 |
| Les Blank |
Les Blank's camera enters the heart of celebrations, feasts, concerts, and dances of regional American cultures that are often overlooked. Music and food crop up repeatedly in his films. He went to college in New Orleans, giving him a fondness for Louisiana culture, demonstrated in films like Always for Pleasure, Dry Wood, and Hot Pepper. His films also portray unique characters from the Bay Area to Appalachia and extraordinary musicians, including Dizzy Gillespie, Lightnin' Hopkins and Ry Cooder.
 |
| The ship in Burden of Dreams |
Burden of Dreams is one of Blank's best-known films for good reason. Stunning footage of seething jungle and its native inhabitants sets the scene for one of the more unusual films about film making. Burden of Dreams documents Werner Herzog's obsessive four-year struggle to complete his 1982 film, Fitzcarraldo. The title character (played by Klaus Kinski) was himself obsessively driven to build an opera house in the turn-of-the-century Amazon. To finance his project, Fitzcarraldo moves a riverboat over a mountain between two rivers, which Herzog re-creates for his film, the jungle fighting him at every turn. The film has to be seen to be believed. Editor, sound technician and frequent Blank collaborator Maureen Gosling will be at the screening to discuss sound and editing.
I will be introducing the films on Sunday July 15th and Sunday August 12th.
Always for Pleasure: The Films of Les Blank
July 8 - August 30, 2012
at the PFA Theater, 2575 Bancroft, Berkeley, CA
Find the complete calendar on BAM/PFA's website here.
Read about the series in this East Bay Express article.
View Larger Map
No comments:
Post a Comment