Films

GINKO YELLOW                                                  

2022, 5 minutes, 16mm, color, silent
with Indigo Cohan

“Yellow, the color.” (AH)

CHABROT                                                  

2022, 3 ½ minutes, 16mm, black and white, sound
with Sheila Pinkel, Paolo Davanzo, Geneva Simmons and Andrew Halpern

A private toast.  Inspired by a random encounter with this Wikipedia entry, while looking up “Chabrol, Claude” for a full listing of his films:

“Faire chabrot or faire chabròl is an ancient Occitanian custom whereby at the end of a soup or broth, one adds red wine to the bowl to dilute the remnants and brings it to the lips to drink in big gulps.”  – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

4 FINGERS, 5 TOES                                               

2022, 11 minutes, 16mm, color, silent

“Endangered animals on an endangered medium. A heartbeat 4/4. Slow cinema, with sex scene.” (AH)

HULA                                              

2022, 6 minutes, 16mm, color, sound
with Henry Franklin on bass

“Abstract music notation and something very obvious.” (AH)

EMIT A BEAM, SEE A LIGHT                                              

2022, 3 ½ minutes, 16mm, color, sound
with Richard Portman & Teresa Roupe

“Statement and demonstration.” (AH)

VERGE for my sisters                                              

2022, 5 ½ minutes, 16mm, color, silent

“A horizon like a blade.  Consistent across landscapes in California – ocean to desert and back to ocean.” (AH)

I TREMBLE / 8:46                                              

2022, 9 ½ minutes, 16mm, color, sound

An opera in the public domain.
“I tremble for my country when I think that god is just.”
Thomas Jefferson

MY DEAR EVAPORANT,                                             

2022, 5 ½ minutes, 16mm, color, silent

“Message for a friend. What can I say about a private letter?” (AH)

MA SEWING                                             

2021, 1 ½ minutes, 16mm, color, silent

“My mother, now 94.  Shot more than 30 years ago.” (AH)

FIRE BELLY                                              

2021, 3 minutes, 16mm, color, silent

“Alchemists thought that salamanders could be reborn from fire – like the Phoenix, or the Christ.  But salamanders do not survive fire, nor extreme dryness. And they do not resurrect after burning.  Consequently they are at present in great danger on the planet.” (AH)

BIRDS IN THE WINDOW  

2020 – 2021, 9 minutes, color, sound, digital
by Amy Halpern and David Lebrun

“Trying to get in, trying to get out. Encounters from the plague year.”

JANE, LOOKING  

2020, 2 minutes, 16mm, color, silent
with Jane Wodening (Brakhage)

Portrait of Jane Wodening (Brakhage). “A person who was the subject of the camera for many years looks back at us with an interrogating stare.” (AH)

NEWT LEADERS                                              

2020, 4 ½ minutes, 16mm, color, silent

“Presents the physically necessary film ‘leaders’ at the front and back end of movies as aesthetic in themselves. The beautiful detritus of the medium.” (AH)

UNOWNED LUXURIES #3                                              

2020, 2 minutes, 16mm, color, silent
with Marpa Franzoni

“The Unowned Luxuries films are about possession through the eyes.  Based on the childhood perception (attributed to me as a five-year-old by my father) that “to see is to touch with the eyes”, these films propose a less toxic mode of ownership.  Actual ownership is over-rated, as a desire and as a goal.” (AH)

MY MINK  (Unowned Luxuries #2)                                              

2019, 4 minutes, 16mm, color, silent
with Shaun Madigan and Lewis Weinberg

MY DIAMOND (Unowned Luxuries #1) 

2015, 4 ½ minutes, color, sound, digital
with Sebastian de Trolio

# 27  

2019, 3 minutes, 16mm, color, silent
with Caroline McCrystal Marcantoni

SLOW FIREWORKS                                             

2019, 2 minutes, 16mm, color, silent

“Papyrus, light, wind.” (AH)

VEZELAY CURTAIN 

2019, 5 minutes, color, sound, digital

“The wind has its own way of praying.” (Randolph Pitts)

THE DEER’S BLESSING  

2017, 2 ½ minutes, color, silent, digital

NEWT PAUSES  

2016, 7 ½ minutes, 16mm, color, silent

MAYA DOUBLE-BOTTOMED BOWL 

2014, 2 minutes, color, sound, digital
for Dumbarton Oaks and Night Fire Films

“Special-effects equipment from about 600 A.D. The sound is made by the movement of the object, no added on.” (AH)

INJURY ON A THEME  

2012, 7 minutes, 16mm, color, sound
for Lynda Gudde

“A short sweet film concerning torture.” (AH)

BY HALVES   

2012, 7 minutes, 16mm, color, silent

By Halves was “discovered” in “pic fill”, discarded 35mm. release print material split in half and perforated as 16mm for use as sound track spacer in the double-system editing process.

“An appropriate appropriation, a gift, a magic act.  The movement of the performer is slowed because one sees first the top and then the bottom of each frame in quick succession.  Surprises result.”  (AH) 

FLICKER WARNING: If you are susceptible to seizures, or are just uncomfortable with flashing lights, please close and cover your eyes and turn away during this film.

