Films by Ôshima Nagisa, Michaela Grill & Martin Siewert and Norbert Pfaffenbichler

January 21, 30 and 31, 2008

 
The Film Museum’s Premiere series, begun in 2002, focuses on essential works which have been overlooked by local cinemas and festivals. They are given their first screenings in Austria in the context of this series. So far, new films by Matthew Barney, David Cronenberg, Marina de Van, Raymond Depardon, Guillermo del Toro, Lav Diaz, Abel Ferrara, Gerhard Friedl, Matteo Garrone, John Gianvito, Robert Guédiguian, Thomas Heise, Ken Jacobs, Babette Mangolte, Alexander Payne, Christian Petzold, Junji Sakamoto, Martin Scorsese, Allan Sekula, Michael Snow and Johnnie To have been shown, among many others.
 
In January, 2008, the Film Museum will show two outstanding examples of young Austrian avant-garde cinema and the most recent film of Ôshima Nagisa, the great Japanese master who celebrated his 75th birthday this year. Ôshima's Gohatto/Taboo was first presented and acclaimed in Cannes in 2000 and has virtually vanished since then. A tale of swordfights, beauty and homosexual desire, the film is set in a samurai camp of the Shogun era. The lead roles are played by two superstars of Japanese cinema, Takeshi Kitano and Tadanobu Asano.

The two experimental shorts cityscapes by Michaela Grill and Martin Siewert (shown for the first time in its 35mm version) and Mosaik Mécanique by Norbert Pfaffenbichler (in 35mm CinemaScope) are connected by their consistent use of black and white imagery, their enchanting wide-screen effects and the integral role of musical composition for the film. The soundtrack of Mosaik Mécanique was created by Bernhard Lang, a rising figure in the international scene of contemporary music. Both works are based on archival material dating from the early 20th century: Grill/Siewert are reworking documents of streetlife in Vienna between 1900 to 1935, Pfaffenbichler is paying homage to early American slapstick cinema.