Les Femmes Underground International Film Festival
Jury for 2016
les femmes underground international film festival
Assistant to Sundance Director of Programming/ Co-Founder of Non-Plussed Born in Brazil, Ana Souza was raised in Amsterdam. She holds a BA from the University of Warwick and an MA from USC. Souza has produced a number of shorts and has contributed to numerous film-related publications, including Indiewire, We Eat Film, Front Row Reviews, and The Artifice. She is currently working at Sundance in the programming department.
Slamdance Programmer Jeanne Jo is a visual artist and filmmaker who writes and directs narrative films, media art installations, and music videos. Her award-winning work has been shown in galleries and festivals all over the world. She was educated at the Rhode Island School of Design and the University of Southern California.
Etheria Film Night Programmer
Slamdance Programmer Oates Yinchao Wu is a film director, writer, and editor. He graduated from California Institute of the Arts with an MFA in Film Directing. He is an autobiographical filmmaker, his films screened at Film Festivals around the world, including Seattle International Film Festival, Asian American International Film Festival, OutFest, Inside Out Film Festival, and more. He also worked for various film festivals before and now works as a programmer for Slamdance Film Festival.
Slamdance Programmer
Etheria Film Night Programmer/American Cinematique
Slamdance Programmer
Sundance Programmer/Non-Plussed Fest Programmer
Sept 3RD 2016 BEYOND BAROQUE
Beyond Baroque Literary Arts Center
681 Venice Blvd, Venice, CA 90291
Beyond Baroque is one of the United States' leading independent Literary | Arts Centers and public spaces dedicated to expanding the public's knowledge of poetry, literature and art through cultural events and community interaction. Founded in 1968.
Beyond Baroque is based out of the original City Hall building in Venice, California. The Center offers a diverse variety of literary and arts programming including readings, workshops, new music and education. The building also houses a bookstore with the largest collection of new poetry books and CDs for sale and an archive that houses over 40,000 books, including small press and limited-edition publications, chronicling the history of poetry movements in Los Angeles and beyond.
Through the years, Beyond Baroque has played muse to the Venice Beats, the burgeoning Punk movement and visiting scholars. Many of the city's leading literary talents, including Dennis Cooper, Wanda Coleman, Tom Waits, Exene Cervenkova and Amy Gerstler, are alumni of the Wednesday night poetry workshop. Many of the worlds most well known independent artists, including Patti Smith, Michael McClure, Dana Gioia, and Viggo Mortensen have performed on its stage.
Schedule of Film Program & Events
Our festival celebrates underground and independent media made by and for women, whether queer, straight, or transgender.
With a neon splash of colour, our first showcase exhibits vibrant pieces blending together digital age aesthetics with experimental cinema techniques. As a feminist film festival, our goal was to highlight women, feminism, and the shifting digital age, making this years’ theme, ‘Fourth Wave Feminism’. Additionally, our first showcase premières coming of age rebellious shorts, whose non-conformist nature resists gender norms with an ardent youthful energy.
Our second showcase explores horror and sexuality, where film-makers utilize
super 8, 16mm, and VHS video. Each film contains a strong female lens in which the lead is an empowering multidimensional character. Sexuality from a feminist perspective successfully creates an evocative tone for our second showcase.
All our programming highlights women with a fourth wave feminist perspective, in which the use of millennial technologies helps transforms traditional cinema into a stimulating immersive resonant experience.
Our ultimate goal was to choose films which reflected the manner in which the digital sphere has help propel a feminist discourse through the web and all forms of social media, thereby reigniting feminism, as it exists in its changing metamorphic body in our modern digital age.
RED CARPET EVENT- 3:00PM
Kick off the evening with the glamourous Red Carpet Event. Get your picture taken against our festival backdrop and network before the evening festivities. Grab a complementary cocktail or two prior to our event. Check out local artist exhibits and vendors on the historic Hollywood Strip.
*** First 50 people get exlusive LEFUFF grab bags.
REJECTED PRINCESSES PANEL- 3:30PM
Jason Porath, feminist & former effects animator at DreamWorks Animation on such films as Kung Fu Panda 2, The Croods and How to Train Your Dragon 2. and creator of "Rejected Princesses" will be talking a little about his work and breaking the female mold in animation.
