been watching end of the world movies since the pandemic started around pi day. below is a list of a few that I have watched, and others that were recommended to me.
List below is sorted by (1) Contagion Flix (2) Apocalypse/End of the World (3) Contagion Vampires (4) Zombies
There is everything on the list from bmovie scifi, to high brow art films with subtitles, action movies with motorcycle henchmen with flamethrowers. zombies. contagion vampires. last day on earth. impending apocalypses. new, old, color, b/w, even a few silents (cause silent movies were made not long after the 1918 flu pandemic). My recommendations below are often American but also from countries around the world. I am especially fond of the late 70s-early 80s Italian and Australian Ozploitation movies that focused on apocalypse themes too.
For some reason a lot of the Italian ones from that period have fantastic leather jumpsuits and boots, not to mention mutant muscle cars souped up and arted out to survive the crisis and be ready to make a sequel lol. special mention goes out to ex-NFL player Fred Williamson who in the 70s made tons of these kind of movies. I hope the studios let him keep all those awesome leather jumpsuits.
David Carradine also made a few notable ones as well like Deathrace 2000 (the original with the mutant vehicles) and Deathsport (a woo filled running man type thing with lots of motorcycle stunts)
(1) contagions.
"The Last Man on Earth" (1964). "The Omega Man" (1971)." I Am Legend (2007)", "The Andromeda Strain" (1971), Outbreak (95), 12 monkeys (95), cabin fever (2002), cabin fever: patient zero (2014 prime), blindness (2008), carriers (09, amazon prime), black death (2010), rise of the planet of the apes (2011), warriors of the lost world (1983 ITL). cherry 2000 (1987) + cyborg2 (1993 angelina jolie bmovie sexbot), gattaca, love in the age of cholera, the thing (1982), cyborg (1989 van damme), shivers (1975). rabid (1977) prime or hoopla, the stand (1994 miniseries), seventh seal (1957), the crazies (1973/2010) prime, Turbo Kid, quarantine l.a. (amazon prime), Mayhem (shudder), The Cassandra Crossing (Prime). The Final Programme directed by Robert Fuest, the sick house. Masque of the Red Death (1925, 1964 vincent price, 1989), quarantine 2008, Survivors (2008 bbc) series, Train to Busan (2016 korean extremely hardcore zombies), rec, the fifth wave. Day of Resurrection (1980 JP,US), the killer that stalked new york (1950 youtube), parts per billion (2014), maze runner series, the hamburg syndrome (1979), 93 days (2016), ebola syndrome (96). L: Change the World 2008, Antisocial 2013, infected (2013). Contracted, Hardware, Night of the Comet 1984), The Mist, The Road, Exterminators of the Year 3000 (ITL 1983), Six String Samurai, Hell Comes to Frogtown, The Bay (2009 HBO), invasion of the body snatchers (1956/78), day of the triffids (1962), the blob (1958/1988), color out of space (2019 hardcore lovecraft), “THE SATAN BUG” (1965), warning sign (1985), flu (2013), REC (2007), the damned (1963), Right At Your Door (tubi), Pulse (Tubi), High-Rise (Hulu, Hoops, and Tubi), A Breath Away (Hulu and Hoopla), The Quiet Earth (Shudder, Kanopy, and Tubi), Radioactive Dreams (1985 musical).in the mouth of madness. Beyond the time barrier (1960 prime). Panic in the Streets (1950 prime). Bird box (2018 sarah bullock netflix). Lang's Destiny/Der Mude Tod (1921). the navigator: a medieval odyssey (1988 tubi). alien (1979), City of Fear (1959)
(2) apocalypses. dystopian futures.
