Movies: Avant garde

Documentary tribute to what VH1 called “the single greatest rock omnibus program ever aired” and Brooklyn Vegan named “the most consistently weird and awesome thing on cable television in the ’80s.” This ‘Best Of’ episode features some of the most m...

With input from actor and writer Jan Hlobil, director and cinematographer Rene Smaal presents a film in the true surrealist tradition, in the sense that only 'found' elements were used, and that it defies interpretation based on ordinary cause-and-ef...

The Documentary centers around Zappa at home, and on Tour. The amazing thing is that Zappa allowed a guy with a camera to film the band at the Fillmore West w/ Flo and Eddie. There are times when the camera man seems to be on the stage. The performan...

Meet Shavon O'Brien: Her family doesn't understand her, her church ignores her, even Jesus forgets about her. With only the spirit of Sinead O'Connor to guide her, Shavon battles institutional child abuse, narcissistic group think, a talking stomach...

Two actresses, Béatrice Dalle and Charlotte Gainsbourg, are on a film set telling stories about witches....

Events take a sinister turn one night in London, when two very different couples arrive at a double-booked apartment. Actions have consequences and not all debts are paid for with money. Leaving, it's harder than you think....

Frank Zappa: A Token of his Extreme is the 1974 television special recorded at Kcet in Hollywood that was produced by Zappa and aired only in France and Switzerland. The program, as thoroughly tweezed and produced by Zappa for his own Honker Home Vi...

The film explores familiar landscape imagery Saïto and Goldstein share in their neighbourhood at the foot of Mount-Royal Park in Montréal, Canada. Using the images of maple trees in the park as main visual motif, Saïto creates a film in which the for...

Frank Zappa: The Present-Day Composer Refuses To Die is a 2000 documentary about Frank Zappa....

Exploring the wit, work and world of Joe Orton through his own words, and the testimony of those who knew him and worked with him....

Produced by Frank Zappa in 1982, The Dub Room Special combines footage from a performance at the KCET studios in Los Angeles on August 27, 1974, a concert performed at The Palladium, NYC on October 31, 1981, some clay animation by Bruce Bickford, and...

In the aftermath of an emotional shock, a ruthless high-class manager faces her own abyss, becomes pervaded by a sensory spirit and undertakes a purifying voyage....

While playing his trombone one Sunday, the enthusiastic Zero sees Beatrix and falls in love. He returns the next week to express his feelings, and it's mutual. Over the next few months, they spoon, kiss, and find happiness. Then, she receives a lette...

Described as 'a fairytale with its roots in the worlds of dadaism and surrealism'....

Mory, a cowherd, and Anta, a university student, try to make money in order to go to Paris and leave their boring past behind....

With some amount of irony, filmmaker Joe Biglin strings together 7 shorts about himself and things that trigger his OCD....

An intimate, affecting portrait of the life and work of ground-breaking performance artist and music pioneer Genesis Breyer P-Orridge (Throbbing Gristle, Psychic TV) and his wife and collaborator, Lady Jaye, centered around the daring sexual transfor...

Frank Zappa: Phase Two is a 2002 documentary about Frank Zappa. It features a lot of footage from Scheffer's previous film, but new material from Malcolm McNab's private achive....

What does the energy harnessed through orgasm have to do with the state of communist Yugoslavia circa 1971? Only counterculture filmmaker extraordinaire Dušan Makavejev has the answers (or the questions). His surreal documentary-fiction collision beg...

A manifesto of sorts for the Czech New Wave, this five-part anthology shows off the breadth of expression and the versatility of the movement’s directors. Based on stories by the legendary writer Bohumil Hrabal, the shorts range from the surreally ch...