~ Filmmaker: James Short ~

The Language is Pronounced “Dead” by Christian Peet

Christian Peet refers to his Big American Trip videos as postcards, but they’re videopoetry as far as I’m concerned. The info at YouTube seems worth quoting in full:

Performed by Kim Gek Lin Short, directed and edited by James Short, based on the book BIG AMERICAN TRIP by Christian Peet. A diverse group of activists, actors, artists, musicians, writers, and otherwise lovely & concerned individuals from all over the US have collaborated with the author to create a polyvocal series of video readings / interpretations based on the book. Assuming the form of postcards authored by an “alien” of unknown nationality, ethnicity, and gender, addressing a variety of people and organizations (political figures, multinational corporations, people in public toilets, et al), BIG AMERICAN TRIP is a startling document of fear and loneliness in the 21st century U.S. Whether deconstructing road signs, a failed relationship, or the state of contemporary poetry, the voice(s) behind these texts is/are at once familiar and strange, determined to be free, and desperate to communicate with anyone who has ever felt at odds with the Language of a Nation.