We are delighted to be co-presenting a program of short films at this year’s Rendezvous with Madness Film Festival. It’s on Thursday November 13th at 9:30pm at TIFF Bell Lightbox, and it’s called Short Bursts of Madness. Here are some details about the films in the lineup:
MOTHER IS GOD (MAMMA AR GUD)
Director: Maria Bäck | Denmark/Sweden 2013 | 30:00
Director Maria Bäck talks to her mother (whose face we do not see) on Skype, constructing an account that captures evidence of several mutable feelings.
LUK’LUK’I: MOTHER
Director: Wayne Wapeemukwa | Canada 2014 | 19:00
A full-time mother and part-time sex worker goes missing on Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside during the 2010 Winter Olympics. This narratively sophisticated and righteously angry commentary on social neglect is set against a backdrop of glib patriotism.
MANIC
Director: Brooks Hunter | Canada 2014 | 6:00
Director Brooks Hunter examines how he has transformed from being ashamed of his mental illness at 17 to now embracing and using it to shape the way he sees and shapes the world every day.
THE AURORATONE PROJECT: NEW FRONTIERS IN PSYCHIATRIC CINEMA
Directors: Various | Canada 2012 | 45:00
The Auroratone Project is a commission of original short films by experimental Canadian filmmakers set to the music of participating artists from POP Montreal’s 2012 roster. Auroratones were abstract musical films used in mental institutions and army hospitals after WWII as a means of soothing post-traumatic stress disorder and general mental disturbance, invented by film enthusiast Cecil Stokes who was continuing on nearly two centuries of previous pseudo-scientific attempts to correlate colour with musical notes. For The Auroratone Project, filmmakers Leslie Supnet (Manitoba), Emily Pelstring (Quebec), Jon Rafman (Quebec), Alex MacKenzie (BC), Walter Forsberg (Manitoba), Leslie Bell (Alberta), Jaimz Asmundson (Manitoba), Cheryl Hann (Nova Scotia), Tamara Scherbak (Quebec) and Sabrina Ratte (Quebec) were approached to create original abstract films guided by the principles of Cecil Stokes’ Auroratones. Music by Yamantaka // Sonic Titan, Julia Holter, Tim Hecker, Cresting, Doldrums and more.
Tickets are $12 and are available online or at the door.