Orphan Film Symposium - March 22-25, 2006


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Wednesday, March 22

All events in the USC Russell House Theater, unless noted otherwise.
Thursday, Friday and Saturday events begin at 9 a.m. and conclude at 11 p.m. (Details subject to change.)
 

8:00 pm Screenings
Short Films including:
Bill Morrison introducing his new film Outerborough (2005)
Dr. Ives on Television (1928, Movietone)
Julie Hubbert introduces Scientists Invent New Musical Instrument (1930)

Feature attraction:
Caroline Martel (Montréal artifactproductions.ca) presents
Le Fantôme de l’0pératrice (The Phantom of the 0perator, 2005)
100 industrial & scientific films (1903-1989) in a dreamlike documentary.



 

Thursday, March 23

 

Dan Streible
Introduction: Orphan Films of Science, Industry & Education

1: SCIENTIFIC IMAGING

Tom Gunning (U of Chicago)
"Demonstrating Science, Producing Magic:
Scientific Oddities as Visual Entertainment, from the 17th Century to Early Cinema"

Scott Curtis (Northwestern)
"On Magnification"
films by Roman Vishniac

Oliver Gaycken
(Temple)
"Persisting Categories in Popular Science Films"

Davis Baird (USC Nanocenter)
"Moving Images of the Nanoscale"
www.ipt.arc.nasa.gov/gallery.html

Greg Siegel (Hollins U), chair

BREAK

2: THE NATURE OF FILM
Chumming with Chipmunks (1921)

Jennifer Peterson (U of Colorado)
"Nature Documentaries of the 1920s and 30s, from the David Shepard Collection"
A Murderous Midget Fish, Struggle for Existence, et al.

Paula Amad (U of Iowa)
"'Time is invention': Dr. Jean Comandon's Time-lapse Cinematography"
L'Epanouissement des fleurs (1926-7, Pathé), Germination de fleurs (1926-9)

Janelle Blankenship (NYU)
"Unbelievable Nature: The Time-Lapse Cinema of John Ott"
Exploring the Spectrum (1980),
Dr. Fred D. Miller and the Gateway to Health (1953, National Library of Medicine)

LUNCH PROVIDED

Television Pictures (1931, Movietone) restored by Colorlab, intro by NYU MIAP

3: EARLY TV SCIENCE

Elaine Charnov (AMNH)
"The American Museum of Natural History's Adventure series (1953-56, CBS)"

Liz Keim (The Exploratorium)
"The California Academy of Science's Science in Action series (1952-66)"

Craig Baldwin (The Other Cinema)
"Spectral Uses of Kinescopy: Found Science Films"

BREAK

4: MISSIONARY SCIENCE

Skip Elsheimer (A/V Geeks) & Marsha Orgeron (NCSU)
"'Something Different In Science Films':
The Moody Institute of Science and the Canned Missionary Movement"
Fish Out of Water! (1954, Moody Institute of Science)
+ The Electric Eel
archive.org/details/electric_eel

Devin Orgeron (NCSU)
"Spreading the Word: The Science of Contagion in Edgar G. Ulmer's T.B. Films, 1939-1949"
They Do Come Back (1940, National Tuberculosis Association)
a new 35mm print from the National Archives

 

DINNER RECEPTION at CITY ART GALLERY (1224 Lincoln St. in the Vista)

5: SCREENING

Nico de Klerk (Amsterdam) introduces
Bits and Pieces Nr. 1-11, from the Netherlands Film Museum

Gustav Deutsch (Vienna) with his works
Film ist. (Film Is, 1998-2003): "Movement & Time," "Light & Darkness," et al.
+ Welt Spiegel Kino (World Mirror Cinema, 2005) Episode 1


Friday, March 24

 
1: RESTORING JULIEN BRYAN FILM COLLECTION

Raye Farr (US Holocaust Memorial Museum)
"The Documentary Legacy of an Industrial-Educational Filmmaker"

Russ Suniewick (Colorlab)
"Preservation and Reclamation of Degraded Nitrate Footage"

Regina Longo (UCSB) & Sam Bryan (International Film Foundation)
"The Search for Siege (1940, RKO)"

BREAK

2: NEWSREEL as WARTIME INDUSTRY

"Cooperative Preservation of the Movietone Newsreel Collections"
Mike Mashon, Cooper Graham (Library of Congress)
Greg Wilsbacher (USC Newsfilm Library)
Pearl Harbor Attack: Now It Can Be Shown (1942) outtakes
Fulbright Committee to Visit London (1944)

LUNCH PROVIDED


3: IN OTHER NEWS . . .

Sean Savage (NYU)
"The Eye Beholds: The Bureau of Commercial Economics as Film Distributor "
Madison News Reel (c. 1918) from Northeast Historic Film

Joe Clark (Brown U)
"Educating the Race: Inequality and Pedagogy in the Films of All-American News"
All-American Newsreel (1944-46)

Bradley Reeves & Louisa Trott (Tennessee Archive of Moving Image and Sound)
"'Sam Orleans Will Go Anywhere, Film Anything'"
Today's News, Tomorrow's Men (1946)
The Sixth Wheel (1962) excerpt

BREAK WITH FOOD AND DRINK
COURTESY OF
COLORLAB & FILM TECHNOLOGY

4: INDUSTRIAL AND INSTITUTIONAL FILMS: A FIELD GUIDE
(Sponsored by the National Film Preservation Foundation and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation)

Don Crafton (Notre Dame)
"The Research Value of Sponsored Films"

Rick Prelinger (Internet Archive)
"An Illustrated Historical Overview of the Industrial Film, 1894-1980"

Wendy Shay (Smithsonian Institution)
"Industrial Films in Multiformat Collections"
Industry on Parade (1950-60) episode
A Tupperware Home Party (ca. 1952) excerpt

(DINNER ON YOUR OWN)
 
5: SCREENING -- INDUSTRIAL AND INSTITUTIONAL FILMS

A program curated by Rick Prelinger.

