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The formative Years (I) - Arsenal Edition

GER 1972-1975, 142 min

The project THE FORMATIVE YEARS makes visible and accessible seven early experimental works by Heinz Emigholz, which provided a crucial impetus for the international experimental film movement of the 1970s and 80s. They are counted among the few experimental works from Germany which have attained enduring international acclaim.
Each film – ARROWPLANE, TIDE and all parts of the SCHENEC-TADY series – consist of thousands of photographs, taken frame-by-frame with a Bolex camera on 16mm film according to a previously established score. The human gaze is thus replaced by a sequence of images appeared as the product of a machine that isolated and saved the individual images, reconfiguring them in the projection in the context of an artificially created sequence of movement.

Synopsis

SCHENEC-TADY I (GER 1972/73, 40 min, b/w, silent)
The first part of the SCHENEC-TADY series has been cut to its final length in 1975. The edited pieces were basis for SCHENEC-TADY III.

SCHENEC-TADY II (GER 1973, 19 min, Color, silent)
SCHENEC-TADY II was planned as a film in two parts. The negative of the first part, shot in Hamburg 1973, got lost. The film was then rescored into its present form.

ARROWPLANE (GER 1973/74, 24 min, Color, silent)
The multiplication of a one-directional, horizontal 180-degree-panning shot with itself, applied to three landscapes – mound, city and beach.

TIDE (GER 1974, 34 min, b/w, silent)
The multiplication of a two-directional, horizontal 180-degree-panning shot with themselves, applied to the procresses “ebb to flow” and “flow to ebb”.

SCHENEC-TADY III (GER 1972/75, 25 min, b/w, silent)
His 'raw material' is 360 degree pans around the settings, but they are edited in such a way that the film constantly subverts conventional perception; cross rhythms, superimpositions, speed fluctations and rapid alternations of direction spark off a remarkable array of illusions, after-images and uncertanties. It confirms Emigholz as the most painterly of avant-garde film-makers. (Tony Rayns, TIME OUT, London, November 1974)

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DVD
The DVD is available in the Arsenal Edition
or separately in the 451-Alive Shop
or separately at amazon

Press reviews

His ‘raw material’ is 360 degree pans around the settings, but they are edited in such a way that the film constantly subverts conventional perception; cross rhythms, superimpositions, speed fluctations and rapid alternations of direction spark off a remarkable array of illusions, after-images and uncertanties. It confirms Emigholz as the most painterly of avant-garde film-makers. (Tony Rayns, TIME OUT, London 1974)

Beautiful and often unusual images are produced by complicated shooting techniques. The differences in each case lie in the system of construction, which is the actual invention of the film and only has validity for a single work. Each film is closed in on itself and substantiated by itself: a cosmos. (Birgit Hein, STUDIO INTERNATIONAL, 1976)

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DVD
The DVD is available in the Arsenal Edition
or separately in the 451-Alive Shop
or separately at amazon

Credits

Concept, Director, Composition, Director of Photography, Editor and Producer
Heinz Emigholz

SCHENEC-TADY I
World Premiere 
Festival of Independent Avantgarde Film, 13.09.1973

SCHENEC-TADY II
World Premiere 
Collective for Living Cinema, 22.03.1975
German Premiere 
Berlinale Forum, 1975

ARROWPLANE
German Premiere 
Berlinale Forum, 27.06.1974

TIDE
World Premiere 
Collective for Living Cinema, 22.03.1975
German Premiere 
Berlinale Forum, 1976

SCHENEC-TADY III
German Premiere 
Internationales Experimental- und Avantgardefilm Seminar, Kino Arsenal, 04.04.1976
Berlinale Forum, 1976

DVD-Details

SCHENEC-TADY I-III, ARROWPLANE and TIDE were published on the DVD THE FORMATIVE YEARS (I)
Extras
Interview with Heinz Emigholz and Stefan Grissemann (68 min, german with english subtitles), Sound slide shows (BROOKLYN BATHROOM PIECE - 1975, Color, 14 min, sound + STAIR PIECE - 1975, Color, 5 min, sound), 20 pages booklet
Language
International version (no dialogue)
Country Code
Code-free
System
NTSC / Color + b/w
Length
142 min + 87 min Extras
Aspect Ratio
4:3
Sound Format
silent + DD 2.0
Content 
Softbox (Set Content: 1), 20-pages Booklet
Release 
05.02.2010
Rating 
Info-Programm gemäß §14 JuSchG