educational opportunities. When they get there they have to live in a poor home in one of the slums located in the city's outskirts, where they encounter a horrible world full of promiscuity and misery, that is quite different from what they expected and that eventually will lead Juana to self-destruction and Juan to reconsider his life in the city.
White Rhapsody is a 1945 short film directed by Jack Eaton, with Ted Husing narrating. The film explores the popular sport of skiing. It was nominated for an Oscar in the category Best Short Subject, One-Reel. Preserved by the Academy Film Archive in partnership with UCLA Film & Television Archive in 2013.
Abandoned after his parents' death, a short film actor assumes multiple identities to bond with people in need of love and affection.
Man commits suicide over his wife's infidelity. His father spends the rest of his life trying to figure out which of son's two children is illegitimate.
Admetus, king of Feres, makes an agreement with the Fates to postpone the date of his death, in exchange for someone else taking his place, without knowing that the chosen one will be his beloved wife Alcestis. Desperate, Admetus asks Hercules for help in rescuing Alcestis from death... An animated short film based on the Greek myth of Admetus and Alcestis.
Bettie de Jong performs the same dance nine times, starting and ending in a reclined position. As the film proceeds the camera becomes more and more adventurous.
Over a decade after leaving the religious cult that dominated her childhood, filmmaker Cara Jones grapples with her time in the Unification Church.
A story of two contrasting individuals — a wealthy youngster who loves to live life partying and wooing women, without a care in the world for anything else, and a pregnant woman who loses her husband and is struggling in life. The two of them get stuck in a lift for several hours, turning both their lives upside down.
Illustrates the events of the Ponce Massacre through the life of one of the victims, Ulpiano Perea.
This 10-minute short documentary exploring the shifting state of the American poultry industry was preserved in 2015 from an original nitrate print. More information is available on the film's page in the National Film Preservation Foundation's website, where this version can be found featuring original music by Michael D. Mortilla.
The unusual talents of Johnny Price, a minor league baseball pitcher and trick artist, are showcased in this Pete Smith Specialty. Among other talents, Mr. Price can throw two (and, in certain situations three) baseballs simultaneously to different people. The catchers can be side by side, with one high and one low, or standing on the pitcher's mound and second base while Price throws the ball from the catcher's position. He can even perform these feats while suspended upside-down.
The sixteenth night of the tournament took place on August 8th, 2023 at Act City Hamamatsu in Naka-ku, Hamamatsu, Shizuoka, Japan.
A Texas Ranger poses as a bad-ass biker outlaw and enlists a blind sniper and his seeing-eye coyote to crush a biker gang that took over her county.
The story of three women searching for more potent, meaningful lives. Each is alive at a different time and place, all are linked by their yearnings and their fears. Their stories intertwine, and finally come together in a surprising, transcendent moment of shared recognition.
A pragmatic U.S. Marine observes the dehumanizing effects the U.S.-Vietnam War has on his fellow recruits from their brutal boot camp training to the bloody street fighting in Hue.
The strange comedy film of two close brothers; one, Wilbur, who wants to kill himself, and the other, Harbour, who tries to prevent this. When their father dies leaving them his bookstore they meet a woman who makes their lives a bit better yet with a bit more trouble as well.
Holly Golightly is an eccentric New York City playgirl determined to marry a Brazilian millionaire. But when young writer Paul Varjak moves into her apartment building, her past threatens to get in their way.
Two men answer the call of the ocean in this romantic fantasy-adventure. Jacques and Enzo are a pair of friends who have been close since childhood, and who share a passion for the dangerous sport of free diving. Professional diver Jacques opted to follow in the footsteps of his father, who died at sea when Jacques was a boy; to the bewilderment of scientists, Jacques harbors a remarkable ability to adjust his heart rate and breathing pattern in the water, so that his vital signs more closely resemble that of dolphins than men. As Enzo persuades a reluctant Jacques to compete against him in a free diving contest -- determining who can dive deeper and longer without scuba gear -- Jacques meets Johana, a beautiful insurance investigator from America, and he finds that he must choose between his love for her and his love of the sea.
A mother and daughter rent a house for a getaway after suffering a sudden and tragic loss, little do they know the house is run by a secret cult.
Anson Page, a lawyer with Southern roots leaves New York, his wife and his kids for Georgia. His assignment is to investigate the case of Garvin Wales, a famous writer, now nearly blind and embittered, whose royalties have apparently never reached him. Back in his native South, Page finds himself immediately exposed to what he had fled : racial and class prejudices. But he also meets his former love, Dinah, now married to go-getter uncouth businessman Mickey Higgins. Will he find out whatever happened to 2,000 dollars in rights Wales did not cash? Will Dinah and Anson renew their love story?
Story of a wild first love that takes place at the mouth of the St. Lawrence River between the refineries at Pointe-Au-Trembles and the rock culture of Montreal.
Two men share an odd friendship while they care for two women who are both in deep comas.
An alcoholic ex-football player drinks his days away, having failed to come to terms with his sexuality and his real feelings for his football buddy who died after an ambiguous accident. His wife is crucified by her desperation to make him desire her: but he resists the affections of his wife. His reunion with his father—who is dying of cancer—jogs a host of memories and revelations for both father and son.
The family of a wealthy businessman gather to celebrate his 60th birthday. During the course of the party, his eldest son presents a speech that reveals a shocking secret.
The young Harold lives in his own world of suicide-attempts and funeral visits to avoid the misery of his current family and home environment. Harold meets an 80-year-old woman named Maude who also lives in her own world yet one in which she is having the time of her life. When the two opposites meet they realize that their differences don’t matter and they become best friends and love each other.
An average, everyday metalworker and volunteer firefighter content in his marriage to his childhood sweetheart finds his emotions unexpectedly stirred when he falls for a pretty waitress from a nearby town.
To Walk Invisible takes a new look at the extraordinary Brontë family, telling the story of these remarkable women who, despite the obstacles they faced, came from obscurity to produce some of the greatest novels in the English language.
Viktor Graves, a troubled young man who isolates himself in rural Ohio, survives an attack by a feral man. Soon after, Viktor sees and hears inexplicable terrors surrounding him at every moment, shredding his sanity and leaving him to wonder...what is real and what is madness?
When a guardian angel – who invisibly watches over the citizens of Los Angeles – becomes captivated by a strong-willed heart surgeon, he ponders trading in his pure, otherworldly existence for a mortal life with his beloved. The couple embarks on a tender but forbidden romance spanning heaven and Earth.
A theater director struggles with his work, and the women in his life, as he attempts to create a life-size replica of New York inside a warehouse as part of his new play.
Spanning several decades, this powerful biopic offers a glimpse into the life of famed Cuban poet and novelist Reinaldo Arenas, an artist who was vilified for his homosexuality in Fidel Castro's Cuba.
In autumn 1944, during the Liberation of Brittany, writer Louis Guilloux worked as an interpreter for the American army. He was a privileged witness to some little-known dramatic aspects of the Liberation: the rapes and murders committed by GIs on French civilians. He also discovered the racism of American military justice. This experience haunted the novelist for thirty years. In 1976, he recounted it in a short novel, "Ok, Joe", which went unnoticed. This film compares his account with the memories of the last witnesses to these forgotten crimes and their punishments.
Tullio Hermil is a chauvinist aristocrat who flaunts his mistress to his wife, but when he believes she has been unfaithful he becomes enamored of her again.