Oddball Films brings you Wanderlust - The Great American Road Trip , an evening of vintage 16mm films about our need to travel and the sights, sounds, and smells of American backroads set to be discovered by car, bus or train. From Technicolor promotional films to chimp-tastic travelogues, cartoons and more, this night is sure to move you. We'll begin the evening with original trailers for Easy Rider, White Lightning and Smokey and the Bandit. Then, s et off with two gals on a Greyhound as they discover roadside America and true love in the delightfully campy America for Me (1952). See all… Read more
Oddball Films presents Strange Sinema, a monthly screening of new finds, old gems and offbeat oddities from the collection. Drawing on his archive of over 50,000 16mm film prints Oddball Films director Stephen Parr has complied his 75 thprogram of classic, strange, offbeat and unusual films. This installment, Strange Sinema 75: Strange Discoveries celebrates the 75 thanniversary of monthly Strange Sinema screenings. In true Strange Sinema style this program presents entirely new discoveries from the archive’s recent acquisition of 300 new 16mm film prints. Most, if not all of these films are… Read more
For one night and one night only, author of Making the Office Waaay Less Boring and If You’ve Got a Frown, Let’s Talk About It! , HR master of the the future, Anetha Buckley, will present her groundbreaking work, “What You Don’t Realize Corporate America Really Is Looking For”, an eye opening presentation + film screening on the multitudinous effects of dated office etiquette which plague the corporate environment to this very day, and a treatise on the changing landscape of business behavior in the modern world. Her talk, her vision , is guaranteed to help everyone see what’s been holding… Read more
Oddball Films and archivist/guest curator Scotty Slade bring you Ethno-Graphics: Ancient Cultures in a Modern World , a showcase of ethnographic films from our incredible collection of 16mm prints. Shamelessly inspired by the BBC’s remarkable series, Human Planet, this program explores the miraculous ability of humans to adapt to their environment and derive what they need from their immediate surroundings. By focusing on people who continue to live as their ancestors have lived for hundreds and thousands of years, these films look at the multifarious ways in which we relate to and form… Read more
Oddball Films and guest curator Lynn Cursaro present: Hollywood Smashes Hitler! Propaganda-tainment from WW2 featuring a smattering of 16mm delights from the 1940s . During the big one, the Hollywood homefront pitched in big time! Silver screen stars served and those who didn’t signed on to support the war effort in their special way. Filmlanders shilled for war bonds in the glittering All Star Bond Rall y (1945) featuring Bob Hope and Carmen Miranda. Frank Sinatra shines as a potent symbol of tolerance in the musical short The House I Live In (1945). Director Fred “ High Noon ” Zinneman… Read more
Oddball Films and curator Kat Shuchter bring you Birdstravaganza - Fine Feathered Films with a lineup of the best birds in showbiz featuring international animation, mini-docs, circus birds and bird-centric shorts from the 30s-80s. From the quirky to the creepy, campy to classic, these feathered films are sure to delight. Behold the marvelous spectacle of parakeets riding bicycles and tightrope walking in the vibrantly colored Bird Circus (1950s) . In the utterly charming Czech rarity Queer Birds (1965), the cutest pair of best bird friends you'll ever see must team up to fight off an… Read more
Oddball Films and curator Kat Shuchter present Learn Your Lesson...Juvenile Delinquents - A Rebellious Shockucation, the fourteenth in a series of programs highlighting the most ridiculous, insane and camptastic educational films, mental hygiene primers and TV specials of the collection. This month we are taking on those teenaged hoodlums that shoplift, vandalize, do drugs and wield knives. The RKO Screenliner Teenagers on Trial (1955) warns parents and teens alike that overcrowded classrooms, vacant parenting and societal pressures can all lead kids down a road of juvenile delinquency.… Read more
Oddball Films and curator Kat Shuchter bring you Stop-Motion Explosion!, a program of mind-blowing stop-motion animation from the 1910s to the 1980’s. In a world saturated with CGI, Oddball Films opens the vaults to celebrate when historical, fantastical and anthropomorphic creatures were hand-sculpted and manipulated into “life.” This program features stop-motion heavy-hitters Ray Harryhausen, George Pal, Art Clokey, Ladislas Starévich and Will Vinton including several rare works we've just uncovered for their big Oddball debut. Ray Harryhausen and George Pal became two of the biggest names… Read more
Oddball Films wants to give a special shout-out to Noel Lawrence and his new picture Sammy-Gate. The film is a dark political satire about how Sammy Davis, Jr. caused Watergate. How the hell did he do that? You will need to the see the film, but the twisted plot involves The Mafia, J. Edgar Hoover, Howard Hughes, and the Church of Satan. 70s retro-philes take note! Sammy-Gate doesn’t just take place in the bad ol’ days of the Nixon era. The film looks like it had been stored in a basement since 1973. Shot on vintage 35mm Panavision gear and lenses in Cinemascope, the footage was pushed extra… Read more
Oddball Films and curator Kat Shuchter present What the F(ilm)?! 4: Quadruple the Cine-insanity an evening of some of the most bizarre, hilarious and insane films from our massive 16mm collection. This time the insanity includes safety lessons from monkey-children, Jesus as a mime, swingin' promotional films and a Busby Berkeley musical number. Monkeying around on your bicycle has never been more deadly than for the 10 chimp-masked children heading to a picnic but not following the rules of the road in the legendary One Got Fat (1963). Jesus is a mime at a circus, alleviating the burdens of… Read more
