Posts By Dave Bonta

Dave Bonta is a poet, editor, and web publisher from the Appalachian mountains of central Pennsylvania.

Wygnana (Expelled) by Bozena Urszula Malinowska

http://www.vimeo.com/21089942

Another film by Marcin Konrad Malinowski for a poem by his mother, the late Bozena Urszula Malinowska. Here’s the translation Marcin supplied. I think he’s open to suggestions on how it might be improved, but this is certainly enough to let the non-Polish viewer understand how the film images relate to, and play off of, the text:

Expelled from paradise
by me
by me alone
expelled
I’ll bury my sin in my heart
I won’t drop to my knees
in hope, that there
behind the gates
I’ll find silence and peace
Today I expel myself from paradise
With a curse
that’ll crush my heart
and I won’t yearn,
cry, wait and dream
I expel myself from paradise
So I can
live again

The post about the video on Marcin’s project blog reproduces a hand-written draft of the poem.

Poetry in Film Festival 2011 now accepting submissions

Like our own videopoem contest, PIFF 2011 challenges filmmakers to make a short film in response to the same poem — in their case, “Four Letters, Three Words” by Brenda Hilton. But their contest is a much more high-powered affair with entry fees and screenings and whatnot, and they also don’t require that the poem be incorporated into the film, only that the film should be a response to it. Here are the rules and regulations.

To a Mouse by Robert Burns

A gorgeous, grungy animation and great reading (by Bill Patterson) of the classic poem, created for the Robert Burns Birthplace Museum, Alloway, Scotland. Barnaby Hewlett directed. Produced by Spiral Productions.

hollow by Peter Stephens

A Moving Poems production, with the cooperation of Nic S. at Whale Sound, who agreed to let me use her reading for the soundtrack, and the author, who perhaps unwisely gave his permission without any constraints whatsoever. Read Peter’s original text at his blog, Slow Reads. I think it’s a spectacular poem, and I hope my video does it justice — or at least excites interest in the poet and the reader.

I found the rest of the soundtrack at ccMixter, and a public-domain film to poach footage from at the Prelinger Archives (just two of the many online resources I’ve found for videopoem makers — check out the whole list).

Mashup: Kiss by Paul Portugés

Paul Portugés wrote the words and screenplay, and Cecil Hirvi supplied machinima/mashup and music, and well as providing the avatar for one of the three actors in Second Life.

A Fire in Ice by Marly Youmans

Paul Digby designed and created this video, which I am slotting into the “concrete poetry” category (even though the text is in rhyming couplets) on the strength of its last few seconds, which to me also perform the essential function of suggesting additional meanings beyond those immediately obvious in the text itself. Marly Youmans reads her poem, which is from her new collection The Throne of Psyche.

Die Farben dieser Welt (Colours of the World) by Rainer Schippers

Rainer Schippers is responsible for the music as well as the poem. George P. Schnyder “Filmed with the GH1 and a Sony HC1 (for the 8mm Stuff).”

Prodigal by Kona Macphee

Alastair Cook‘s 11th filmpoem. His description at Vimeo is worth quoting in full:

Prodigal is a film of Kona Macphee‘s poem, which was born from Andrew Philip’s project for the second Hidden Door festival, held in Edinburgh in October 2010: I was asked to record a reading of the poem. As I read it, I felt its power and resolved to make a filmpoem. I commissioned a cello piece from Rebecca Rowe and we performed this live at the Poetry Association of Scotland‘s meeting on 9th March 2011, at the Scottish poetry Library. A new direction for these perhaps, the addition of live performance… but the work is as dark and mercurial as ever.

My Love for You is So Embarrassingly by Todd Boss

Deb Kirkeeide designed and animated this motionpoem for a poem by Todd Boss.

Cet Amour (This Love) by Jacques Prévert

I didn’t expect to like this, but I did. Noah Oros directs. English subtitles are included.

Fearless Laughter: Yusef Komunyakaa’s Advice to Young Poets

A video created by Sampsonia Way magazine for Rattapallax. Komunyakaa was interviewed by Elizabeth Hoover, and the video production and editing are by Glen Wood.

Walking & Falling by Laurie Anderson

The video is titled “Step,” filmed by Pascal Rekoert and released as a podcast by NYC’s Flexicurve Dance Company in 2008. Anderson recorded the spoken-word piece for her 1982 album Big Science, and that’s the recording featured here.