~ Video Library ~
ПИЛИГРИМЫ / Pilgrims by Joseph Brodsky
Pilgrims is “a short film based on the poem of the same name by Russian-American Nobel Prize winning poet Joseph Brodsky,” performed, directed, cinematography by John Doan. Click the CC icon for subtitles in Russian, German, French, or English. The synopsis on Vimeo reads:
Poet alone with his thoughts and feeling tries to find answers to life’s greatest questions. Where is this world going? What is real and what is illusory? Where can one find salvation and peace? Will his inner pilgrimage come to an end?
In addition to his other roles, Doan was also the English translator here; the music is by Moby. Visit the Facebook page for more information on the film.
Antesala altísima / Lofty Anteroom by Estefanía González
Spanish poet Estefanía González appears as one of three actors in this film interpretation of her poem from director Eduardo Yagüe. The English translation in the subtitles is the work of Jean Morris, and the music is from Swoon‘s album Time & River.
The poem appears in González’s 2013 collection Hierba de noche, which, according to this webpage, was born in large part from her activity on blogs, Twitter, and other social networks and internet collaborations. So it seems especially appropriate that her work should now be the subject of further web-based collaboration and transformation. As a blogging poet myself, I love her description of her outlook:
Sigo desperdigando poemas y semillas por las cunetas. Sigo vertiéndome como un jovenzuelo infinito. Sigo prefiriendo lo por venir a lo obrado. La perfección aún me recuerda a la muerte, cualquier elección me recuerda a la muerte. Quizá se trate de inmadurez. Seguramente.
(I keep scattering poems and seeds into the gutters. I keep pouring myself like an endless youth. I still prefer whatever is coming to what’s already been made. Perfection still reminds me of death, any choice reminds me of death. Maybe it’s immature. Surely.)
Transmission by Chris Sakellaridis
A gorgeous animation by Afroditi Bitzouni accompanies a recitation by the Anglo-Greek poet Chris Sakellaridis. The echo effect makes it a bit hard to understand at first, but the text is included at the end of a review at The Creators Project, which begins:
Animated paper cutouts a la Henri Matisse come together to form a visual representation of a poem influenced by the Greek mythological character Orpheus. In Transmission, illustrator and animator Afroditi Bitzouni interprets Chris Sakellaridis’s poem of the same name through a form of collage animation. The seamless fluidity of Bitzouni’s animation resembles the work of Matt Smithson in his Decoding the Mind video. Taking cues from a chilling score by John Davidson, Bitzouni creates fragmented landscapes and abstract humanoids from scraps of colored paper. The majority of the cut outs are grain layer construction paper while others look like they were taken from a magazine or book.
The film is part of the 3361 Orpheus project,
an experimental performance, that combines poetry, music, animation, dance and opera. Ιt draws inspiration from a range of retellings and adaptations of Orpheus’s myth.
The performance’s concept is based on a triptych. The dismemberment and subsequent journey of Orpheus’s head from the river Evros to the island to Lesvos and the creation of his Oracle near the Petrified Forest. The spatial, disembodied, satellite voice coming from the constellation Lyra, where the lyre was placed after his death. The fate of Orpheus’s limbs, buried near Mount Olympus.
The main characters in the narrative are Hermes, in his capacity as psychopomp and transporter of dead souls; Eurydice, recounting her own experience, in the form of shade and dryad, as well as memory; and Orpheus with his lyre, which is seen as a fourth character, a creature alive with its own vital energy.
This is Bitzouni’s second appearance at Moving Poems. Back in 2014 I shared her animation of Night by Tasos Livaditis, a video from Tin House magazine’s late, lamented videos section, Tin House Reels.
My dad’s bigger than your dad by Dave Viney
Sometimes the only thing a poetry film needs to be great is to demonstrate an advanced understanding of play. This film by Jo Lane does just that. She describes it on Vimeo as
A visual representation of a poem by the mancunian poet, Dave Viney.
‘My dad’s bigger than your dad’ is not only a nostalgic chant that everyone has memories of, but a poignant metaphor for many current political scenarios. [link added]
Myles Sketchley Mercer composed the music.
Days of Kindness by Leonard Cohen
The late singer-songwriter’s poem about his life in Greece in the 1960s is juxtaposed with footage from contemporary Detroit by filmmaker AG Rojas. It all works beautifully, calling into question easy dichotomies of urban/rural, exotic/familiar, and nostalgia/regret.