Every week, Porath posts a drawing of a new heroine in classic Disney style, and tells her tale in all of its odd, off-beat, and often gory detail. He also shows his work, pointing readers back to the primary sources for their own further reading.
SHOWCASE A - 4:00pm-6:30pm
SHOWCASE A.1 PSYCHTROPIC VISIONS (EXPERIMENTAL CINEMA)
Guest Judge: Ana Souza- Sundance/Non-Plussed Fest
Owls, Bunnies & Tigers- Sandra Powers
A psychedelic live action animation.(00:30)
Love Sick - Maggie Levin & Braedan Herrera
Chris and Tessa have had their hearts torn to shreds by their respective exes. Soon, the couple discovers their uniquely busted pulmonary systems are beautifully complementary - if a little messy in this psychedelic twisted love story. (13:29)
Hoop Dreams - Samantha Gurry
A celestial journey in the spaceship of imagination meets evolution, Meena Kumari, and rhythm itself. (4:36)
Light Up the Sky- Yoko Okumura
A fantastical colorful music video for Polartropica. (3:32)
Super Fun Show, with Learning! Episode 2 - Lexie Kahanovitz
Super Fun Show, with Learning!” is a surreal and fantastical sci-fi comedy about how our technology is changing who we are. The series revolves around Sandy Childs, a recently unemployed millennial, who is easily influenced by her manipulative electronics. (16:30)
Diary of Reflection - Penda Diakite
A visual reflection of how the filmmaker sees women portrayed in popular culture, and her personal experiences with it as an African-American female. (3:00)
Sinking - Myriam L. Obin
Sinking, is a film exploring depression through acetate over ink and pushing it in order to create animation. (1:00)
27 - Leila Jarman
27 is an experimental music video for performance artist MRK. The video explores the themes of death, impermanence and decay as seen through the lens of a gradually degrading and dying image. The video was processed entirely using an analogue video synthesizer. (3:38)
The Magical Porno Theatre - Jovanna Tosello
An animated film full of mischief and sexual innuendo. (3:00)
Olvido - Caitlin Diaz
A woman learns to let go of her preconceived notions of reality. Ultimately, she finds bliss through the oblivion and surrenders to the idiosyncrasies that surround her. (5:13)
Fruitcake - Harriet Croucher
Based on personal experiences and insights, this film explores one of the last great taboos: mental illness. It examines the realities of mania and psychosis, and the way in which society defines and denigrates people by their disabilities. (1:38)
Technicolor Angst - Ketchup Freeland
Our heroine and Stella are best friends foreva, discussing global politics and how they're gonna deal with it. That is till Stella gives the deuces and a basic bitch moves in - with all the strain and all the pain, will rage consume our heroine? (14:49)
SHOWCASE A.2
YOUTH & ALTERED STATES
Guest Judge: Jeanne Jo- USC
Suppress - Payton Baril
A recollection of a feeling the filmmaker had as a child first finding out about adult films. (0:30)
Panty Symphonic - Zach Strum
An outrageous death leads to a battle over a mystical pair of women’s panties. Comic and irreverent, this nearly wordless narrative short was shot on VHS and set to the music of Antonín Dvořák and Julius Fučík. (13:35)
The First of the Free Girls - Alexandra Velasco & Alexander Kahan
A girl entering womanhood discovers a dissonance between what she really wants and what society expects of her. (4:00)
Digital Generation - Molly Reith
Teens today are growing up in a Digital world. Relationships, sex, their changing bodies: all the dramas of teenage-hood are now online. Digital Generation asks teenage girls about the unique challenges of growing up in the age of 24/7 social media. (2:27)
Flying Trout & Swimming Vulture - Oates Wu
After breaking up with her boyfriend, artist/photographer Anne asks her ex-boyfriend Peter to take a 'reverse gender photograph' as the last piece to finish her art project. This photo will also end up being the last step of their relationship. (8:00)
Lookout - Noa Gusakov
Timmy is a look-out in the military. As a diversion from her tiring frame work, she creates an imaginative, childish world. When she has to deal with the real military world for the first time, her own world is shattered and undermined. (17:56)
