Cinema Archive Detail

January 2015
New: Works by Loretta Fahrenholz
We are happy to be presenting Loretta Fahrenholz' new video work MY THROAT, MY AIR (Germany) and other works of hers as part of our distribution range.
Set in Munich’s petty-bourgeois Westend, MY THROAT, MY AIR documents life at home with former Fassbinder actor, Warhol collaborator, and horror movie director Ulli Lommel. Rather than shooting a straight documentary portrait of this bohemian household, Fahrenholz prefers to follow the narrative impulses of Lommel’s stepchildren, inviting the possibility of a strangely self-fictionalizing realism. Lost in serious play, the kids improvise hypnotic death scenes while their mother claims to come from a planet where everything is "ethereal and incorporeal." As parent-child relations are un-scripted and re-scripted on the fly, the dilated time of a collective daydream is punctuated by the ordinary sounds of an electric toothbrush, vacuum cleaner and piano.
December 2014
In Focus: Vincent Macaigne
Actor Vincent Macaigne (*1978) has been omnipresent in recent French cinema. Together with filmmakers Guillaume Brac, Justine Triet, Sébastien Betbeder and Antonin Peretjatko, in whose films he acts, he is one of the defining figures of the up-and-coming group currently breathing new life into French auteur cinema. The feature debuts of this new generation of directors in their mid-thirties have been celebrated in France as marking the dawn of an energetic new form of independent film that takes a very different look at contemporary life, displaying a great feel for comedy, a sure grasp of everyday absurdities, and an awareness of crises both private and political in the process. Vincent Macaigne, who is an actor, theatre director as well as a filmmaker, has to a certain extent become the public face of the films of this group of kindred spirits, in which he always plays men pushing thirty grappling with the passing of their youth, the complications of being in love, and solitude in charming, timid and winningly innocent fashion. His roles are marked by comedy, tragedy, and a certain sense of melancholy. We are happy to be able to present six current films with Vincent Macaigne as part of the Französische Filmwoche.
December 2014
All Singing, All Dancing: Hollywood-Musicals 1933–1957
The film musical is one of the most popular genres from the golden era of classic Hollywood cinema, blending comedic, theatrical, dance and circus elements into a new artistic whole. The development of the genre is closely connected to the introduction of sound film. "All talking! All singing! All dancing!" is how Metro Goldwyn Mayer 1929 advertised the first feature-length sound film musical The Broadway Melody in 1929, which carried a whole wealth of similar productions in its wake.
In a comprehensive film series in December and January, Arsenal presents 22 key works of the genre, taking in the backstage musicals of the early 30s, Busby Berkeley’s complex choreographies of geometric figures and ornamental crowd scenes, Fred Astaire und Ginger Roger's musical version of the screwball comedy, and the musical’s sparkling Technicolor heyday in the late 40s and 50s. Starring Fred Astaire, Lucille Ball, Leslie Caron, Cyd Charisse, Judy Garland, Kathryn Grayson, Rita Hayworth, Lena Horne, Gene Kelly, Ruby Keeler, Oscar Levant, Carmen Miranda, The Nicholas Brothers, Eleanor Powell, Ginger Rogers, Frank Sinatra, Esther Williams and many, many more.
December 2014
All Singing, All Dancing: Hollywood-Musicals 1933–1957
The film musical is one of the most popular genres from the golden era of classic Hollywood cinema, blending comedic, theatrical, dance and circus elements into a new artistic whole. The development of the genre is closely connected to the introduction of sound film. "All talking! All singing! All dancing!" is how Metro Goldwyn Mayer 1929 advertised the first feature-length sound film musical The Broadway Melody in 1929, which carried a whole wealth of similar productions in its wake. The stock character of the early film revues and behind the scenes stage shows, which merely gifted the story with a excuse for music and dance numbers, gradually gave way to film musicals unburdened by such tricks from 1933 onwards. Over the course of just a few months, Warner Bros charted an entirely new course in the form of three modern, unsentimental, and fast-moving productions full of cheeky dialogue (42ND STREET, "Gold Diggers of 1933" and "Footlight Parade"). For the choreography of the lavish musical numbers, Busby Berkeley arranged dozens of showgirls into geometric, kaleidoscopic patterns and transformed the stage into a world of cinematic fantasy by way of special effects, a moving camera, and rapid sequences of shots. At the same time, RKO produced musicals with dancing couple Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers that came across like a counterdraft to Berkeley’s ornamental crowd scenes and the visual opulence of the Warner musicals. The films are characterized by a more intimate, individual elegance and the everyday character of the stories, with song and dance being integrated into the plot to a greater degree. It was the MGM musicals of 40s and 50s that managed to blend songs, dance and plot together in truly seamless fashion, musicals which are above all connected with Arthur Freed's production unit and director Vincente Minnelli. Song and dance no longer needed any explanation, as within the reality of the musical, the boundary between dream and real life dissolves and the rules and conventions of everyday reality are suspended: "Music, dance and color do away with the 'seriousness of life' and promise the victory of love and happiness." (Ulrich Gregor/Enno Patalas)
December 2014
Magical History Tour: Manifestos, Writings and Pamphlets
Flaming manifestos, hard-hitting charges, trailblazing texts, precise descriptions of different states, and dynamic blueprints for the future are at the heart of this month's Magical History Tour – an attempt to shine a light on film history from the perspective of several central texts and manifestos. In all these writings, it's about nothing less than the fundamental renewal and/or liberation of cinema from restraints and conventions of commercial, aesthetic, narrative or political nature; about proclaiming a new form of cinema that takes a clear political and artistic position. Each of the selected manifestos has one or two films placed alongside it, which are either "cinematic" adaptations of the texts or are mentioned within them and were usually written by the authors themselves.
December 2014
Cinematic Recollections of the Holocaust
2015 sees the 70th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz extermination camp on January 27th 1945. The "Asynchronous. Documentaries and Experimental Films on the Holocaust. From the Collection of Arsenal – Institute for Film and Video Art e.V." project is dedicated to the cinematic remembrance of the victims of Nazism and thus connects questions on remembrance, archives, and public spheres. A selection of around 50 titles from the Arsenal collection will be put together for the project, ten of which will also be made newly digitally accessible at the same time. In addition, a catalogue will be created to accompany all the films. For the start of the project, a film series with a comprehensive accompanying program will be taking place at Arsenal from January 27. Beforehand, Christian Pichel's FU film studies seminar presents a selection of the films in December and January in six public screenings in cooperation with the project.
December 2014
FU Seminar: Cinematic Recollections of the Holocaust
2015 sees the 70th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz extermination camp on January 27th 1945. The "Asynchronous. Documentaries and Experimental Films on the Holocaust. From the Collection of Arsenal – Institute for Film and Video Art e.V." project is dedicated to the cinematic remembrance of the victims of Nazism and thus connects questions on remembrance, archives, and public spheres. A selection of around 50 titles from the Arsenal collection will be put together for the project, ten of which will also be made newly digitally accessible at the same time. In addition, a catalogue will be created to accompany all the films. For the start of the project, a film series with a comprehensive accompanying program will be taking place at Arsenal from January 27. Beforehand, Christian Pichel's FU film studies seminar presents a selection of the films in December and January in six public screenings in cooperation with the project.
December 2014
Cinema Release "Asta Upset"
In January arsenal distribution is releasing ASTA UPSET (ICH WILL MICH NICHT KÜNSTLICH AUFREGEN) by Max Linz.
The film which premiered in last year's Forum programme, tells of young Berlin curator Asta Nielsen who has to draw on all the style, charm and theory at her disposal to realise her new project, yet runs into difficulties following an overly critical interview. An amusing reflection on the absurdities of the cultural scene.
The film will be on show in selected cinemas from January 8.
December 2014
Think:Film Award 2014 in Berlin und Cairo
December 2014
The DEFA Foundation Presents

New: Works by Loretta Fahrenholz

In Focus: Vincent Macaigne

All Singing, All Dancing: Hollywood-Musicals 1933–1957

All Singing, All Dancing: Hollywood-Musicals 1933–1957

Magical History Tour: Manifestos, Writings and Pamphlets

Cinematic Recollections of the Holocaust

FU Seminar: Cinematic Recollections of the Holocaust

Cinema Release "Asta Upset"

Think:Film Award 2014 in Berlin und Cairo

The DEFA Foundation Presents