"[Maddin is] the most reluctantly radical and humorously
tortured maverick working in the movies today."
- John Waters
"He belongs in the tradition of obsessional, poetic
tale spinners and studio craftsmen such as Erich von
Stroheim, F.W. Murnau, Josef von Sternberg, Jacques
Tourneur, and Michael Powell, who bend public
materials toward private ends and take us on a
feverish ride."
- Jonathan Rosenbaum
The 2011 Dorothy H. Hirshon Film Festival with Director in Residence Guy Maddin -Screenwriter, Director, Cinematographer, and Film Editor
Includes a director-in-residence screening followed by a Q&A, a master class, and the 32nd annual New School Invitational Film Show featuring the best student films of the past year.
Presented by the Department of Media Studies and Film, in cooperation with The New School Arts Festival.
A bequest from the late Dorothy Hirshon, a trustee of The New School for over 60 years, established this annual event with the mission of promoting excellence and education in the filmmaking arts.
Guy Maddin, the world's foremost cineaste planant, was born and raised in Winnipeg, Manitoba: the coldest and most central city in North America. His filmic output to date—nine feature-length projects and innumerable shorts—is a remarkable canon of fantasia. Viewing a Maddin movie, short- or long-form, it's hard not to conclude that there must have been some strange alchemy on the set; the pictures seem woven and filigreed rather than simply, bluntly "shot" as other movies are and, furthermore, must have been magicked together by a team of pillow-sleeved artistes with a rouged, beret-clad Maddin shrieking directions in falsetto from a golden velvet throne floating atop a dais of honeyed mist.
However, he is, in person and on set, quite a normal man. His first feature, Tales from the Gimli Hospital, appeared in 1988, and became a midnight movie classic. His second, Archangel, won the U.S. National Film Critics Award for best experimental film. Since then, he has won many other awards, including the Telluride Silver Medal for life achievement in 1995, the San Francisco International Film Festival's prestigious Persistance of Vision award in 2006, and others—and created dozens of beguiling films in his unique personal style. These include such celebrated feature works as The Saddest Music in the World (2003); Brand upon the Brain! (2006); and My Winnipeg (2007).
Maddin is also a writer and teacher and occupies the position of Distinguished Filmmaker in Residence at the University of Manitoba.
Schedule of Public Events
Friday, April 1 - The 32nd Annual New School Invitational Film Show
8:00 p.m.-10:00 p.m. Admission is free.
Tishman Auditorium, 66 West 12th Street. A reception follows the event.
The annual Invitational Film Show, a presentation of the year's outstanding New School student films, begins the Dorothy H. Hirshon Film Festival. The best films made by New School students during the past year (narratives, documentaries, and experimental shorts) have been selected in a juried competition by a panel of distinguished filmmakers and film industry professionals. All were produced in the Department of Media Studies and Film.
Wednesday, April 6 - Director in Residence Screening: Guy Maddin's Lost Films
8:00 p.m. Admission is free; seating is limited and reservations are required.
Tishman Auditorium, 66 West 12th Street
Guy Maddin introduces a screening of Hauntings, his short adaptations of movies by great directors for which the prints have been lost, which he based on plot synopses found in ancient Variety magazines. This work was commissioned by the Toronto International Film Festival. The screening concludes with a Q&A with Writing Program director Robert Polito.
Friday, April 8 - Original Script Reading Event
8:00 p.m.-10:00 p.m. Admission is free.
Wollman Hall, 65 West 11th St., 5th floor (enter at 66 West 12th St.)
The New School Script Reading Event is an evening where students' written words are released from the page and brought to vivid life.
Portions of screenplays written by students completing the Screenwriting Certificate will be performed by accomplished working actors reading before an audience of peers and invited film industry professionals. Audio and video components will accompany the readings to better help bring the material's cinematic qualities even closer to life.
The New School Script Reading Event provides students with both the invaluable experience of hearing their characters voiced by trained actors while also offering them the chance to publicly showcase their talent.
A public reception will be held afterward to celebrate the evening.
Schedule of Private Events
Monday, April 4 - Guy Maddin Master Class
2:00 p.m.-5:00 p.m. Admission is free, but advance reservations are required.
66 West 12th St., Room 510 (Malcolm Klein Reading Room)
New School students and faculty are invited to participate in a lecture and conversation with Guy Maddin, the director of My Winnipeg (2007); Brand Upon the Brain! (2006); The Saddest Music in the World (2003); Cowards Bend the Knee (2003); Dracula, Pages From a Virgin's Diary (2002); Twilight of the Icy Nymphs (1997); and Careful (1992), among other films.