Toxic - Patricia Luna Alfiorova
A toxic cloud leads a upper-middle class family to evacuate. Its yellow presence has other consequences than the ones expected. Inspired by Don DeLillo’s novel, White Noise. (5:31)
Numberland - Gina Napolitan
A little girl falls asleep at her school desk. A short animated sketch, featuring a children's mathematics textbook from the 1920s. (1:30)
View - Grace Nayoon Rhee
VIEW is an imaginary story, also a reality of a 'child', who thinks her 'mommy' has left her behind because she doesn't love her anymore. (5:35)
RECEPTION - 6:00pm-7:30pm
Drinks, hors d'oeuvres, appetizers, desserts
FEATURING MUSIC BY:
Members: Ihui Cherise Wu || Andrew Lessman || Graham Chapman || Alexander Noice
Genre: Epic Electro-Synth Pop
Hometown: Los Angeles, CA
SHOWCASE B - 7:30pm-10:00pm
SHOWCASE B.1 FEMME FATALES (HORROR)
Guest Judge: Heidi Honeycutt- Etheria Film Night Programmer
Doctor or Monster - Cat Tanchanco & Marisha Legan-Johnson
An original song & music video created from scratch by ASAD RAY, Nikki Paige, AUDFACED & a team of artists based out of Los Angeles. (4:16)
Nasty Prano Bailey-Bond
It's 1982. Twelve-year old Doug is drawn into the lurid world of VHS horror as he explores the mysterious disappearance of his father. (15:10)
Rougarou Catherine Taylor
Writer: Brennan Elizabeth Peters, Producer: Erika N. Ewing, DP: Sophia Stieglitz, Editor: Dana Maddox
In rural Louisiana, 11-year-old Sabine is livid when her widower father misses Ash Wednesday Mass, and pushes him to give up drinking for Lent. However, when he fails to keep his vow, he evokes the wrath of the Rougarou, a local mythical beast that punishes bad Catholics. To save her father, Sabine must go into the bayou to vanquish the monster.... (15:00)
Domestic Affairs Alexia Muinos
High heels sound in the distance in a lonely street. Agathe runs away from her past just to crash into her future. Nighthawks are bound to meet each other, but that is not necessarily for a good reason.Domestic Affairs is kind of a threesome. A love horror triangle, a cruel tale that happens on a summer night where the full moon drives everyone's destiny. (13:04)
Val-En-tina Araeia Robinson
When a high profile politician makes a controversial speech on immigration reform, walked undisturbed alongside her. (10:10)
SHOWCASE B.2
SEXual ReduXXX (THE ADULT SHOW)
Guest Judge: Oates Wu- Slamdance Programmer
DISCLAIMER
*** The programming that follows contains adult material such as nudity, suggestive content, and language not suitable for individuals under the age of 17… unless you’re okay with your kids watching mature material… then we cannot judge you.
The Astronaut and the Star - Christina Kolozsvary
The Astronaut and the Star, is an exploration of the threat of femininity. The lines between desire and disgust blur, as the passage of time accelerates. (19:04)
Self Portrait at 24 - Amanda Bonaiuto
A late night observation of myself through a variety of angles as I try to suss out my career. (00:30)
You’re Just Projecting - Marinah Janello
An intentional fragmentation of the female body wherein legs, breasts, stomachs hands and feet have been placed in or near pieces of architecture. (2:27)
The River - Ya-Ting Hsu & Geoffrey Hughes
An experimental short, documenting the repetitively traumatic nature of pregnancy. (16:14)
His Cucumber - Sharine Atif
An Egyptian woman shares her story about a man who sexually harasses her while at the market. Instead of ignoring him as most women would do, she confronts him with a shocking and unexpected tone. (3:22)
Tension - Karissa Hahn
A canted angle, a “collaboration”, rather a collusion. “A Young Girl Defending Herself agaist Eros” by William Adalphe Bouguereau 1880. Suspense and tension. (2:53)
Hymn of Haruspex - Kathryn Ferguson
'Hymn of the Haruspex" imagines an alternative realm in which the symbolic function of hair has been elevated to the level of autonomous deity. The film plays with the elimination of the individual as that which owns or cultivates hair to grant a beguiling and unsettling agency and intention to Le Mindu's pieces. (2:06)
