Cinema Canada (Nov 1977)

The make-up fit the mood in Down Among the Deadmen year. Not quite the bar scene from Star Wars, it did have it’s bizarre personality. The film was commissioned by a rock group to be shown as the band performed their song “Down Among the Deadmen.”’ Although the film is not your usual beginning-middle-end scenario, it did illustrate the song with excellent make-up and effects, and very good camera work. Vision House by Rafal Zielinski (Concordia) requires special comment. Rafal is a young filmmaker in his early 20’s who is constantly directing films with inexhaustible energy. Although he isn’t your typical student filmmaker, since Vision House was made with a professional cameraman, ACTRA actors and CBC money, Rafal is definitely a feature director contender. Unlike most young filmmakers, Rafal understands both the business and technical aspects of filmmaking. The drama of a would-be-robber who meets a would-be rich lady in an empty real estate house is intended for a television audience. Although not that sophisticated, Vision House remains a good television film. Never Say ‘‘Hi’’ to Strangers by Craig Cottle (Concordia) is a first film by a student filmmaker who had only studied, but not made films before last year. Craig’s short film about a frightened little girl was concise and well-presented. One special presentation during the festival was the 1976 National Student Film Awards (Academy of Motion Picture Zielinski works with the pros (actress Czerski) to make Vision House 36/Cinema Canada Griffith and cameraman Taking a shot in Pizza to Go Arts and Sciences and sponsored by AT & T). These film Awards presented 35 films selected from 300 entries. Top films won $1000. Curiously enough, four of the five top award winning films were made in California, and curiously enough, at least three of these films included pro-Hollywood photographs or remarks. The films were introduced by a terribly shot film or video of the awards presentation, with Hollywood clips hastily inserted before and between — propaganda plus. What the Notes Say by Karen Grossman and Richard O’Neill (Adelphi) was a competent documentary about the Settlement Music School in Philadelphia. The film was lovely because one watched serious young people adeptly creating music. The film was humorous because one watched a young boy just slightly bigger than the violin he was holding, accomplish quite a difficult line with the exact changes his instructor had just indicated. Fame by Richard Jeffries and Mark Kirkland (California Institute of the Arts) had no redeeming value. The animation began well and then disintegrated into a mass of unsensuous, unartistic, cold graphics of famous people and famous words. The film exploited familiar entertainment names and failed to stimulate the imagination. The Preparatory by Terence Cahalan (University of Southern California) dealt with a rather well-worn subject — a boy in a Catholic boarding school, but the film was probably the best shot, best acted, and best directed film shown during the festival. We’ve been through Lindsay Anderson’s If and Marco Bellocchio’s In the Name of the Father, but The Preparatory doesn’t pretend to tell a complete story in 24 minutes. Instead, it tightly sketches a few dramatic scenes of institutional life. One last remark. It seems that once again, this is the year for the anti-experimental film category. Only two experimental films were pre-selected for the Canadian Student Film Festival. Then the jury dropped the ‘Best Experimental Award’ in lieu of ‘Best Entertainment’, of all things. No one seems to know what kind of film should be labeled experimental, and if one doesn’t understand, one drops. The Canadian Film Awards completely ignored the Experimental Category this year. What is happening to the creative ‘risk’ in filmmaking? Ironically enough, the film that won ‘Best Entertainment’ could be called an experimental documentary. But this is the 20th century, the land of brand names and pre-identified moving algae; even babies in wombs are now given identity numbers. 0 Note: One perhaps failed to comment about two of the award winners L’age dort and and The Prophet Nostradamus because one, perhaps unfortunately, fell asleep during both of these movies.