PALM DOWN 

2012, 6 minutes, 16mm, color, silent

“Two palindromes, no happy ending.” (AH)

CHESHIRE SMILE 

2012, 5 minutes, 16mm, color, sound
with Caroline Olsen-Van Stone and Adnan Ibrahim

“Stand up and use your ears like a man”  – Charles Ives

3-MINUTE HELLS   

2012, 14 minutes, 16mm, color, sound
with Arwa Ibrahim

“A progress from detention to release in 7 movements” (AH)
1 – Detention
2 – Hollywood Hills
3 –  Reptile
4 – Bestiary
5 – Abstract and Concrete
6 – Doorway Occupation
7 – Sideways

ELIXIR   

2012, 7 minutes, 16mm, color, silent
with Asha Wilson & Joyce Campbell

“A love letter.” (AH)

POURING GRAIN   

2008, 2 ½ minutes, 16mm, color, silent

“An exploration of the natural structuring of pouring grains through light – including the grains of the film emulsion in its fall across the projector beam.” (AH)

ACCESS TO THE VIEW  

2000, 2 minutes, 16mm, color, sound
with Yogi John Franzoni

FALLING LESSONS 

1992, 64 minutes, 16mm, color, sound
Musicians: Sam Claiborne, Marilyn Donadt, Tony Dumas, David Hykes and the Harmonic Choir, Billy Higgins, Tito Lariva, Toni Marcus, Chalo Quintana, Lakshmi Shankar, Sandman Sims, and others.  Mix: Richard Portman.  Camera, editing, music and sound design: Amy Halpern

“Amy Halpern’s 64 minute Falling Lessons is a stunningly sensual, life-affirming experience from a major experimental film artist that is open to myriad meanings. The film is a rhythmic montage of almost 200 faces, human and animals, that Halpern pans vertically, creating a cascade of visages suggesting that while individuals express a range of emotions they remain ultimately enigmas.

“The glimpses of life going on around all these faces have an unsettling, even apocalyptic quality, and the film forces you to consider living beings and their value collectively rather than selectively. Halpern’s rich, inspired mix of sounds, words and music complements her images perfectly.”
Kevin Thomas, Los Angeles Times

“A healing film… All of the people in it seem naked… It should be shown in mental institutions – to the patients and the doctors alike.”
Ornette Colman

“The strangest film I have ever seen.”
Chick Strand

READY-MADE 

1989, 3 minutes, 16mm, color, silent, animation

Writhing, from a pack of “nudie-cutie” cards  (AH)

INVOCATION 

1982, 2 minutes, 16mm, color, silent

“A temporary sculpture; an invitation and benediction.” (AH)

CUTICLE TORTURE 

1981, 2 minutes, 16mm, black and white, silent

PYTHONESS                                             

1979, 2 minutes, 16mm, black and white, silent
with Siri Dharma Gagliano

Pythia or the Pythoness was the priestess of Delphi.  “Introspection must be clear for the tongue to speak the truth.”  (AH)

CIGARETTE BURN  

1978, 7 ½ minutes, 16mm, black and white, sound
with Nancy Halpern & Yves Marton

“Sitting home smoking cigarettes during the occupation. Very nasty and sophomoric. And beautiful.” (AH)

SELF-PORTRAIT AS A CITY  

1977, 5 minutes, 16mm, color, silent
camera operator in N.Y. Larry Gottheim

STUDY for CIGARETTE BURN                                            

1976, 2 minutes, 16mm, black and white, silent

PLAUSIBLE LIGHT SOURCE

1976, 1 minute, 16mm, color, silent

FILAMENT (THE HANDS)  

1975, 6 minutes, 16mm, black and white, silent
with Mikis Theodorakis

“Theodorakis… always performed in a black shirt, so that his hands were enunciated.  I had seen his hands become animate of themselves and take flight and become these rhythmic inspiring objects.  So that’s what I was gunning for.  It’s a progression of stocks, Plus-X to Tri-X to 4-X, so that the most halated shots occur at the end. 

Mikis Theodorakis, Greek composer, then recently freed from prison, filmed during a concert at Independence Hall, Philadelphia. Shot from backstage. 

“The ‘flashes of lightning’ are static electricity.  And I’m always delighted that the flashes rhyme with his gestures.  This is energy for liberation.  This is energy for carrying the fire forward.” (AH)

PEACH LANDSCAPE                                            

1973, 5 minutes, 16mm, color, silent

“A rapture of film grain and light, an expanse of flesh, and the fruit of the universe. Literally, a rhapsody on a slice of canned peach in a bowl.” (AH)

A GLANCE                                           

1972, 1 minute, 16mm, color, silent

“2 seconds of image. Essential: the looking.” (AH)

THREE PREPARATIONS                                           

1972, 6 minutes, 16mm, color, silent

– Drops
– Statice / Frameline
– Cannonball Section

“Considerations of the frame.  The grain as it holds colored light.  Glass as it holds colored light.  Loud silent music (especially The Cannonball Section, the last movement)” (AH)

ROLL #1 FOR NANCY                                           

1972, 3 minutes, 16mm, color, silent

“Considerations of the frame.  The grain as it holds colored light.  Glass as it holds colored light.  Loud silent music (especially The Cannonball Section, the last movement)” (AH)