district b13 (2007 parkour), warriors of the wasteland (1983 ITL). mad max, a boy & his dog, barbarella, blade runner, the time machine (1960). 1990 bronx warriors (1982 ITL). escape from the bronx. 2019 after the fall of new york (1983 ITL). the bad batch (2017). dr. strangelove. miracle mile (1988), threads (nuclear war), war of the worlds. mars attacks. the hundred, cell (2016), jericho (2006), soylent green, the hunger games, under the dome, logan's run (1976), Mad Max (AU), Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior, Mad Max 3 Beyond Thunderdome,Mad Max 4 Fury Road. "The World, the Flesh, and the Devil" (1959 Harry Belafonte). Escape from New York (1981 Kurt Russell). Snowpiercer (2013). Slipstream. Five (1951), brazil (1985), children of men (2006), Ender's Game (1985/2013), the running man (1987), deathrace 2000 (1975), rollerball (1975), outland (1981 sean connery), on the beach (1959) the blood of heroes (1990). Wheels of fire (1985). Warriors of the Year 2072 (1982 ITL), Battletruck: Warlords of the 21st century (84) , godzilla. panic in year zero! (1962). the ultimate warrior (1975). one night stand (AU 1984). Warrior of the Lost World (1983 ITL). When Worlds Collide (1951). time of the wolf (2004 French). The Day the Earth Caught Fire (ENG 1962). 4:44 - LAST DAY ON EARTH (2011), doomsday (2008), the world's end (2013 comedy), The End of August at the Hotel Ozone (1967 CZ on youtube with subtitles), When The Wind Blows (UK), Take Shelter (2011), last night (1998 youtube comedy). These Final Hours (2013 youtube), end of the line (2007 canadian). Knowing (2007 nic cage). the time travelers (1964 prime). Stalker (1979 criterion, youtube prime). Spacehunter (1983 space opera molly ringwald, archive.org) . dragon head (2003 JP). The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (1921). tank girl (1995 prime, vudu), the signal (2007)
(3) vampires (contagion, not supernatural).
the strain. the hunger. the addiction. true blood. nosferatu (1922), daybreakers. lifeforce
(4) zombies.
Dawn of the Dead" (1978/2004 remake), resident evil series (2002-2017), 28 days later (hulu), 28 weeks later, world war z (2013), pontypool (2008). The Day After Tomorrow, maggie (2015). shawn of the dead (comedy). anna and the apocalypse (2018 zombie xmas musical comedy). Pride prejudice and zombies (2016 comedy), Planet Terror. zombieland (comedy).
Like JoeBob said in March, every zombie or vampire movie is a virus/outbreak movie. Now I didn't list every single zombie or vampire movie, because the point of this qtine marathon is more about contagion than haunted mansions or supernatural stuff and mostly I avoided alien movies unless they caused mutations or were contagious.
I have found these movies to make me feel a little better about what is going on because hey, at least there are not motorcycle henchmen with flamethrowers chasing me. the current pandemic is temporary even though it is uncertain how long we will be toughing this out or what side effects it will have on us a a society. I feel like our ancestors survived the bubonic plague and 1918 flu pandemic, so some of us will survive this too. We're survivors.
i love me some twin peaks. i already have my outfit picked out for may 21. i saw the original movie opening day in the theatre as a sophomore in high school. the series is wonderful & completely fukt up. in today's marathon tv sessions, it will go super fast. 2 seasons (30 hour long episodes) + 1 rated R movie. You want watch the movie after the series. You can find them both on hulu or find the series on netflix & amazon.
i wonder, did the network execs like not watch this directors other weird ass movies? how the fuk did he get backing for this twisted stuff? this is the guy that made the 1984 dune & eraserhead & midgets tapdancing in his film wild at heart with mf'n isabella rosellini.
lynch likes to take super normal exterior & make it super weirdo inside. with an eyepatch or a secret coke habit or cross-dimensional travelling giants & midgets, or depending on the day, pie or donuts. just roll with it, its not going to be normal. its going to freaking oddball arty af. dirty, bruised & strangely beautiful.
when you get to the 2nd season remind your self that this ish ran on network tv, super fresh & modern even now. lol the censors were blown out of their chairs. the show was not renewed for a 3rd season. but man what a ride.
so here is my synopsis for people that don't watch the show told in gifs. i will try not to leave any spoilers...
