From: Ken Bawcom (email suppressed)
Date: Fri Apr 07 2006 - 23:00:35 PDT
HS kids are High School kids, teens.
Spreading out the screening committee work to too many people brings on
many problems. At some point, everyone has to see everything that is
being voted on, or it makes no sense. And the more people you have, the
more it becomes programming only what no one strongly objects to. That
is NOT a prescription for showing challenging films. I would almost
say, that once the schlock is ruled out, one would be better off to
show ONLY films that someone (not all) objects to!
Ken B.
Quoting Freya <email suppressed>:
>>
>> Freya,
>>
>> lobby. That hasn't happened yet. But, we do have a
>> mailing list, so
>> maybe we can do a mailing, asking for volunteer
>> screeners. But,
>> screening requires such a long time commitment, that
>> even those
>> qualified and willing to screen, find it difficult
>> to commit. Three or
>> four times a week, for three or four months is more
>> than most people
>> can fit into their lives.
>
> but maybe if they were people well qualified for the
> job then you could ask them to make less of a
> commitment and spread the work around more people? Of
> course I don't know how well that would work, the more
> people involved perhaps the more things will seek out
> the lowest common denominator instead of what people
> are really excited by. Groups of people have a life
> all of their own too which can be bad sometimes.
>
>> We definitely do have a community interested in
>> exp film here, but I
>> would say that roughly half of our audience, in this
>> university
>> community, are students, many who don't really know
>> much about exp
>> film. They mainly expect to be entertained.
>
> That's a good opportunity to introduce people to
> experimental film then! And if the students go away
> "back home" or wherever then maybe they will take
> their experiences with them too. :)
>
>> It is no secret that experimental film isn't as
>> popular as high
>> production value, Hollywood style narrative. If it
>
> Yes I noticed that too! ;)
>
>> panels, such as the
>> one Bryan was on. I believe the AAFF has incipient
>> plans to do
>> something with local HS kids, and we have done such
>
> What are HS kids? Are they children who are poorly?
>
>> open to
>> appreciating exp film, by showing something more
>> mainstream, but still
>> non-standard. From an artistic standpoint, I am
>> definitely not entirely
>> in agreement with what we showed. From an economic
>> standpoint, I don't
>> have the data to know if the strategy was effective.
>
> I've not really heard of these works, which from the
> point of view of them being more mainstream might not
> be a good thing. Don't forget that exp films are not
> neccesarily less popular because they are different,
> but perhaps more because they don't have a huge hype
> and marketing machine behined them. There often seems
> to be an assuimption that exp film is just unwatchable
> or something, or maybe that the audience are too
> stupid to be able to understand it. I don't think
> there is as much truth in this as people might imagine
> but maybe I am just feeling good about these things
> because of the success of the evolution festival so
> far.
>
> Last night I sat in a screening of Rose Lowders films
> with some students which was certainly more difficult
> than the previous nights work with all it's beautiful
> lights and smoke and dancing patterns but despite this
> I got the impression we all really liked her work. In
> fact the boy I was sitting with was asking me all
> kinds of questions about how it was done!
>
> People are able to enjoy strange and even unsettling
> and different work, they just aren't told they have to
> go and see it.
>
>> To those who say
>> that art should be above such economic
>> considerations, I say that the
>> AAFF has to continue to exist in the real world, and
>> pay the bills. The
>> aim, to bring in more people to see REAL exp films,
>> is certainly a good
>> one. Hopefully, we will find more appropriate, and
>> effective, ways of
>> doing that in the future.
>
> Sadly economics rules all, especialy these days.
> "Nothing of any value was ever made for the want of
> money" the saying goes. Perhpas "Colours" by Ken
> Nordine is an exception, maybe Len Lye too, but I'm
> not entirely sure that even these works were made
> purely for economic considerations. I guess you have
> to strike a balance but be very aware of what you are
> doing.
>
> I think it is possible to get large audiences for
> experimental work, but it's probably easier to put on
> a much hyped mainstream film to get the audiences in.
>
> "At some point, we all have to decide between what is
> good, and what is easy" <VBG>
>
> love
>
> Freya
>
>
>
>
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__________________________________________________________________
For info on FrameWorks, contact Pip Chodorov at <email suppressed>.