WHAT IS THE TOUR?
HOW TO WATCH
The Ann Arbor Film Festival is a pioneer of the traveling film festival tour which launched in 1964 with film screenings in Paris, Los Angeles, and Berkeley. Since that time, the AAFF tour has presented hundreds of influential works by film artists including Barbara Hammer, Gus Van Sant, Sally Cruikshank, Don Hertzfeldt, Bill Brown, Ross McLaren, Paul Winkler, James Duesing, Martha Colburn, and Jay Rosenblatt.
The tour provides filmmakers the unique opportunity of having their work screened in front of audiences for whom, in many places, the tour venue is their only access to this form of film art. Each filmmaker participating in the AAFF tour is also paid for each tour stop, thereby helping to directly support their filmmaking.
For more information about booking the tour, including rates, please email us at tour@aafilmfest.org.
Interested in seeing what it is all about? For the first time ever you are able to bring the excitement of an AAFF tour stop to your own home. Rent one of our 5 Programs today. At home rentals will only be available for a limited time so catch them while you can. Check them out below.
PROMOTION
To support your promotion of the AAFF tour program, we provide high-quality still images, a customized PDF for printing posters/flyers, a customized PDF program summary, festival graphics and copy. In addition, the AAFF promotes each tour stop on its website and monthly eNewsletter (more than 7,000 active subscribers), and will conduct basic press outreach to each tour stops host city to help ensure media coverage.
TOUR STOPS FROM THE 57TH AAFF
6.28.19
Rooftop Cinema series, Madison Museum of Contemporary Art in Madison, Wisconsin
10.15.19
University of Colorado Boulder in Boulder, Colorado
10.30.19
Pitzer College in Claremont, California
11.13.19
Pitzer College in Claremont, California
11.11.29
Three Rivers Festival in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
11.30.19
Cranbook in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan
12.10.19
Alabama Museum of Contemporary Arts in Mobile, Alabama
1.12. 20
Los Angeles FilmForum in Los Angeles, California
1.18.20
Ludington Area Center for the Arts in Ludington, Michigan
1.25.20
The Senate Theater in Detroit, Michigan
1.26.20
Clinton Macomb Library in Clinton Charter Township, Michigan (Romeo Plank Road)
Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee
1.30.20
Grand Rapids Public Library at Wealthy Theater in Grand Rapids, Michigan
2.1.20
Grand Rapids Public Library at Wealthy Theater in Grand Rapids, Michigan
2.13.20
Grosse Pointe Public Library in Grosse Pointe, Michigan
2.10.20
Ann Arbor District Library in Ann Arbor, MI
3.5.20
Casket Cinema in Minneapolis, Minnesota
3.13.20
Rhode Island School of Design at Acoustic Java in Providence, Rhode Island
3.14.20
Rhode Island School of Design at Acoustic Java in Providence, Rhode Island
OUT NIGHT
Happy
Seyed Ahmadreza Mousavi
Tehran, Iran | 2018 | 9 | digital
North American Premiere
A human being in search of his sexual identity finds himself in a continuous loop.
Fifth Metacarpal
Scott Fitzpatrick
Winnipeg, MB | 2018 | 6 | digital
“I broke my hand last summer.” A memoir of tenderness hazarded, muted ache, and a fibreglass cast.
Lesbian Farmer
Carleen Maur
Columbia, SC | 2019 | 2 | digital
A brief meditation on coyotes, my mother, and conservative talk radio.
A messy story about oak and
Emilý Æyer and Maria Bang Espersen
Houston, TX | 2019 | 14 | digital
A short, incomplete story about Danish kings, royal trees, democracy and beech trees, as well as their entwined connection to wild weeds, Abraham Lincoln, neighborhood rules in Houston, and more. The music, composed and sung by Emilý Æyer, references a play by Friedrich Kuhlau titled Elve’s Hill, the Danish national anthem, and music by a Danish royal composer, all interrupted by experimental sounds.
Framing Agnes
Chase Joynt and Kristen Schilt
Canada/US | 2018 | 19 | digital
In the late 1950s, a woman named Agnes approached the UCLA Medical Center seeking sex reassignment surgery. Her story was long considered to be exceptional and singular until never-before-seen case files of other patients were found in 2017. Framing Agnes features preeminent trans culture-makers breathing new life into those who redefined gender in the midcentury.
