Tuesday, July 31, 2007

Press Release: The Journal of Short Film Releases Volume 8 (Summer 2007)

for immediate release

(July 31, 2007) The Journal of Short Film released Volume 8 (Summer 2007) today. The JSF is a quarterly DVD featuring exceptional, peer-reviewed short films. To date, the JSF has published over 80 filmmakers from 10 countries. Volume 8 includes the Journal’s first films from Romania and Iran.

Volume 8 covers more ground than most previous volumes, walking through fields in Romania, crossing the Brooklyn Bridge in 1899, busing the streets of San Francisco, and touring a prehistoric site in Mexico. But before a theme can take hold, the collection of 11 films continues the Journal’s policy of diversity. Other settings range from urban Iran to a sheep farm to a morgue to a birthing room full of surprises.

The Journal was pleased to host Chicago-based filmmaker Deborah Stratman as a guest editor for Volume 8. She is known for her work through her production company Pythagoras. She was highly praised for her short work In Order Not To Be Here, and she recently completed Kings of the Sky, a feature documentary about Muslim Uyghur tightrope walkers in western China.

The Journal continues to have a free and open submissions process. Submissions should be sent to The JSF, PO Box 8217, Columbus, OH 43201, USA. The Journal also remains ad-free, committed to independent and underrepresented work, and insistent that art and entertainment are not mutually exclusive.

Following is a list of the films in Volume 8:

1. LAMPA CU CACIULA (THE TUBE WITH A HAT) – Radu Jude [Romania] (2006, 23:00) A father and son carry their TV set to the city to have it fixed before the afternoon movie. 2. THE BOY IN THE AIR – Lyn Elliot (2005, 2:00) An enigmatic advertisement inspires a letter. The corporation writes back. 3. MANUELLE LABOR – Marie Losier (2007, 10:00) A collaboration with Guy Maddin leads to a birthing scene unlike any other. 4. ART/WORK – Avram Dodson (2006, 5:00) A realistic look at the relationship between the artist and the day job. 5. FLIP-FILM – Ellen Ugelstad and Alfonso Alvarez (1999, 1:05) A staccato peek at San Francisco from the inside of a bus. Made in the tradition of Biograph’s 1890 Mutoscope. 6. MARDHA HAMDIGAR RA BEHTAR MIFAHMAND (MEN UNDERSTAND EACH OTHER) – Marjan Alizadeh [Iran] (2007, 8:00) Two men and a woman: it seems men understand each other better. 7. UNIFIED FIELDS – Brandon Walley (2006, 9:00) During a hot summer weekend in the country with my family, I tried to capture an odd sense of interconnectedness yet isolation. 8. OUTERBOROUGH – Bill Morrison (2005, 8:30) A split-screen extrapolation of a film taken while crossing the Brooklyn Bridge in 1899. 9. NOTHINGNESS – Arzu Ozkal Telhan (2005, 2:55) Nothingness is about resignation; an unwilling state of existence under the weight of insatiable humanity. 10. MARTIN – Bill Basquin (2004, 5:00) Martin is a poetic portrait of a sheep shearer and his philosophical musings on rural life. 11. TO THE SOUTH WAS 72 – Sabine Gruffat (2005, 11:00) “A personal guided tour of the largest prehistoric city north of Mexico.” -Anonymous

Contact: Karl Mechem, publisher, The Journal of Short Film, contact@theJSF.org

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