Oddball Films presents A Decade of Experimentation: 1960s Avant-Garde Cinema, an evening of breathtaking, mind-blowing experimental films featuring works by Norman McLaren, Saul Bass, Chick Strand, Arthur Lipsett, Pat O'Neill, Bruce Conner and more. The 1960s were a decade of political turmoil and rebellion as well as sexual and pharmaceutical experimentation. This shift in consciousness affected a whole generation of media innovators who used the climate of change to permanently alter the landscape of cinema. Canadian innovator Norman McLaren's Pas De Deux (1968), superimposes the minute… Read more
Oddball Films and curator Kat Shuchter present Erotic Oddities with the most bizarre and offbeat smut, burlesque and erotica of the collection. From insane pornographic cartoons to marionette strippers, experimental sex to bizarre stag films, this is one night of the strangest smut you'll ever see. One of the earliest stag films, Getting his Goat (1923), a man is in for a surprise when he propositions sex through a hole in a gate. Eveready Hardon heads to the beach in the outrageous cartoon Buried Treasure (1928). Nudism: A Way of Life (c. 1950) sheds light on the rise of nudist culture in… Read more
Oddball Films and guest curator Lynn Cursaro present another edition of Pop! Goes the Classroom: School Films from the Golden Age of Groovy . A wide range of 1960’s sensibilities trickled down to educational films, from far out editing to groovy imagery, with weird, wild and beautiful results. Facts and dates gave way to concepts, color, song and action. Narration-free documentary shorts, such as Night People's Day (1971) gave youngsters a chance to ponder the hidden world of the night shift. One of the most outrageously adorable films ever, Baby Rabbit (1969) looks at bunnies and the… Read more
Southeast Asian Film Society presents DOCLAB Selects: Documentary Shorts From Vietnam. The beauty of cinema is its availability to everyone. With the advent of digital technologies, even more people are now able to express themselves. This is especially important in countries where cinema is heavily dependent on state funding, which dictates the ideology and form of the films that are made. DOCLAB Hanoi was created by independent documentary filmmaker Nguyen Trinh Thi to provide young Vietnamese filmmakers and media artists basic film and video training. Because of this program, we are able… Read more
Oddball Films and curator Kat Shuchter present Knee Deep in the Blues, an evening of some of the most exquisite films about blues and jazz music the country has ever seen. These beautiful rarities contain not only incredible music but stunning visuals and personal and in-depth portraits of brilliant but tortured artists. One of the most haunting and important films of the collection, view Bessie Smith's only film appearance in the moody musical melodrama St. Louis Blues (1929). Brilliant documentarian Les Blank's A Well Spent Life(1971) taps into the rich history of 75 year-old blues… Read more
Oddball Films and guest curator Tooth welcome the coming of spring with Silent Spring - Live Cinematic Soundscapes for the Vernal Equinox; a trio of silent cinema shorts with live musical accompaniment. As the weather heats up and the pheromones begin to swirl, we look to a collection of films that explore the fabric of human desire and its powers, both destructive and transcendent. The night begins with a multi-projector expanded/live cinema piece, by Tooth and accompanying electronic musician Joey Casio. Dream Flowers (1930s) studies, in strikingly gorgeous black and white, the cultivation… Read more
Oddball Films and curator Kat Shuchter present Learn Your Lesson...with Puppets - A Dangerously Squeaky Shockucation, the thirteenth in a series of programs highlighting the most ridiculous, insane and camptastic educational films, mental hygiene primers and TV specials of the collection. This month, as we await the release of the newest Muppets film, we will learn all our valuable lessons from the mouths of delightfully creepy puppets. From gender-identity to dental hygiene, fire safety, sex, drugs, anger management and more, this is one night of puppet propaganda too bizarre to see anywhere… Read more
Oddball Films presents Strange Sinema, a monthly screening of new finds, old gems and offbeat oddities from the collection. Drawing on his archive of over 50,000 16mm film prints Oddball Films director Stephen Parr has complied his 74 thprogram of classic, strange, offbeat and unusual films. This installment, Strange Sinema 74: Strange, Strange Music focuses on avant-garde, electronic music, quirky jazz, ethnographic and other musical novelties and exotica from around the world. T his program presents the rare documentary The Dreamer that Remains (1973) featuring American visionary composer,… Read more
Oddball Films and curator Kat Shuchter present What the F(ilm)?! 3: A Third Dose of Cine-insanity an evening of some of the most bizarre, hilarious and insane films from our massive 16mm collection. From crime-fighting chimps to evangelical "scientists" to children acting like toasters, this is one night of rare and hilarious head-scratchers you won't want to miss. School kids are forced to act out household appliances in a sad attempt at physical education in Perc! Pop! Sprinkle! (1969). That wise-cracking simian spy spoils a mad dentist's attempt at political espionage in the ridiculous… Read more
Oddball Films presents German Expressions, a program of gems of German cinema, as well as rarities from German performers, artists and visionaries from the 1920s-1970s. Through an excerpt of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920), witness the innovation and creativity that set Germany apart from the realism of early cinema and influenced nearly 100 years of film. It may be a little late for the Olympic tie in, but Leni Riefenstahl's Olympia Diving Sequence (1936) endures as one of the most breathtaking documents of the beauty of the human form throughout cinema history. Silhouette animator Lotte… Read more