Goodbye Fantasy
Amber Bemak and Nadia Granados
Colombia/US | 2019 | 15 | digital
Goodbye Fantasy is about two bodies in relation to each other as they let go of multiple cinematic universes they occupy together. Transforming from a fantasy body to a dreaming body to a dying body, they enact different constellations of social and political power as they relate to each other within the tight construct of the frame.
When night falls
Alexandre Lechasseur-Dubé
Montreal, QC | 2019 | 8 | digital
US Premiere
As night falls, creatures with pearl and lace ornaments gather at the center of the forest where lies an inanimate body.
ALMOST ALL AGES
Organic
Steven Woloshen
Montreal, QC | 2019 | 3 | DCP
US Premiere
Joy, vitality, and a steampunk organ. A perfect recipe for direct cinema. Organic was created with the ancient mariner’s technique called scrimshaw. This film was originally commissioned for the closing ceremonies of the 2019 Annecy International Animation Festival.
MOTH
Allison Schulnik
Sky Valley, CA | 2019 | 3 | digital
MOTH is a traditionally animated, hand-painted gouache-on-paper film. It is animated mostly straight ahead, with frames painted on paper almost daily for 14 months. The film seeded and bloomed from the simple act of a moth hitting the artist’s studio window and continues as a wandering through the primal emotions of birth, motherhood, body, nature, metamorphosis, and dance.
Louie’s Antiques
Melissa McClung
Northampton, MA | 2019 | 9 | digital
In Louie’s shop, objects get a second life—and come to life.
The Immortality of the Crab
Giacomo Manzotti
Reggio Emilia, Italy | 2019 | 2 | digital
Experimental short shot on Super 8 film, made with in-camera editing and no post production. The synaesthetic research between sound and image is accomplished by connecting the animations, made on 1125 cardboard frames, with a soundtrack produced using only cardboard sounds. “Thinking about the immortality of the crab” is a South American expression which indicates the act of daydreaming.
The Flounder
Elizabeth Hobbs
London, UK | 2019 | 6 | DCP
US Premiere
One day a humble fisherman catches an enchanted fish. Can the fish help him and his wife improve their lot? The Flounder is an adaptation of the Brothers Grimm tale “The Fisherman and his Wife.”
Someday
Páraic Mc Gloughlin
Sligo, Ireland | 2019 | 4 | digital
Our situation on earth is fragile, as individuals, as a people. And the planet itself is delicate. Nothing is certain—life can change dramatically for better or for worse in an instant. We may fear losing what we have, but we try to hold on.
Chronosync
Sofia Laszlovszky
Budapest, Hungary | 2018 | 8 | digital
Based on observations on the changing worldview of mankind, the story shows the weird connection between different cultures through time and worldview. Scenes contain associations on myths, legends, and scientific facts, which were in their time believed as reality. What is reality? Or is “reality” just as fragile, varying just as much as every individual’s own view of existence?
Freeze Frame
Soetkin Verstegen
Brussels, Belgium | 2019 | 5 | DCP
Freeze frame: the most absurd technique since the invention of the moving image. Through an elaborate process of duplicating the same image over and over again, it creates the illusion of stillness. In this stop motion film, identical figures perform the hopeless task of preserving blocks of ice. The repetitive movements reanimate the animals captured inside.
Winter’s First Moons
Kathleen Rugh
Brooklyn, NY | 2018 | 3 | 16mm
Following the winter solstice, the longest nights of the year prevail. Filmed over numerous nights, different phases of the moon are brought together through multiple exposures on film and in-camera editing. Official NASA sound recordings from space help activate their actions. The stoic moon breaks free and gravitates at will.
Katatjatuuk Kangirsumi (Throat Singing in Kangirsuk)
Eva Kaukai and Manon Chamberland
Kangirsuk, QC | 2019 | 3 | DCP
Eva Kaukai and Manon Chamberland practice the Inuk art of throat singing in their small village of Kangirsuk. Their mesmerizing voices carry through the four seasons of their Arctic land.
A Recipe for Tofu Scramble
Alex Fink
Freemansburg, PA | 2019 | 2 | digital
A piece of tofu goes on a journey to find ingredients and create tofu scramble.
Digits of Pi
Tom Bessoir and Joshua Pines
New York, NY/San Francisco, CA | 2019 | 3 | DCP
A transcendental film inspired by Marcel Duchamp’s Anemic Cinema. The filmmakers set out to create a film composed within a circular frame. This circular composition led directly to using the number pi for the underlying structure. