Canyon Cinema:
The Life & Times of an Independent Film Distributor
Program 1
Screening on Film
$10 Special Event Tickets
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Tung
Directed by Bruce Baillie.
US, 1966, 16mm, color and b&w, silent, 5 min.
One of Baillie's sensuous tone poems, Tung is a portrait of a friend; sandy skin and flaxen hair in the early-morning light.
A classic, early found-footage film, and, for better or worse, one of the instigators of MTV.
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Big Sur: The Ladies
Directed by Larry Jordan.
US, 1966, 16mm, color, 3 min.
"Fast-moving impressions of the Big Sur, the water, the ocean, and the Ladies, as part of the landscape, swimming, or running nude, against the sun or part of the sun. The movements of the camera are impregnated with such happiness that they pull you into a world of exuberance, of light, of joy of living." – Jonas Mekas
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Oh Dem Watermelons
Directed by Robert Nelson.
US, 1965, 16mm, color, 11 min.
A major American underground classic. This film originally served as a theatrical intermission in the San Francisco Mime Troupe’s social-political satire “A Minstrel Show, or Civil Rights in a Cracker Barrel,” but it quickly took on a life of its own. Oh Dem Watermelons takes hilarious and absurd jabs at the watermelon as a tired Black stereotype, using a wild mix of collage, animation, and irreverence, set to a propulsive soundtrack by Steve Reich. – Mark Toscano
Song of the revolutionary hero, Valentin, sung by Jose Santollo Nasido en Santa Cruz de la Soledad; Chapala, Jalisco, Mexico.
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High Kukus
Directed by James Broughton.
US, 1973, 16mm, color, 3 min.
"A High Kuku is, of course, a cuckoo haiku. In inventing this form James Broughton has concocted zany verses which are 'high' in the sense that they are often metaphysical and are keenly aware of the metacomedy of things.... In the contemplation of lofty themes most people are serious, though not always sincere. Broughton, however, is always sincere but hardly ever serious. Indeed, seriousness is a questionable virtue; it is gravity rather than levity, and it was that devout Catholic, G.K. Chesterton, who maintained that the angels fly because they take themselves lightly. And, in company with the angels, Broughton laughs with God rather than at him." – Alan Watts
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Hot Leatherette
Directed by Robert Nelson.
US, 1967, 16mm, black & white, 5 min.
A kinetic film sketch designed to involve the viewer's muscles. The rocky seaside cliffs near Stinson Beach, California, hold the wrecked carcass of a ‘52 pickup that is a rusting monument to Hot Leatherette. – Robert Nelson