SYNOPSIS in moving pictures
the 30 episode tv series follows the mystery related to the death of a popular high school girl named Laura Palmer, who dies fairly early in the first episode so this isn't really telling you anything. She seems to have it all, steady football player boyfriend, charity work, and extracurricular activities galore including some of the seedier variety. The local police find her body on the beach wrapped in plastic and call in for federal backup, in the form of the series detective, Agent Dale Cooper.
Cooper investigates the people associated with the young girl and learns about the minutaie of the friendly small town, all the way down to the best place to get cherry pie and coffee at the local diner.
However, under the Mayberry - Leave it to Beaver -like exterior of the little down, dark forces are at play. Agent Cooper teams up with the local sheriff's crew to figure it out. Together they try to uncover leads, some of which point a local bar & brothel, others more surreally metaphysical. Often we wonder if the culprit is more domestic than exotic.
Agent Cooper meticulously combs through all the evidence, the dead girl's possessions and those who loved her.
The show has a distinctive look and super non-traditional storyline. Expect more art house than soap opera in this teleplay.
Clues come from unusual places like "talking" logs and dreams, in addition to more typical clues gathered at the scene & from interviewing suspects.
Expect cameos by stars like David Bowie, Heather Graham, David Duchovny in drag, and the director himself as a hard of hearing agent.
& true to Laura's word back then, the series is back after 25 years. But now on cable with the same director and cast... can't wait
- INDEX - (1) transcript of the curator quotes & artists' statements for the dallas video fest collaboration to show art on the Omni Dallas Hotel (2) summary video clips of the one time only screening as captured on youtube, vimeo etc. from multiple perspectives (3) local press coverage of the event & photos & press videos of the display
--- (1) copied from the the curator Carolyn Sorter's press release which includes artists' statements below -
"The walls of the Omni Dallas Hotel are continuously wrapped with LED bars that function rather like a low-res computer monitor. Only a handful of buildings in the world offer displays similar to this one, and since this particular system was specifically created to fit the hotel's architecture, it is unique.
The company that installed the system provided a small repertoire of videos adapted for it, but not even the person responsible for operating it, Pat Anderson, understood all the details of the system's requirements and display parameters.
So the coordinator of the project, Carolyn Sortor (also an artist in the program), with assistance from Ben Britt, worked with Anderson to analyze and test the formats compatible with the system and the dimensions of the display and its "pixels." Sortor and Britt then created a template designed to make it easier for artists to create works that might utilize the display's full
potential.
(Digital image by Carolyn Sortor, from part of the template, which was also used in testing the display.)
All had experience with video, but none had ever worked with anything remotely like the Omni system. The display constitutes a potentially looping screen approximately 193 feet high and 999 feet wide. But while it may be the biggest screen in town, it's very low-res, effectively just 20 display pixels tall and 333 in width or circumference.
The organizers also hoped KXT 91.7 FM public radio would simulcast the
program audio, and that could happen only if it were appropriate for the
station's listeners; e.g., the works had to have audio, without any excessively
long silences or objectionable content. But since many people might also never
hear the audio, the videos also had to work without it...
The "expanded" in the program title refers not just to the size of
the Omni display, and not just to the seminal 1970 book of the same title by
pioneering new media theorist Gene Youngblood, who will speak at the VideoFest
on Sunday afternoon, but to the breadth and depth of our viewers, as well as
the potential of media to help us not only to define but also to share and expand
our points of view....
All works are site-specific video especially designed for the LED display on
the exterior walls of the Omni Dallas Hotel, with audio expected to be
simulcast by KXT 91.7 FM radio, and were made in 2012. Curated by Carolyn Sortor, Bart Weiss, and Michael A. Morris. (TRT 52:15
min.)
Works in the program are shown in the
order listed below. Tim Capper with Ryan Hartsell and Wes Martin, Pong Master, 1:49 min.
visionwise.com
"Playing games with each other is the intention of the living. Being nice
to each other is the invention of the living. Exploiting each other is the
convention of the sinning." Online flaming. Game Over. Concept by Tim
Capper, with script, music, and audio effects by Wes Martin and animation by
Ryan Hartsell.
