Whimsical, questioning and utterly absorbing, a collection of animated work delving into worlds of wonder, subversion, and Marxist mystery. Playing with form and overflowing with provocation, these works are fun and some re-construct ideas of animation, paying homage to experimentalists who came before.
This short film program includes the following films:
backflip
Nikita Diakur, Germany/France (12 min)
Given his own limited abilities and the present danger of physical injury, filmmaker Nikita Diakur decides to teach his computer-generated avatar to do a backflip; what follows is priceless.
Woman as Image, Man as Bearer of the Look
Carlos Velandia, Colombia (8 min)
Unpacking the male gaze by splicing together a staccato montage of found footage, which include images depicting the mother, the wife, and the object of desire, an ode to obsessive deconstructionism emerges.
Zoon
Jonatan Schwenk, Germany (5 min)
Salamander-like creatures copulate under the moonlight. A feast ensues, propelling a hungry group of two-legged forest dwellers to new heights.
Intermission
Réka Bucsi, Hungary (5 min)
Set to a minimalist score, simple dots and lines appear at first, then connect, meet, and separate again, as the forms become ever more complex with time, celebrating the joy of ornamentation.
Perforated Realities
Gustaf Broms, Sweden (16 min)
As identification with the self slowly dissolves, the borders between beings evaporate and the environment disintegrates. This mirrored photo performance, which could also be considered a kind of reverse-engineered stop-motion, takes frames away rather than adding them, forming a myriad of sentient beings.
Hardly Working
Total Refusal, Austria (21 min)
Total Refusal returns to MODES with new work following 2020’s dazzling live performance of Operation Jane Walk, and their anti-war masterpiece, How to Disappear. In the moments when the algorithm of their existence shows inconsistencies, the Non-Playable Characters (NPCs) of the popular action-adventure game, Red Dead Redemption, break out of their routines momentarily to display their faultiness and present something touchingly human.
Various
Various
2021-2022
Various with English subtitles
Book Tickets
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Montreal, ma belle
In this Valentine to discovering love later in life, the ever-elegant Joan Chen plays Feng Xia, a 53-year-old Chinese immigrant and mother in Montreal whose world is turned upside down when she meets and falls in love with a young Quebecoise.
Sirât
A desperate father (Sergi Lopez) searchers for his missing daughter through the spiritual wasteland of the Moroccan desert. An unforgettable sensory powerhouse, Sîrat will have you riveted and rattled for hours after the end credits have rolled.
L'Atalante
Jean Vigo died from TB in 1934 at the age of 29. Yet he is revered as one of the great innovators of the medium, and his only feature, L'Atalante, is a seminal film, a tender, lyrical love story set on a barge on the Seine.
Spring After Spring
Three daughters strive to live up to the standards set by their mother Marie Mimi Ho, and keep Vancouver Chinatown's Spring Parade going through thick and thin, in this enormously affectionate local documentary by Jon Chiang.
The Painted Life of E.J. Hughes
A beautiful portrait of E.J. Hughes, who quietly helped reshape the artistic landscape of British Columbia in the 20th century. This extraordinary documentary explores Hughes’s legacy not only as an artist, but as a devoted, humble human being.
The Love That Remains
Anna and Magnús have separated, leaving her to raise their three children as he spends long stretches at sea, working as a fisherman. As the seasons pass, their emotions ebb and flow. A richly conceived story with unexpected delight and humour.