Scenes from a Film Symposium: Orphans 6

The first several slides would suggest that the participants in the Orphan Film Symposium, March 26-29, 2008 at NYU, were more interested in food and drink than films, but most of the images that follow reveal their true passion.

Today is my day for naps, pizza, and college basketball. As a sophisticated flâneuse, I sometimes need a time-out.

T.O., baby! Texas is out.

Walking Off the Big Apple will return to the streets tomorrow.

(see previous posts for more on the Orphan Film Symposium.) Photos in slideshow by Walking Off the Big Apple. March 2008.

Orphan Film Symposium: Moving Orphans, Itinerant Filmmakers, and Pancho Villa

Last night at the Orphan Film Symposium, we gathered for dinner inside the historic Judson Memorial Church on Washington Square South. Making the most of the "on location" feel for the symposium, most of the events take place in and around Washington Square Park.

Ever since it was announced that the symposium was moving to New York, some people worried that the southern grit flair established in South Carolina for so long would be lost in translation. I worried about this myself, but on balance, just after the opening couple of days, I don't think there's anything to worry about now. Wednesday night's tribute to the late Helen Hill, a native of Columbia, South Carolina, and with it, the presence of family and friends from South Carolina, made an effective and moving transition for the symposium's segue to New York. In addition, the friendly humor that developed among earlier participants is still alive and well here, and maybe even funnier. The food is still good, and all the films are remarkable.

Last night I attended Mexican filmmaker Gregorio Rocha's presentation and screening of the restored La Venganza de Pancho Villa (ca. 1930-34) by itinerant filmmakers, Felix and Edmundo Padilla. Rocha's discovery of the famous lost reels of Pancho Villa in the archives at the University of Texas at El Paso was a breaking news story announced at the second symposium in 2001. The Padillas, operating as itinerant filmmakers along the US-Mexican border, put together this thrilling tale, combining fictional recreations with actual footage of the real Villa and his army.

Growing up in Texas and living in Austin, I met several Texans from the border area who had their own stories of Villa's raids on their ancestors' haciendas. They couldn't decide if they loved Pancho Villa or loathed him (their grandparents hated him), and the film that Gregorio showed the audience was equally ambiguous.

I've spent most of the day running errands - buying flowers, beverages, cheese and crackers, all with the aim of hostessing the orphanistas, as we are known, with le know-how, the French translation for je-ne-sais-quoi.

Images: above, gathering for dinner at the Judson Memorial Church, and below, flowers at W. 3rd and Thompson St. I brought home the red carnations.

For more on Gregorio Rocha's Pancho Villa, please see the related post at the Orphan Film Symposium blog.

Orphan Film Symposium: The 1961 Folk Singer Protest in Washington Square Park, and Emile de Antonio's America

At the beginning of each Orphan Film Symposium, I like to scan the schedule and make note of the films I can't miss. The registered participants see all the films together as well as talk over organized lunches and dinners. The screenings start in the morning and continue through the evening, so the collective experience is intense. Though I take care of minor behind-the-scenes tasks, I like to attend most of the screenings.

I put today's early afternoon session at the top of my list – films that documented protests held in Washington Square Park in the 1960s, and a couple of presentations on maverick documentary filmmaker Emile de Antonio.

Dan Drasin was a burgeoning 18-year-old filmmaker when he took his cameras and some black and white film to document a protest by folk singers in Washington Square Park in 1961. Reacting to the passage of an ordinance that prohibited singing in the park (folk singers attract unsavory elements, don't you now?), the active folk music community brought guitars to the park and sang songs of freedom. After the singers dispersed, policemen beat up some of the spectators. Drasin's 17-minute film captures that gritty determination of New Yorkers at the beginning of the 1960s, and many consider Sunday to be the first protest film of the 1960s.

Other films from the session included selections of footage shot in Washington Square Park from 1966 by Bob Parent, an artist known mostly as a still photographer, and an NYU surveillance film from 1968 of students protesting Dow Chemical's role in the Vietnam War. Ross Lipman (UCLA) presented a PowerPoint show on the restoration of Emile de Antonio's Point of Order (1963), focusing much on the usage of the word "spectacle."

Andrew Lampert of the Anthology Film Archives recently found a 1967 interview with de Antonio filmed in Leipzig, Germany. With Point of Order, his edited film of the 1954 Army-McCarthy televised hearings, De Antonio explains that he didn't set out to make a movie about his opposition to Sen. Joe McCarthy but to make a movie about the aspects of America that created the conditions for McCarthyism. De Antonio, by the way, promoted and distributed Drasin's Sunday protest film.

After sitting in the dark film theater and seeing the sights and hearing the sounds of Washington Square Park in the 1960s, walking back through the same park in the rain on my way home was a bittersweet experience. The fountain area is torn up now as part of an extensive multi-year renovation. The sincere voices and strumming that accompanied the well-preserved black-and-white moving images of protest seemed fresh, but the sounds of "This land is your land, This land is my land" grew faint as I looked around the park in it's current state of disruption. I am full of hope, however, that variations on these melodies will return one day back in full force.

Images: above, NYU surveillance film of Dow Chemical protesters; below: de Antonio.