Michael Alexander Morris, Monument for Juanita: Candy is the Sun, 2:45 min.
michaelalexandermorris.com Monument for Juanita: Candy is the Sun is an ephemeral moving light monument to
Juanita Slusher (aka Candy Barr), the infamous exotic dancer and Dallas folk
hero who performed at Abe Weinstein's Colony Club, which was originally located
just steps away from the current location of the Omni Hotel in Downtown Dallas.
Over the years, the skyline of Dallas
has morphed from the brick and concrete architecture that characterized many
cities at mid-century to a sleek, postmodern cityscape of glass, argon, and LED
screens. In her own words, “[d]ancing was my greatest pleasure. It was my
world. I danced a picture. I just lived it up there, and whatever I was
painting came across – charcoals, oils, or pen-and-inks.” Monument seeks to
commemorate Juanita in her moments of creative ecstasy, giving her the face of the
city as her canvas.
Shane Mecklenburger, OMNEY, 4 min.
shmeck.com I'm fascinated with perceived value – what we value, and how we value it. I'm
also interested in – and often astonished by – the spectacle accompanying
symbols of value. This spectacle is a creative activity, like the daily
invention of value itself. Nothing has any value until we impart it, so every
economy is an act of imagination. My projects participate in these activities
to highlight our creative control and the malleability of value. For the Dallas
Videofest I chose the format of the dance party, a basic human spectacle accompanying
nearly every important cultural transaction. I thought it would be fun to try
and make the building dance. The spectacular scale and cost of the Omni's
display made it seem like the perfect medium to express the ritual dance of
value and exchange.
Mona Kasra, You'll Forget Everything, Soon, 1:28 min.
monakasra.com
Mona Kasra is a new media artist and a PhD candidate at University of Texas at
Dallas with a focus in Arts & Technology. Mona's video artworks tend to be
poetic autobiographies, revealing her curiosities, memories, fears, and
insecurities, and are mainly centered on a process of personal discovery
through an open narrative structure. You'll Forget Everything, Soon is about physical and emotional distance. It
alludes to the obscurity of human communication, and the curious relation between presence and
absence. It explores the state of being and simultaneously not-being, and is
occupied with the thoughts of two people who are close, yet far away from one
another.
Andrea Goldman, Stop. Collaborate. Listen., 3:07 min.
andreagoldman.org
Andrea Goldman creates videos, drawings, and songs that explore overlapping
rhetorics of ideology, common sense, and personal freedom. Her video Stop.
Collaborate. Listen. uses the concept of hendiatris, a rhetorical device that
conveys a broad concept – or motto – through three terms or phrases, such as
"eat, drink, and be merry" or "live, love, and learn."
Jenny Vogel, Save Our Souls, 7:30 min.
jennyvogel.net
My work explores subjective themes as they are experienced in the age of
information. I examine the anxiety of alienation, the desires of communication and
a sense of be-longing in a virtual world. These traits, attributed to
Romanticism, are dealt with in my work through the lenses of contemporary communication technology, the media and
historical preconceptions. I am particularly interested in the depiction of the
individual and individuality through media technology, with its resulting
misrepresentations and miscommunications. Through this juxtaposition of technology and Romanticism
I attempt to challenge the image of the Internet as the “global village,”
objectivism in the news and the ideology of science. High-resolution photographs of low-resolution encounters, offer a
surprisingly intimate reading of a contemporary loneliness. Live streaming
video projections of the one-shot-per-second progression of web cameras result
in a fireworks-display of light signals as if trying to communicate in some
unknown code, some unknown message. Voyeurism and self-induced surveillance
through constant online exposure are the desperate desires of participation in
the online world, which fails in the colloquial boredom of chat-rooms. Together
these practices present a postmodern tableau of the Romantic ideal of solitude,
the failing utopia of the global village and the dark beauty of a mediated
planet. However, I don’t merely see my subjects as victims whose individuality
is crushed by the homogenizing effects of globalization and mass media. They
are also heroes in a way, defying categorization, re-instating a sense of
humanity, poetry and myth. These themes are expressed through a wide range of
practices, including photography, live-streaming web movies, video, drawing and
printmaking. In many of my works the medium is used in its original form,
providing references to its real world scenarios, while at the same time adding
self-reflexive content.
