movie world

Canadian Institute for Exploratory Cinemas presents Cross-Eye, an anthology of Quebec and Canadian experimental film and video art (1960-2011) . From surrealist refractions to punk and dissident factions, the anthology brings together a unique collection of avant-garde movie works. Tearing apart the barriers betweens eras, borders and mediums, the viewing experience encompass a total experience of the brain unstrapped of subtle luminosity and high voltage experimentations. This anthology aims to act as a catalyst for the establishment of an oblique view of the Quebec and Canadian cinema.

This anthology aims to act as a catalyst in the formation of a transversal vision of Quebecker and Canadian cinema. The organization of the three discs presents the program on the basis of valuing chronological interlacing and permutations. This baroque fragmentation allows angles and reliefs that emphasize the presence of archetypes in the discontinuous narrative. Coteries associated with the chapels of experimental films and video art, through the purists defenses of celluloid and digital visions, have deliberately been addressed to be distilled, transmuted and sublimated. This optic contamination will act as visual immunotherapy for the visionary viewers.

The geographical path of Contre-Oeil reflects the porous field of experimental cinematography: pathways that all tend toward interior civilizations. The films, videos and composite visions that constitute the program have in common to emphasize the electrical and chemical genesis of the images to apprehend both their tangibility and their narrative and discursive potential. From the anonymity of found footage to terrorists hijacking, through the crystalline diffractions of surrealism and punk's legacy, it's a whole area of production from Quebec and Canada that is celebrated here.

This selection proposes the possible migration of avant-garde refractions. A maneuver that juxtaposes the echoes of Quebec's first film society in churches' basements, of traditional cinemas, but also of nightclubs and other circus tents of clandestine projections, who received the dazzling lights of subversive cathodic, celluloid and pixellic rays. Genuine attempt to emphasize the permanence of the works, Contre-Oeil isn't only intended to shine a light on the perspective that current time dismisses, but also a way to pierce the veil and to take place on the other side of the mirror. This collapsing of appearances lets the intuitive gaze function by induction and mental images production, allowing an accurate realism and kinetic lucidity.

3 x DVD5 | NTSC | 268 min | 12.2 Gb + 3% rec
Language: English or Silent
Subtitles: none
Genre: Experimental

DVD 1:
La femme image / Guy Borremans (1960, 35 min.)
Bad blood for the vampyr / Lysanne Thibodeau (1984, 22 min.)
La nuit obscure / Pierre-Luc Vaillancourt (2011, 29 min.)

DVD 2:
Aeon / Al Razutis (1969-1971, 26 min.)
Urban fire / C.E. Brown (1982, 15 min.)
The garden of earthly delights / Izabella Pruska-Oldenhof (2008, 8 min.)
Ville Marie / Alexandre Larose (2006-2009, 12 min.)
Mouvement de lumiere (Motion of light) / Karl Lemieux (2004, 8 min.)
Trees of syntax, leaves of axis / Daichi Saito (2009, 10 min.)

DVD 3:
Jaffa-gate / Richard Raxlen (1982, 6 min.)
Riviere 0 (River 0) / Jean Claude Bustros (2002, 18 min.)
The blood of many filmmakers / Istvan Kantor (2006, 27 min.)
Las mujeres de Pinochet (Pinochet's women) / Eduardo Menz (2005, 12 min.)
Du moteur a explosion / Dominic Gagnon (2000, 40 min.)