SCFZ

https://cinefest.de/en/festival/

cinefest – International Festival of German Film Heritage

In close collaboration with international scholars and archives, CineGraph and Bundesarchiv have developed a new concept for their traditional conference, expanding it into cinefest, a Festival of German Film Heritage. Apart from exploring new and forgotten areas of film history, the festival will provide a prominent showcase for archives which preserve and restore the treasures of German Cinema. The aim is also to create a forum for academics, students, archivists, technicians and film buffs to exchange information and discuss new developments. An extensive retrospective looking at key aspects of the history of film in Germany will be combined with workshops and conference sessions, allowing guests to see and discuss rare films from German and international archives.

Integrated in the festival in Hamburg is the International Film History Conference.

Local partner of cinefest in Hamburg is the Kinemathek Hamburg e.V.

After the event in Hamburg, parts of the film program will also be shown in Berlin, Wiesbaden, Prague, Vienna and Zurich. Our partners there are Zeughauskino of the German Historical Museum in Berlin, Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung in Wiesbaden, Národní Filmový Archive in Prague, FilmForum in Udine/Gorizia, Filmarchiv Austria in Vienna and Filmpodium Zürich and Cinémathèque Suisse.

next Cinefest
19th Edition
11 - 20 November 2022

BUT
4.4. — 13.4. 2022
echoes of the past Cinefest (In Prague)
different films in 3 sections
one section devoted to Werner Nekes
gonna attend (in Ponrepo)...
ULYSSES (Werner Nekes, 1982)

https://youtu.be/QH1okfKQ76w

https://www.researchgate.net/publicatio ... ht-erature

Werner Nekes' Uliisses Literary Citations Between Eye and Brain in the Cinema of Light-erature
by Jesús Isaías Gómez López

...

Anyone who has been confronted with Nekes´ work will be very eager to discover how he will deal with literary material like the Odyssey, because until now, Nekes has always firmly resisted resorting to literary means in his film sequences and montage.

Indeed, Nekes´ film follows essentially the same episodic structure as Homer´s Odyssey; Nekes also incorporates elements of Oram´s play, as well as specific approaches to the subject matter as developed by Joyce. Nekes even worked with the drama troupe which, independent of Nekes, two years before had done Oram´s 24-hours play The Warp in Great Britain. However, Nekes does not utilize the literary treatment of the material by Joyce, Homer or Oram/Fenelon in order to illustrate it in his turn, or to make his own vision out of it. Literary citations serve the function of discovering or splitting up the customary cooperation between eye and brain; the thematic literary citations compel the brain to construct new expectations with regard to the filmic material. These literary citations provide the brain with the inducement and assistance necessary for unaccustomed interpretations of the optical and visual offerings which Nekes gives us in his film.

If, for want of literary references, we do not achieve the divorce of our habits of seeing from a neocortical processing, we are simply left with the impression that Nekes wants to shock us with terrorist arbitrariness. Up until now, viewers of Nekes´ films have frequently reacted in this way, which is understandable, because until now, there has hardly ever existed in a film by Nekes the possibility, through the treatment of an independent literary subject, to totally intervene in the collaboration, customary in film in general, between eye and brain and to activate the capacities of the brain which will free the film material from the laziness of the eye.

...

ULYSSES (Werner Nekes, 1982)

the screening was introduced (& concluded) by Bernd Upnmoor, cinematographer of the film.
never heard (such a shame!) of him before.
he should be much more known — such a charming gentleman!

Werner Nekes & Bernd Upnmoor


in the past, Bernd worked mostly (in general) as a cinematographer, but made a few experimental films (as a director) as well.
imdb lists 3 → https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0881455/
bfi lists 4 (1 title identical with imdb) → https://www2.bfi.org.uk/films-tv-people/4ce2ba462e46a
mubi lists none → https://mubi.com/cast/bernd-upnmoor
lbox lists hardly anything → https://letterboxd.com/editor/bernd-upnmoor/

i would really love to see films he made as a director but it is probably a complete utopia to find them anywhere.
so, will at least try to see as many films as possible he shot as a cinematographer.
was really impressed by his persona!

in his intro speech, he mentioned...

ULYSSES's plot is an amalgam of 1/ Oram's 24-hours play The Warp (that Werner Nekes has seen in Edinburgh and thereafter decided to make this film), 2/ Homer's tale, 3/ James Joyce's tale, 4/ one day in the life of a photographer Uli (living in the Ruhr area).

german title ULIISSES is a wordplay. it can be read ULI-ISS-ES. ISS stands for IST (in some german dialect). thus ULIISSES = ULI IST ES (it is Uli).

film had no profound script (Werner Nekes was not allegedly a person interested in extensive scriptwriting), only approximately 4 pages with about 18 main points (corresponding to 18 main episodes of Odysseus's journey).

after the script was shot, actors from the UK came (those who participated in a play Werner Nekes attended) and moreover were shot some scenes from their play. allegedly it was the most demanding chapter in the whole of Bernd's career. Britons were wild, the whole crew was working hard, partying hard, after everything was done Bernd slept 27 hours in a row to get rejuvenated (others' period of rejuvenation was allegedly even longer).

after all of this, came the phase of extensive postproduction (making all kinds of tricks and experiments with the film stock Werner Nekes was so keen on). a few examples of how various scenes were shot and what was made with the film stock were told by Bernd — f.e. cutting 1,6 meters long segments of a film strip (corresponding to ca. 3,5 seconds, corresponding to a length of a stock that can be loaded into a photo camera), etc., etc., etc.

we have watched a digitalized copy of the film and Bernd said that he has spent (during the digitalization process) about 8 hours explaining to the persons who were making the digitalization how all the specific scenes were filmed. so, he joked that his intro speech can proceed for the next 8 hours but let's watch the movie instead.

after the film, Bernd was ready to answer the questions.
and it turned out that in the audience were probably several female shooting stars of the local experimental film (or what?) because several young girls started to ask Bernd about various technical details of his cinematography. so, he proceeded with explaining how various scenes were exactly made.
these Q&A didn't last 8 hours.
only about 20 minutes.
but i would not be surprised if (while i am compiling this post) some of those girls would be (in Ponrepo's café) still interrogating poor old (charming) Bernd about the technical details of filmmaking.