15. Feb

PHANTOM THREAD

Thu, February 15th, 2024 – 8:00 p.m. Hackesche Köfe Kino

Films:

MOTHER, WHO WILL WEAVE NOW?

AN EVENING SONG (FOR THREE VOICES)

Debate

On films that wrap us around their fingers and people who are entangled with cinema: Two playful experimental films, one feature and one short, here give rise to a discussion about idiosyncratic styles, image textures, and the art of captivating the audience.

Guests include: Mathilde ter Heijne, Srikanth Srinivasan, Graham Swon 

[All Guests]

[Tickets]

MOTHER, WHO WILL WEAVE NOW?

D: Amit Dutta, A: Vatsal Agarwal,  IND 2022, 25 min., without dialogue – GP

In MOTHER, WHO WILL WEAVE NOW? Amit Dutta creates a delicate, expressive cutout animation based on high-resolution scans of archival textiles from a museum collection. Interspersed with the gossamer images are words from fifteenth-century weaver-saint Kabir, whose mystic couplets employ weaving as a metaphor for spiritual transformation. Balancing the abstract with the figurative, Dutta’s film pays tribute to handmade textiles while seeking the appropriate cinematic language to render them in. The filmmaker draws from both the poetic metres used in Kabir’s verses and the intricate patterns of the fabric swatches on display. The result is a richly-textured artisanal film that weaves together themes of history, art, labour and spirituality.

AN EVENING SONG (FOR THREE VOICES)

D: Graham Swon, C: Deragh Campbell, Hannah Gross, Peter Vack, DOP: Barton Cortright, USA 2023, 86 min., English Original – GP

Iowa, USA in the 1930s. Writer couple Barbara and Richard move to the country due to Barbara’s agoraphobia. While Richard earns a living with light novels and pulp stories, Barbara has given up her literary ambitions. When the pious Martha moves in with them as a housemaid, a strange love triangle develops. Stream-of-consciousness monologues and off-screen confessions with superimposed images of scenes from their everyday lives delve into their complex relationship. In the style of early silent films, and with mesmerising music, the film unfolds with a mysterious aesthetic and immersive pull. The film is loosely based on the story of the writer Barbara Newhall Follett, who disappeared without a trace in 1939.