Frank Campagna, Orange you glad I didn't say knock knock, 3:22 min.
franksart.net
Frank Campagna is a fixture in Dallas whose murals are as recognizable as his
scratchy voice. But he also has made an artistic mark with Deep Ellum's Kettle
Art gallery, which offers a quiet escape amid the entertainment district's
music venues. (USA
Today 7/ 27/ 2012.) In his video entitled, Orange you glad I didn't say knock
knock, Campagna utilizes his experience of working on a large scale, along with
his recent fascination of playing with both video and audio editing.
Kyle Kondas, DOTS, 2:30 min.
vimeo.com/kyle1point0
My video paintings have always been a study of how to break down and disrupt
the normal image of the video. The original material that I work with has
always had to come from various areas of interest that I've been passionate
about. First it started with video games, which I still work with, but recently
I've started working with media referencing pop-culture. Originally, my pieces
were glitched through the use of programs, but now I have started working with
the video's code through the study of circuit bending. For the Omni, I decided
to go back to one of my very first pieces ever and try applying both forms of
glitching together. DOTS has been a new experiment and possible first piece into
a new area of work.
Rebecca Carter with Mark Collop, The Eyeballs From Outer Space/Strangers in the
Night,3:14 min.
rebeccacarter.org
My works utilize language, thread matrixes, photography, and video to explore
shifting states of intimacy and alienation. The Eyeballs from Outer Space have
become a kind of super hero. They are the cosmic gaze of a benevolent Other swarming in layers
larger and smaller. Semi-embodied as flickers of light momentarily on the Omni hotel they
peer over the city of Dallas.
They fix the city for a moment in a shifting gaze. "I love you Dallas." They can't
speak it, but the impulse of intention sits there on the edge of seeing and
being seen. With audio by Frank Sinatra with Mark Collop.
Carolyn Sortor, Braille, 3:08 min.
c-cyte.com
In Braille, two hands each seamlessly circle the building twice, but never
meet, "reading" a visual braille that sets out the name of the
alphabet's inventor twice. In the language of dreams, Freud wrote, doubled
objects can refer to repetition in time. The text is huge, but could probably
be read only by those who can't see it, and be seen only by those who can't
read it. The alphabet's inventor, Louis Braille, used an awl to create his
texts, the same instrument with which he'd accidentally blinded himself as a
child. Braille's invention revolutionized communications for the blind, but the
school in which he taught forbade its use. Use of the alphabet spread after he
died, but it's now being superseded by automated reading technologies. The
sextet from Lucia di Lammermoor that's used in this piece expresses both the
paralysis and gorgeous order that can result from conflicting emotions within
individuals in an interconnected social group. Within individuals, such
conflict can result in abulia; it can also create consciousness. In the moment
of conscious indecision, time seems suspended; but it's not. Conflict implies
difference. Some handicaps are invisible, yet real.
(above film clip #4 include Braille, Specter City and Owboy)
Edward Setina, Specter City, 3:38 min.
edwardsetina.com
Ted Setina's piece casts the Omni as a giant audio levels display that
literally translates music into visual form, with display bars of a size
suggesting rising and falling skyscrapers.
Jeff Gibbons, Owboy, 2:58 min.
jeffgibbons.net
I often find myself with a lack of position, more concerned with the
interactions or connections between infinity and a seemingly finite life. I am
here in an existence, all of which manifests itself in the perception of a
fragile mind, a vehicle of flesh, which resides in a “cause-and-effect world.”
This instills a need for attachment, understanding, and meaning (purpose). So I
place meaning in the work I do (how I function in society), purpose in my
attachments and love, and try to make the best of living, while existing in the
knowledge of my own mortality. I see purpose as a coping mechanism that I
cannot live without. It is the meaning I place on my own existence and
everyone/everything else’s that makes now, before, and after have value. There
is a balance between purpose and doubt, existing within life and death, where meaning
and futility work as a seemingly polarized constant.
