Film Format: 16mm

  • Unnamed Film

    This film is presented in chronological order, revealing the world the filmmaker is discovering in her quest to become an immigrant in the land her great grandparents abandoned over 100 years ago.

  • Even Flowers Wake Up in the Morning

    “A powerful visual tribute to a lost loved one. Superimposing hand-processed film footage with home movie imagery, director Tara Khalili conveys an eloquent personal message of mourning. Funerary footage mixes with that of a quiet home, resulting in sensitive reflections on loss and remembrance.” – Alex Rogalski, Hot Docs Festival 2010 “Even Flowers Wake Up in the Morning” is a filmic expression of my feelings about the absence and death of my Iranian grandfather. Memories of him flicker in my head as if I were watching a projector shining old film clips in a dark theater. In this film, I…

  • State of Mind

    Live sound performance/installation: “State of Mind” is conceived as an exploration of the mind through the basic elements that constitute the activity of the brain: light and electricity. The performance uses photocells to transform light variations into electrical signals and thus, into sound. It can be shown as a single-channel projection, live performance or installation; it all depends on the context where it is shown as well as the state of mind of the moment. Every time it is shown, the editing changes as well as the approach of the sound/image relationship to convey the natural instability of one’s brain…

  • Shutter

    “Shutter” tracks the rising sun, the lengthening shadows and the darkening day of a total solar eclipse. “Shutter” is a formal exploration of the phenomenon of the sun eclipsing objects in the natural world. Inspired by footage of friend and amateur astronomer Andreas Gada’s 16mm recording of the 1980 total solar eclipse, this work captures the beauty, complexity and terror of the shifting light that precedes and accompanies a solar eclipse. Shadow, focal variance and illumination of earth-bound nature conspire along the course to the incomparable moment of totality.

  • Trailing Arbutus

    It’s 1975 and Toronto horticulture enthusiasts are buzzing with excitement; Dr. Timothy Arbutus, the famous British flower arranger, makes his Canadian début at Toronto’s O’Keefe Centre. Onstage he thrills the audience with his colourful bouquets and delightful banter. But all is not as beautiful in Arbutus’ world as his bouquets would suggest. Backstage in his dressing room, a dark drama unfolds. His devoted manservant, Fitzrooy, has just learned that he has been replaced by Larry, the hot young stage manager – and Arbutus’ latest fling. Distraught, the straitlaced Fitzrooy secretly follows the two lovers into Toronto’s gay underworld, determined to…

  • Doll House

    In “Doll House”, Barbara Hammer captures an echo of the militant feminism that informed her earlier work. “Doll House” was released in the U.S. along with four of her other short films as a feature-length package, “Lesbian Humor: The Films of Barbara Hammer, Volume I” (Planet Out).

  • Family Portrait #2

    An ultrasound recording of my first-born’s heartbeat…the intensity of childbirth…a family portrait. Form is altered through lens manipulation, optical printing and hand-processing to elicit the polarities and fragility of life.

  • SEE/SAW

    A film about seeing and having seen. Completely hand-processed and painstakingly edited, ‘SEE/SAW’ is comprised of a series of iris fades – commonly found in silent films to signal the beginning or end of a scene – re-appropriated as a formal approach that frames the desire to see and to remember. Dichotomies surface in the high contrast images – opening/closing, beginning/ending, light/dark – it is also a deeply personal film that faces the imminence of not being.

  • Still Life

    A loose narrative comprised of both found and shot footage derails conventional uses of familial images and forms the residue of a looming traumatic experience. The anxieties of parenthood feed an undertow of tension that heightens awareness to the vulnerabilities of the children we bring into this world.

  • Chute

    A hypnotic mass self-portrait from within the runners’ chute at the end of the 2009 Ottawa Marathon. The dramatic enactment of an endless final reward cycle in our inevitable tumble, together and alone, towards the unknown: connect, release, repeat.