• Spare Time

  • Schwechater

  • The Case of Lena Smith

  • The Present

  • Recreation



The Clock: Notions of Cinematic Temporality



This program is a somewhat surrealist-populist attempt at telling a story of the twentieth century. In a more serious vein, it relates to three different notions of cinematic temporality: it talks about leisure or “free time” (a realm of life usually regarded as the province of movie-going); it addresses the “time of film” (a passing era that also produced new concepts of history and memory, both of which are now becoming more tenuous by the nanosecond); and it celebrates our imprisonment in “film time” when experiencing a theatrical projection (the distinct duration of a film, its irrevocable passing at a specific pace of X frames per second). Another way of looking at this film selection is through the eyes of Amos Vogel, who was born in Vienna in 1921, and who died in New York in 2012. I hope that the program can also serve as a tribute to Amos. Among his many achievements in film culture was a new approach toward placing films alongside each other in an evening’s program, freed from their traditional groupings by era, genre, aesthetic, etc. In addition, the Viennese amateur film shown here—HA.WEI. March 14, 1938—is a document of the historical moment that turned seventeen-year-old Amos Vogelbaum into an exile.

Alexander Horwath

 

Films in this Screening

1/48”

Jorge Lorenzo Flores Garza, Mexico, 2008

FILM DETAILS 
Print Info
  • Color
  • 35mm
  • 1 mins
source
  • Austrian Film Museum

Meissen Porcelain! The Diodattis’ Living Sculptures at the Berlin Conservatory [fragment]

France/Germany, 1912–1914

FILM DETAILS 
Print Info
  • B&W
  • 35mm
  • Silent
  • 2 mins
source
  • Austrian Film Museum

The Case of Lena Smith [fragment]

Josef von Sternberg, United States, 1929

FILM DETAILS 
Print Info
  • B&W
  • 35mm
  • Silent
  • 5 mins
source
  • Austrian Film Museum

Mosaik Mécanique

Norbert Pfaffenbichler, Austria, 2008

FILM DETAILS 
Print Info
  • B&W
  • 'Scope 35mm
  • 9 mins
source
  • Austrian Film Museum

HA.WEI. March 14, 1938 [archival title]

Austria, 1938

FILM DETAILS 
Print Info
  • B&W
  • 16mm
  • Silent
  • 13 mins
source
  • Austrian Film Museum

Spare Time

Humphrey Jennings, United Kingdom, 1939

FILM DETAILS 
Print Info
  • B&W
  • 35mm
  • 15 mins
source
  • Austrian Film Museum

Yours

Jeff Scher, United States, 1977

FILM DETAILS 
Print Info
  • Color
  • 35mm
  • 4 mins
source
  • Austrian Film Museum

Recreation

Robert Breer, United States/France, 1956–57

FILM DETAILS 
Print Info
  • Color
  • 16mm
  • 2 mins
source
  • Austrian Film Museum

Schwechater
(Schwechater)

Peter Kubelka, Austria, 1958

FILM DETAILS 
Print Info
  • B&W/Color
  • 35mm
  • 1 mins
source
  • BAMPFA

The Anthem

Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Thailand, 2006

A cinematic blessing designed as an alternative to the national anthem played before every screening in Thailand.

FILM DETAILS 
Language
  • Thai
Print Info
  • Color
  • 35mm
  • 5 mins
source
  • Austrian Film Museum

Roller Coaster Rabbit

Rob Minkoff, United States, 1990

FILM DETAILS 
Print Info
  • Color
  • 35mm
  • 8 mins
source
  • Austrian Film Museum

The Present
(The present)

Robert Frank, United States/Switzerland, 1996

FILM DETAILS 
Language
  • English
Print Info
  • Color
  • 35mm
  • 24 mins
source
  • Austrian Film Museum