Theatrical Premiere
Tuesday, October 5, 2010, 7pm
Kino Světozor
Breathless - Dominance of the Moment was launched in 2008 with the aim to support the development and production of creative documentary films, to boost cooperation between the two countries, and to get some idea about the state of documentary filmmaking both in the Czech Republic and Germany. As early as 2007, the project was initiated by Zipp – Czech-German Cultural Projects, Institute of Documentary Film and DOK Leipzig.
Jiří Konečný, endorfilm, was in charge of the production for the two Czech films; Stefan Kloos, Kloos & Co. Medien, was the head producer of the German projects.
Two Czech and three German filmmakers were selected by a jury to present their own original take on the subject of time. The omnibus film Breathless - Dominance of the Moment clearly shows that each of the filmmakers tackled the topic from a different perspective, including: diary entries of an ordinary woman from Prague’s neighbourhood of Zbraslav (dir. Jan Gogola), a cinematic treatment of time as a physical quantity (dir. Karel Žalud); a documentary about the rendering of a John Cage composition in a German church, set to last 639 years (dir. Anca Miruna Lazarescu); a depiction of a post-industrial landscape in Montana, USA (dir. Rainer Komers), and an eternal moment that occurs during a car accident (dir. Marie-Catherine Theiler and Jan Peters).
I Love My Boring Life
Director of photography: Jiří Zikmund
Editing: Zdeněk Marek
Sound: Jiří Melcher
Mám ráda nudný život, Czech Republic, 2009, 27 min, 35 mm, Creative, Portrait
The diary of a grandmother from the Prague neighbourhood of Zbraslav as a diary of eternity. Using informal language, for five years grandmother Alena Němcová from Zbraslav has been writing down weather forecasts, dreams, her morning exercises, cooking, everyday house bustle, global events as well as notes concerning relationships, religion and the general spirit of the times – matters of a private, family, social, real and also surreal nature. The film captures the life in her house as a place that could represent a slice of the world and merge various events and connections, both of a daily and timeless nature. It points out that banality can indeed be part of our perception but not of the world itself. The device is just a change of banality to singularity. This film is part of the "Breathless – Dominance of The Moment" documentary film project.
Phantom of Liberty II
Přízrak svobody II, Czech Republic, Germany, 2009, 59 min, 35 mm, Creative, Personal view
In the so-called global age, man is caught in the trap of time he has set for himself and then got stuck in it along with his freedom. A film about time, which consists of several fragmentary documentary sequences. Each of them shows how subjective the protagonists’ perception of time is: an undertaker transporting coffins every day, a group of aging actors celebrating a birthday on a train, or soldiers rehearsing a manoeuvre. The stories are connected in free association and told circularly to make palpable that all these times exist simultaneously. The film explores time's physical quantity as well as its crucial impact on our actions, behaviour, perception, social rituals and our outlook on the world.A project of Zipp – German-Czech Cultural Projects, the Institute of Documentary Film, Prague, and DOK Leipzig.
Milltown, Montana
Milltown, Montana, Germany, 2009, 34 min, 35 mm, Ecology, Nature, Society
Time inscribes itself into Rainer Komers' meticulously composed images and impressive sound collages of MILLTOWN, MONTANA. Each picture tells a story of a place that once belonged to the largest mining area in the United States that was contaminated by toxic substances and heavy metals. But the film does not only show the devastated landscape. Without dialogue, it sensitively portraits the people living and working there: cowboys branding their calves, Blackfeet Indians laying down the foundation stone for a new educational center, trappers and golfers, workers in a silicium plant, old miners, and young scholars competing in a mining contest.MILLTOWN, MONTANA is visibly scarred by man and trapped in a postindustrial phase of standstill. By alluding to its former wealth but showing the area's actual lack ofprospects, the film dramatically undermines the image of the American Dream.
One Day Today Will be Once
Director of photography: Tobias Tempel, Tanja Häring
Editing: Uwe Wrobel
Music: Friedrich Wohlfarth
Sound: Friedrich Wohlfarth, Johannes Schmelzer-Ziringer
Es wird einmal gewesen sein, Germany, 2009, 27 min, 35 mm, Creative, Music
In a small church in Halberstadt, in the former East Germany, a pipe organ plays avant-garde composer John Cage's „Organ2/ASLSP" (Organ squared/As SLow aS Possible) a single note at a time - and will do so without interruption until the year 2640, resulting in a 639-year long concert. In a humorous but also thoughtful way the film shows different sides of this mind-boggling project: on one hand the long and overly intellectual wrestles among the initiators, on the other the volunteering staff members' direct and practical way of dealing with all the work that surrounds such a project.These two perspectives make ONE DAY TODAY WILL BE ONCE a film bursting with moving as well as humorous moments - attuned to the question of humanity's perception of time.
Time's Up
Director of photography: Marie-Catherine Theiler, Jan Peters
Editing: Sandra Trostel
Music: Pit Przygodda
Sound: Marie-Catherine Theiler, Jan Peters
Time's Up, Germany, 2009, 15 min, 35 mm, Creative, Personal view, Society
Being confronted with the finiteness of life in a car accident while having theirunborn baby inside, the filmmakers Marie-Catherine Theiler and Jan Peters suddenlyrealize that their lives have become way too hectic. They spend too much precioustime rushing from one appointment to another, hunting deadline after deadline. Theydecide to change their lives and slow down. But how? During a humorous odysseyfrom one time-expert to the next, Marie-Catherine and Jan ask the questionsmost of us would like to know the answers to… Within the timeframe of Marie-Catherine's pregnancy, the directors of TIME'S UP leave no stone unturned, examiningwith wit and irony how today's society – and above all they themselves – deal withthe subject of 'time'.
More details about the project at www.breathless-films.com.