@hdxdvd (Kari Altmann), Omnia XII Ethnique Epic Vista Demo 1280p with
Tribal, 2:47 min.
karialtmann.com
A string of mutated, translated, and appropriated terms from the back end and black
markets of cultural and biological production. Through proximity, they exoticize
and re-brand each other into mythical new territories, textures, and tribes. Displayed
and titled similarly to HDTV demo clips full of "ethnic," seductive,
and often feminine footage. Kari Altmann is a wifi-based artist currently stationed in Baltimore
and New York, with recent residencies and
on-site projects in Bucharest, Seoul,
Tokyo, Rotterdam,
Panama, Bilbao,
Berlin, and beyond, as well as several tours
inside the U.S.
Since earning a BFA from MICA in 2008, she has exhibited in a range of
platforms, from "print to real life" showrooms and live stages to filesharing
cloud communes, 3d simulated spaces like Chrystal
Gallery for Gentili Apri, and editorial
arenas like Dis Magazine and Rhizome at the New Museum.
Philip Lamb, Metamorphosis, 2:30 min.
philiplamb.com As with most all cities, Dallas has a history of replacing old buildings with
new ones . .. sometimes for good, sometimes for the worse. In the case of the
Omni hotel, Dallas
is lucky to have gained a beautifully appointed convention hotel where other buildings
have stood. The metamorphosis of our built environment is an ongoing slow
process. With intended irony, Philip Lamb’s video symbolizes this evolution by
showing the implosion of older buildings on the surface of the new building.
After the collapse, the architectural regeneration is represented by patterns of
color. The music accompanying the video is "Bat Chain Puller" by
Captain Beefheart. It is nonsensical and surreal, and serves to emphasize the
organized chaos from which cities evolve.
Expanded Cinema was coordinated and compiled by Carolyn Sortor, and the
template to facilitate the making of the video works was created by Carolyn
Sortor and Ben Britt. Special thanks to Mark Abuzzahab of KXT 91.7 FM public
radio; Pat Anderson of Matthews Southwest, Lighting Producer; the Omni Dallas
Hotel, the Dallas Convention Center hotel; the City of Dallas; Bart Weiss with
Dallas Video Fest for pushing the idea, and Jeff West for saying yes."
----
(2) video clips of the one time only screening as captured on youtube, vimeo etc. from multiple perspectives. The clips embedded above seem to be opportunists with a camera whom I believe got the best shots of the work synched to the audio simulcast on KXT.
I tried to put the individual videos with their artist statement above. My favorite background noise is from a video taken from the perspective of one of the bridges from Oak Cliff shot by chadeg as "omni video #1" which I have posted below. if you listen to the audio
at :23... bystander “you are about to get run over, lol. Like
really, do you want to risk your life just to film this?”
cameraman: “yes ma'am, yes.” His camerawork in the first 2
videos is lacking as he gets his bearings on the busy bridge but the shots get way better & you can hear the KXT simulcast
audio clearly from #2 through video #5. His is the most unusual perspective with a
great view of downtown of all the video I found of the exhibition. The award for best audio and video for capturing this moment goes to youtube poster puddingebola.
snippets of all artists' video without KXT audio by dallasfilmsociety (3:55)
first 11 minutes of program without KXT audio (nice clear footage by JKStudioDFW)-
summary video of event (13
minutes) by pulp lizard
(3)
post event coverage story by pegasus news with embedded video interview by dallas morning news
wfaa's excellent vantage point for videotaping during event with terrible audio
(faint kxt simulcast, lots of wind on mic, 8 mins. includes work by Vogel & Campagna)
general show of the hotel's wall screen technology not related
to the event
Dallas Video Fest - film opening with credits
http://vimeo.com/49561451
www.videofest.org
more info about the experimental films shown at the 2012 festival in my earlier blog >here<
much gratitude to the artists and organizers who participated in this public art event. the true beauty of the project is that it exposed the general public in this city to video art. people that may have never set foot in a museum were shown this undeniable artwork which used the skyline of the city as a canvas. Art projected on the hotel's exterior as a moving picture screen, synched to the sounds of free public radiowaves for one night only. this writer was emotionally moved to have witnessed it & am glad it was captured by all those cameras so it can be shared again here.
