~ Huffington Post ~
Review of Filmpoem 2014, Antwerp in Huffington Post blog
Poet and filmmaker Robert Peake has posted a handy summary of last weekend’s Filmpoem 2014 Festival—part of the Felix Poetry Festival in Antwerp—by way of sharing the seven videos that constituted the first part of the program: “An Introduction to the Film-Poem.”
Poets, musicians and filmmakers from all over the world converged on a converted packing house in Antwerp, Belgium last Saturday for a day of gorging on film-poems. It was glorious.
While last year in Dunbar, Scotland had an element of novelty on its side, this year was carefully structured to up the ante. A group of Dutch and Flemish film-poem artists presented their work, along with the debut screening of the UK National Poetry Competition film-poems, Absent Voices films, conversations with poets in response film-poems of their work that they had just seen, and even live performances of voice and music in accompaniment to film. The scope, variety, and innovation was impressive, not to mention the roster of heavy-hitters in both the poetry and film genres.
Organiser Alastair Cook emphasised the point that the film-poem genre is an inclusive and encouraging one–suggesting that we all start somewhere, even if with the video facility on our smart phones, and start making film-poems. Particularly helpful in that regard was the first screening, an introduction to the film-poem. Luckily, most of the works that Alastair picked to illustrate the depth and range of this genre are also available online. What follows, below, are those films (recommended to view in full-screen mode).
Watch. Enjoy. Make film-poems. Perhaps I’ll see you at a film-poem festival soon.
Click through to watch the films.
2013 Filmpoem Festival reviewed in The Huffington Post
Due to Moving Poems’, um, extended vacation this summer, I’ve neglected to share until now Robert Peake‘s review of the first Filmpoem Festival in his poetry column for the Huffington Post: “The Film-Poem Arrives in Britain.” Here’s a snippet:
Over two intensive days of screenings and discussions, poets and filmmakers from all over the world converged and convened in the Dunbar Town House on August third and fourth to experience some of the most innovative works in this emerging genre. Described as “slim, but international” by founder Alastair Cook, the group of sixty enthusiasts in attendance was dense with heavy-hitters in both poetry and film.
Scottish poet John Glenday appeared to discuss the experience of having one of his poems developed into film-poems by five different accomplished filmmakers. Above all, though, it was the quality of films that stand on their own in representing the unique and exciting possibilities of this new medium–for poets, musicians, and visual artists throughout the UK.
Peake concludes with a selection of six of his favorite films from the festival, shared as embeds (rather than just links) for maximum viewership. Check it out.