Things I Carry Into the World by Cynthia Manick
This unusual and ambitious poetry film, created for the seventh season of Motionpoems by directors Jamil McGinnis and Pat Heywood, includes words from five different NYC poets, as Heywood explained in an email (links added):
The film is an adaptation of the poem ‘Things I Carry Into the World’ by Cynthia Manick. It’s an abstract meditation on the body, the feminine, the everyday realities of being young and black, and the fragility between the manmade and the natural. We worked with an incredible nonprofit, Urban Word NYC, who teamed us up with four poets: Esther Aloba, Nkosi Nkululeko, Makayla Posely, and Trace DePass, the scenes featuring them are actually adaptations of their own poems, heard briefly in the opening scene. We ended up with moments from four separate films, crafted under the umbrella of Cynthia Manick’s original poem. We found adapting poetry into film to be creatively liberating. Sort of like putting together a thematic puzzle; juxtaposing images, observing, asking questions, and finding moments of meditation to digest the poem’s text. We had our theater premiere at the Walker Arts Center in Minneapolis on October 27 and our online premiere on NOWNESS on November 6.
The poems excerpted at the beginning are “untitled” by Makayla Posely, “Rule #1” by Esther Aloba, “band-aids & other temporary healings” by Trace DePass, and “From the Inside” by Nkosi Nkululeko. See Vimeo for the complete credits.
Goddank / Thank heavens by Max Temmerman
A day late for American Thanksgiving (I was busy hanging with the fam), here’s a Judith Dekker film of a poem by Flemish poet Max Temmerman, with Willem Groenewegen’s English translation in subtitling (and also in the Vimeo description). Dekker notes:
Max Temmerman’s poems and my images are related in a way. They both show the small movements, moments, objects and try to slow down around them. All the images for this one are shot in a time i had to say goodbye to one home to move to another. They are glimpses from both homes. The soundtrack is made by multi-instrumentalist Jon Birdsong.
Click through to Vimeo to read the rest.
Known Unto God by Bill Manhire
British animator Suzie Hannah teamed up with New Zealand’s poet laureate Bill Manhire for this poetry film, part of the Fierce Light series co-commissioned by 14-18 NOW, Norfolk and Norwich Festival and Writers Centre Norwich. It was “Voiced by Stella Duffy, with Sound Design by Phil Archer,” says the description on Hannah’s website, which continues:
Mud and and pigment animation interpreting Bill Manhire’s poem about tragic death of youths in WW1, comprised of 14 short epitaphs for unknown NZ soldiers killed at the Somme, and for unnamed refugees drowning as they flee from wars now, 100 years later.
The film has been selected for screening at the following: 14th London Short Film Festival 2017, Aesthetica Short Film Festival 2016, O Bhéal Poetry Film Festival 2016, Zebra Poetry Film Festival 2016, Interfilm 32nd International Short Film Festival Berlin 2016
“Known Unto God writes the epitaphs to the lost of our world: those fallen soldiers of the Somme whose bodies were never found; those refugees of today who drown seeking a better life for themselves and their families. Bill Manhire and Suzie Hanna have created a bold and powerful memorial to the voiceless, and a reminder that WW1 was a conflict that shook the entire world, and that our lives have grown ever more interconnected since. ” Sam Ruddock, Writers Centre Norwich
Od’e Miikan / Heart Line (Moose version) by Heid E. Erdrich
The latest videopoem collaboration between Heid E. Erdrich (poetry, voiceover), Jonathan Thunder (animation), and Trevino Brings Plenty (music)
arose out of Erdrich’s vision and understanding of Ojibwe/Anishinaabe star knowledge as told to her by elders and in the Ojibwe Star Map.nativeskywatchers.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/NSW_OjibweNorth.pdf
In Ojibwe cosmology, the figure seen hunting corresponds to the constellation known to others as Scorpio. Mooz corresponds to the constellation known to others as Pegasus. The Wolf Trail or Ma’iingn Miikan is the motion of the stars across the year, also known as the ecliptic.This poemo exists in two forms, one with Heid’s voice auto tuned to wolf sounds and one with Heid’s voice auto tuned to moose sounds. You can here composer Trevino Brings Plenty talking about the process here: youtube.com/watch?v=mwIo5THOPNA
This poem film was created to align with the large, interactive animated creatures Wolf and Moose, the Creative City Challenge 2016 Winner that was directed by artist Christopher Lutter with collaborative partners Heid E. Erdrich, Kim Ford, Karl Stroerzinger, Coal Dorius, and Missy Adzick.