Orphan Film Symposium, Explanation of "Orphan Widow," and Keynote Address

Orphans 6 (Orphan Film Symposium, 6th iteration) kicked off officially this morning in the Cantor Film Center. Richard Allen, the Chair of NYU Cinema Studies, introduced organizer and faculty member Dan Streible by saying all kinds of nice things about him, including holding up Streible's new book, Fight Pictures, and reading passages from Charles Musser's introduction. If you've been following along in previous posts, I am Streible's spouse, and I am sometimes known as the "orphan widow."

Because Streible spends an unreal amount of time preparing for Orphan events, I came up with this witticism to describe my status. I'm actually listed in the official program that way. I really haven't felt much like the widow at all for Orphans 6, however, probably because he's often at home and on the computer, and I'm also at the keyboards, blogging half the day. We spend quality time at home sitting on the couch with our laptops and watching TV at the same time.

Back to the symposium. The first bit of orphan film was from the University of South Carolina's Fox Movietone Newsreel collection and was footage from 1929 showing sights and sounds of New York's Radio Row (Wikipedia entry). The camera caught the action of the neighborhood from the top of a truck, showing the streetscapes and people in this once vibrant section of the Lower West Side.

Paolo Cherchi Usai's keynote address focused on the dilemmas facing state-run media archives, and as he spoke, he showed us a silent film from the National Film and Sound Archive in Australia. I'm not sure what year the film was made, but it was some sort of older instructional film to show the evolution of animals as upright walking creatures. The film opened with crawling, low-riding animals such as alligators and moved up to primates. The shocker came at the end, with a humiliating racist depiction of indigenous Australians. After the film concluded, Usai pointed out that the film was at at one point "de-acquisitioned," or "orphaned, but it's now back in the archive's collection. The larger issue, he explained, was the potential for all of cinema history, as film, to become orphaned in the digital age.

Image: early arrivals, Orphan Film Symposium, Thursday morning, March 27, 2008.

Openings and Overtures: The Orphan Film Symposium

Yesterday's weather of warming temperatures, clear skies, and abundant sunshine in New York provided clear sailing for the arrival of guests at the Orphan Symposium. The twilight that followed provided a stunning glow for the opening reception. Here you see the celebrated film accompanist, Dennis James, providing the sounds. The skyline, even more glamorous than usual, made a too perfect backdrop for a conference devoted to film.

I had a great time at the reception. I saw many friends I haven't seen since Orphans 5, and I introduce several people to one another. In point of fact, I think this is my most important role in the symposium. Making new friends, discovering new potential colleagues, and establishing the groundwork for future relationships is what it's all about. After the reception, the participants strolled across Washington Square Park toward NYU's Cantor Film Center to take their places for opening remarks and the special tribute night for the films of Helen Hill.

The evening screenings at the film center kicked off with imaginative Bill Morrison's special trailer for Orphans 6. Created in his signature style, one that calls attention to the frailties and beauties of the material of film, the trailer incorporated clips from upcoming screenings that showed people arriving at a new place - debarking from airplanes and so forth. While watching the extraordinary short animated films of Helen Hill that followed, I continued to be moved by how her vision was so innovative, loving, avant-garde and full of childlike wonder. No one else I know can be described as a cutting-edge and experiment saint, and so, she is sorely missed.

Image: March 26, 2008. Dennis James at the piano. New York, New York. by Walking Off the Big Apple.

Preparing for the Orphan Film Symposium

As I've hinted in previous posts, I've set aside the regular agenda for Walking Off the Big Apple this week in order to make myself useful as the spouse of the organizer of a film symposium. This usefulness should last only through Sunday morning. Then I can return to my normal life as the peripatetic and useless bride, back out on the streets of Gotham in search of art and culture and in denial about any pressing needs at the grocery store.

The Orphan Film Symposium (official site), a biannual gathering of film scholars, film archivists, filmmakers, film restorers, and other filmic professionals, began in 1999 at the University of South Carolina. Designed to heighten awareness and improve preservation of previously neglected moving images such as home movies, industrial films, and educational films, the symposium grew in size and stature over the years. Dan Streible, the founder and animating impressario, now teaches at NYU, and the symposium will be held in NYC for the first time. Streible, a native of Louisville, Kentucky, was given the honorary distinction of "colonel" by the Commonwealth of Kentucky when he was 14 years old. The plaque hangs on our dining room wall. I took the framed decree down off the wall the other day to show someone, because the person seemed surprised by the whole thing.

I plan to write as many posts as possible about what transpires over the course of the next few days. The event begins tonight with a tribute to Helen Hill, a gifted filmmaker who was tragically killed in post-Katrina New Orleans. I will see several of the films tonight and during the next few days, but my main duty is to smile, run interference, and procure enough food and beverages for any sort of party. Over 300 people are registered for the symposium, with 18 countries represented. Fortunately, they're not all staying with us. My postings should provide an unusual perspective, given that I'm on the edges as a participant. I will have to break away from the proceedings at times so I can walk the dogs.

This morning I picked up the fine art prints of the posters for the symposium. I designed them. My artist friend in Tribeca did a great job printing them, and I think they look really good.