BARBIE DREAM HOUSE 2018 (0:4:22. Color. Sound.)
The film follows one person’s story, which is interrupted by other stories that are interwoven between the central narrative. The pacing and the word play, along with the vertical density and retrograde effect, are intended to actively engage the viewer as the speaker of this text; a character who is grasping to retain fragments of memory and thought that are at risk of being smothered in trauma. The 1960s era cardboard Barbie dollhouse reflects the specific conditioning of girls and how generations later these stories have stayed the same and how they are now being challenged. When these walls talked.
The film is at the Filmmakers’ Coop.International Screenings include:
San Francisco Cinematheque, Microscope Gallery, Millennium Film Workshop, Amsterdam World International Film Festival (Best Short); Top Indie Awards Tokyo, Japan (Best Message), Euro Film Festival, The Artists Forum Festival of the Moving Image; Couch Film Festival, Montreal Indie Short Films Awards, DUMBO Film Festival, Changing Face International Film Festival, New York City International Films Infest Festival, Alternative Film Festival, Experimental Forum, Leiden International Short Film Experience, Society for Photographic Education Festival, Video Art International Festival and NewFilmmakers New York.
OCTOBER SURPRISE: An installation piece.
BARBIE DREAM HOUSE is the centerpiece; the ‘theme’ film. (This work is also intended to stand alone without the accompanying ‘variation’ films.)
Conceived to be exhibited in a variety of ways: 1) as an installation environment shown on monitors of any size and/or projected directly onto walls; or 2) as two concurrent films: BARBIE DREAM HOUSE (on its own monitor) and the six shorts edited together on a separate monitor; or 3) each short film shown on its own monitor. The six films can be grouped in any order, or shown together in a loop, or each can stand alone and can start and end at different times.
This film septet is a reaction to a former employer, and to all the others. It is also a commentary on mass media constructs and pundits’ reactions with glimpses into the onslaught of information and language on both a global and personal front.
Each interrelated film is likened to a musical movement that is varied, yet part of a cohesive whole. (i.e the Brahms Sextets’ theme and variation structure.) Sometimes words are repeated, deleted or move too quickly, prompting viewers to elicit their own interpretations of what they believe they just saw or heard.
The ‘variations on a theme’ films are in black and white, and silent.
WITCH HUNT (00:33)
WHAT THEY KNEW (01:13)
THE LAST STRAW (00:33)
BOYS WILL BE (03:07)
WHAT HE MEANT TO SAY (00:43)
NOT NORMAL (01:22)
