Eclectic Shorts by Eric Leiser

Robert Motherwell and the New York School: Storming the Citadel(en)

Made shortly before Robert Motherwell’s death in 1991, is an exploration of the Abstract Expressionist movement and a portrait of one of its last survivors. Having come to New York in the early 1940s, Motherwell found himself on the battleground of American art. He and a group of painters set out to change the face of American painting. The film charts this epic battle led by Jackson Pollock, Willem de Kooning, Mark Rothko, Franz Kline, and Robert Motherwell, who endeavored to make American painting equal to painting elsewhere and, in the process, shifted the center of modern art from Paris to New York.

Dilution(en)

Dilution is an experimental short film that explores the transit between resistance and (di)ssolution, between holding and releasing and a path towards obsessive repetition. They are layers, exposed pores, matter that oscillates between remaining or disappearing. The sound is not a background, but a puncture: friction, tearing, water that drags what still persists. A sensorial testimony of what refuses to vanish completely.

En ny og sørgelig vise(da)

Fluisteraars(nl)

Destroying your own artwork. For many artists it is unmentionable, but Loes Heebink from Kolderveen irreparably destroyed her artwork "Fluisteraars" herself and came up with the idea for a documentary of the same name, directed by Saskia Jeulink.

Anger(en)

A fleshy nightmare barrages the viewer with an onslaught of abstract gore and nonsensical terror.

Animus(en)

A lone humanoid creature explores the darkness of a mysterious gun-metal labyrinth.

Dragon(en)

MTV station ident.

Ab ovo - Traces of Sand(xx)

A non-narrative film thematising the eternal struggle of human life in a series of scenes connected by associations and accompanied by a strong music motif.

The Lord of the Rings(en)

Young Hobbit Frodo Baggins is thrown into an amazing adventure when he's tasked with destroying the One Ring, created by the dark lord Sauron. Frodo must travel in a small fellowship of nine warriors and accomplices. But it won't be an easy journey for the Fellowship of the Ring, on the ultimate quest to rid Middle-earth of evil.

Layla(fr)

Three 11 year old boys get a hold of a sex robot to have their first experience with her. At the moment of truth, they are too innocent so they become friends with her.

Charlotte(fr)

The true story of Charlotte Salomon, a young German-Jewish painter who comes of age in Berlin on the eve of the Second World War. Fiercely imaginative and deeply gifted, she dreams of becoming an artist. Her first love applauds her talent, which emboldens her resolve. When anti-Semitic policies inspire violent mobs, she escapes to the safety of the South of France. There she begins to paint again, and finds new love. But her work is interrupted, this time by a family tragedy that reveals an even darker secret. Believing that only an extraordinary act will save her, she embarks on the monumental adventure of painting her life story.

All About Yves Montand(fr)

Yves Montand would have been 100-years-old in 2021. A journey through the 20th century by the son of an Italian immigrant who reached the peak of his art and popularity. The song, the cinema, the commitments, a film all in archives.

Paint Until Dawn: a documentary on art in the life of James Gahagan(en)

Seeing is to painting what listening is to politics. Survival as an artist demands both. Paint Until Dawn is a documentary on art in the life of James Gahagan (1927-1999), who painted all night to push the limits of vision. His life and thought reveal a correlation between art and activism through an interesting angle: the creative process itself.

Apocalypsis(en)

Set in a parallel universe entering a black hole, a woman reading the book of Revelation has visions of regeneration during Anthropocene.

The Canterville Ghost(en)

An American family moves in to the Canterville Chase, a London mansion that has been haunted by ghost Sir Simon De Canterville for 300 years.

Mad God(en)

A figure known as "The Assassin" descends from the heavens into a nightmarish pit full of monsters, titans, and cruelty.

Negative Space(en)

Even though Sam's father is hardly ever home because he is often away on business trips, he is able to connect with his son by teaching him how to pack a suitcase.

Bird Trap(ar)

Hala, an 8-year-old girl, lives a difficult life with her brother Amir and their cruel stepmother. To escape her painful reality, Hala retreats into a fantasy world, finding solace from the harshness around her. However, one question continues to haunt her: Do the dead fly?

Le complot de famille(fr)

A psychopathic husband tries to feed his nonexistent family.

NO LITTERING(ja)

While enjoying a date in a park, a man carelessly tosses an empty bottle onto the ground. His selfish littering promptly summons an imposing figure wearing a white hockey mask. The gruesome events that follow tell an admonishing tale about the importance of preserving the outdoors and defending the environment from the ugly menace of litter. The short was made for the tve YouTube Relay project, but wasn't included because it's too violent.