Highlights include

Alan Stark (Film Technology Co.) & Tom Regal (BluWave Audio / Universal)
introducing the newly restored
Master Hands (1936)
by the Jam Handy Organization, for Chevrolet Motor Co.

Jan-Christopher Horak
introducing the new George Eastman House restoration
Eyes of Science (1930)
by Dr. James Sibley Watson, Jr., for Bausch & Lomb Optical Co.



 

Saturday, March 25

 

Charles Musser (Yale) on identifying the Newsfilm Library's rediscovered

How the Professor Fooled the Burglars (Vitagraph/Edison, 1900)
Dewey on Education (Movietone, 1929)

Craig Kridel (USC Museum of Education)
John Dewey's home movies (1940s)

Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Visiting Artist
David Shephard (Film Preservation Associates)
"Through the Alimentary Canal with Gun and Camera"
The Wheat Farmer (1938) & other ERPI Classroom Films

BREAK

 

1: IN THE CLASSROOM

Charles R. Acland (Concordia U)
"Celluloid Classrooms and Everday Projectionists:
Post-WWII Consolidation of Community Film Activism"
Film and You
(Jean Palardy, 1948)
Looking Forward: The Story of a Film Council
(Stanley Jackson 1957)

Claudy op den Kamp (Nederlands Filmmuseum)
"The Nederlandse Onderwijs Film Collection, Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision"
NFO compilation DVD

Eef Masson (U of Utrecht)
"How Teaching Films Teach:
Strategies of Motivation in Dutch Classroom Films of the 1940s and 50s"

Robert Silberman (U of Minnesota) & Matt Bakkom (Minnesota Film Arts)
"'Search and Rescue' from the U's Deaccessioned 16mm Collection"
Sophie More: A Fictitious Representation of Campus Life (ca. 1918)
preserved by Monaco Film and Video, John Carlson
piano accompaniment by Dennis James

BREAK
+
Ro-Revus Talks About Worms (1971) introduced by Skip Elsheimer
frank talk about Ascaris lumbricoides

 

2: COTTAGE INDUSTRY, HOME SCHOOLING

The Center for Home Movies
(Snowden Becker, Brian Graney, Chad Hunter, Dwight Swanson, Katie Trainor)
Best of Home Movie Day DVD (2006)

Anke Mebold
[Charles G. Boehm amateur film, Chicago] (ca. 1920, 28mm Pathéscope)

Margaret Compton (University of Georgia Media Archives)
[Louis Harris, Sr. home movie, Nevada] (1953, 16mm Kodachrome)

LUNCH PROVIDED

Anke Mebold
(Deutsches Filmmuseum Filmarchiv) the 28mm safety film, 1911-1930
[Fire Insurance Industrial, ca. 1924]
digital restoration by Haghefilm, Peter Limburg

3: SEX ED

Linda Williams (UC Berkeley)
"Porn Films in the Kinsey Institute and Elsewhere"
[untitled 16mm color film]

Christopher Lane & Amy Sloper (UCLA)
"Sex Mis-Education: The Sex-Ed Film in the Moving Image Archive"

Discussion of archival, ethical, access, and research issues.

BREAK

4: MEDICAL

Snowden Becker (Academy Film Archive) & Tanya Rollins (Cherry Hospital)
"Dr. Frank Whelpley's Films of the North Carolina 'Asylum for the Colored Insane'"
[Whelpley Collection 16mm footage of Cherry Hospital] (1941)

Zoe Beloff (Queens College, CUNY)
"Dr. L. Pierce Clark's Projections"
Child Analysis I and II, Stamford Psychoanalytic Sanitarium (1930)
restoration by Cineric, Chip Wilkinson

Discussion of archival, ethical, access, and research issues.

DINNER at the Top of Carolina

5: FINAL SCREENINGS: details TBA

to include
Geoff Alexander (Academic Film Archive of North America)
Protein Synthesis: An Epic on the Cellular Level (1971)

Carolyn Faber (Chicago)
For the Record (2004) Regiscope Surveillance

Osa and Martin Johnson on Africa Expedition (1929) printed by Summit Film Lab
& "Congorilla" Opens at the Winter Garden Theater (Movietone, 1932)

And other entertaining fare throughout. . .

including mini-Movietone moments

and
live music by
film archivist Kelli Hicks (Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum), et al.

and
a video lounge with new work by media artists using science films

and
door prizes. . .

 

Thanks to our sponsors:

Kodak
Dan Klores
Cineric
Summit
Haghefilm
Colorlab
Film Technology

BluWave Audio / NBC Universal
Technicolor
Cinetech
Monaco
Fotokem
Apple
Milestone Film & Video
University of California Press

City Art
Ben Arnold-Sunbelt Beverage
The Association of Moving Image Archivists
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

with additional thanks to
National Film Preservation Foundation
& the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation

Library of Congress Motion Picture Conservation Center
& The Film Foundation

and the USC Film Studies Program, a part of the
University of South Carolina College of Arts and Sciences

Updated: Feb. 23, 2006