Indiana University Cinema

Om Shanti Om: A Giddy Cinematic Ride

Posted on March 21, 2017 by Michaela Owens

Guest post by Michaela Owens.

Four years ago, I watched a film I never forgot. Every week for my musical theatre class, we would watch a range of musicals, from Gentlemen Prefer Blondes to Rent. I had heard of all of them, except for an export from Bollywood called Om Shanti Om. Only one person in my class knew the film, leaving everyone else flabbergasted when we watched it. Throughout the screening, we went through the emotional gamut, alternating between laughing until we cried and tearing up at remarkably tender moments. (more…)

Immersed in the Process: The Work of David Gatten

Posted on March 20, 2017 by Establishing Shot

Still image from What the Water Said, Nos. 4-6

Guest post by Alex Svensson.

I first experienced the work of filmmaker David Gatten in 2010, at a weeknight screening of experimental short films held at Emerson College in Boston, MA. I remember the films that night were well suited for the bitter chill and absent sun of the city in February; though memory escapes with each passing year, I’m still greeted by flickers of icy light urgently dancing with bursts of darkness. With Gatten’s selected piece – What the Water Said, Nos. 4-6 (16mm, 2007) – at the forefront of my recollections, the mind drifts between haunted fragments of nature, swaths of grieving bodies, and obscured visions of what could pass as either the outer reaches of the universe or a level of Hell suffocated by black ice. Needless to say, the strange, beautiful discomfort of the evening still lingers. (more…)

King Who? The Chinese Director You Should Know

Posted on March 6, 2017 by Jesse Pasternack

Still image from Dragon Inn — Still image from *Dragon Inn*

Chinese cinema has produced a lot of great directors. The long list includes internationally respected artists such as Xei Fei, Wong Kar-Wai, and Shu Shuen Tong. These wonderful directors are associated with what Americans might call the arthouse tradition. But China also has a great tradition of action films that focus on martial artists. Many great directors have created these films, but I want to talk about just one in this post. His name is King Hu, and his work is ripe for discovery for both neophytes and experienced cinephiles. (more…)

“What Andrea Arnold’s Films Mean to Me” – Women Filmmakers Share Their Insights

Posted on March 3, 2017 by Barbara Ann O'Leary

This spring IU Cinema has launched a new Staff Selects Film Series providing Cinema staff members with the exciting opportunity to share some of our favorite films with our community. There are so many films I can imagine wanting to screen, but the instant that IU Cinema’s Business Manager Carla Cowden first proposed the series Andrea Arnold’s amazing film Fish Tank flew into my mind. I was startled by the clarity and immediacy of that choice. Later when it came time to draw names to see who would have a chance to program this season and my name was chosen, again Fish Tank came to mind instantly and fiercely. No doubt. It had to be Fish Tank.

Since then I’ve been asking myself, “Why Fish Tank?” Here are a few thoughts: (more…)

Cine-cats love…

Posted on March 2, 2017 by Laura Ivins

Bell Book and Candle (Richard Quine, 1958) — *Bell Book and Candle* (Richard Quine, 1958)

I love cats! I especially love cats in movies, and I’m super excited to see the documentary Kedi (Ceyda Torun, 2016) at the IU Cinema this week. Kedi focuses on the free-roaming cats of Istanbul and how their lives intersect with human co-habitants (but not owners!).

In anticipation of Kedi, I made a little video with some of my favorite cinematic cats. It turns out cine-cats love 3 things….

(more…)

Stop Making Sense: The Strange Auteurism of Stephen Chow

Posted on March 1, 2017 by Aja Essex

Auteur theory is a complicated subject to broach, seeing that the debate to place a definition on the term “auteur”has been ongoing since the 1940s. Everyone has their own variation and take on the term that gets assigned to monolithic and specific directors. To me, however, an auteur is a director with a singular and specific vision that manifests visually, aurally, and thematically over multiple works. There are many filmmakers we celebrate in this vein, but some become lost or forgotten and some like Hong Kong director, actor, writer, and producer Stephen Chow are just plain underrated. An artist with a singular vision, he has somehow all but disappeared from the conversation about auteurism, despite being one of the most artistically innovative and financially successful directors in the world. (more…)