Self-described as a “kinographic novel,” THE SOMNAMBULISTS combines stylized drawings, inter-titles and music to fashion an intriguing combination of graphic novel and early silent cinema. In the year 2047, a new drug called Somnambula, which does away with the need for sleep, arrives to a city below the Moon’s surface. As the residents wander about in a sleepless daze, Bruno, a former circus performer, searches for his missing partner, a boy who has mysteriously disappeared. Bruno’s search leads him to the inventor of Somnambula, who seems to have the power to control others with his mind. Winner of the Best Animated film at the 2015 Independent Filmmakers’ Showcase in Los Angeles, Andres’s film is a hypnotic fantasy and a meditation on the nature of love. (94 mins.) 

An exhibition of drawings from the film is currently on display at the Augen Gallery. Mark Andres will introduce the film. 

Filmmakers Austin Will, Sam Kuhn and Fantavious Fritz form a collective known as Lion Attack Motion Pictures. The energetic group began their careers in the Pacific Northwest before expanding their operations to New York, Toronto and Miami. Join us on this special night as the three filmmakers return to their home state of Oregon to screen a selection of their award-winning films. The program will include PARADISE FALLS (2014), an idiosyncratic tale of two boys’ adventures in an abandoned suburban mansion, IN SEARCH OF THE MIRACULOUS (2015), an ironic homage to the enigmatic Dutch artist Bas Jan Ader, and LONG WAY GONE (2014), a surreal portrait following a lost soul navigating ghostly landscapes in search of shelter from a vicious storm. (80 mins.) 

The filmmakers will introduce the program. 

Taking its title from the Lakota name “Mako Shika,” meaning “bad land,” MAKOSHIKA focuses on the lonely prairie landscapes of eastern Montana, where graduating classes of local one-room schoolhouses can often be composed of only a single student. First-time feature director Hart weaves alternating first-person narratives together with engrossing historical commentary to tell the story of a region in transition, largely due to oil development fueled by the nearby Bakken shale formations. Like the prospectors of years past, modern-day fortune hunters are making their way into these remote lands...while holding the fates of local communities in the balance. (65 mins.) 

Jessica Jane Hart and Fractured Media will introduce the film.

What was the song with which you first fell in love? “An anthology love letter to music” is how cinema artist Brown, aka the Chocolate Giant, explains his 12-part film, which asks friends and strangers to record themselves reciting the lyrics of a personally meaningful song. Using his subjects’ lyrical recitations and backstories, Brown fashions a dozen short pieces inspired by the songs and the people who love them. Subjects range from The National’s “Pink Rabbits”, Lauryn Hill’s “That Thing”, The Deftones’ “RX Queen,” to Built to Spill’s “Velvet Waltz.” With THE LYRIC PROJECT, Brown fashions not only music videos, but “powerful reminders of a certain place in time and lyrics that can sink in and stick with you forever--for better or worse.” —AP Kryza, Willamette Week. (73 mins.) 

Director Ezekiel Brown will introduce the film.

Prior to the screening stop by the Stevens room next to the Whitsell for small reception featuring vinyl records for participants to write the lyrics of their favorite songs on.  Stop in and participate before settling in to enjoy the show.

Winner of the 2014 Oregon Media Arts Fellowship, Portland filmmaker Kurtis Hough’s work blends animation, documentary, and the surreal into an investigation of the musical undertones found in abstract patterns of nature. Beginning with time-lapse photography of landscapes from around the planet, Hough’s work captures the lyricism and movements of unseen microscopic formations and natural events that typically go unnoticed by the human eye. The program includes STUMBLE THEN RISE ON SOME AWKWARD MORNING (2004), MOSSGROVE/ BED OF MOSS (2011), CRYOSPHERE (2012) and TO SEE MORE LIGHT (2015), as well as the premiere of his new film PAINTED HILLS (2016). (80 mins.) 

Kurtis Hough will introduce the films. 

Portland filmmaker and educator Jodi Darby has been making festival rounds with her award-winning 2014 documentary ARRESTING POWER: RESISTING POLICE VIOLENCE IN PORTLAND OREGON, which she co-directed with Julie Perini and Erin Yanke. Darby will join audiences at the Northwest Film Center to present a program of some of her earlier short works, including STONEWALL (2010), an essay film exploring the American Civil War through a queer lens; 100 SUNS (2011), a found footage work utilizing film from a Los Alamos nuclear testing lab and set to a score by Marisa Anderson; MAN MOVIE (2013), a deconstructive look at male-centric cinematic action, and CONSTELLATION (2014), a visual documentary exploring the border wall between the US and Mexico and the ideological divide it represents for the two cultures on either side of the fence. (80 mins.) 

Jodi Darby will introduce the program.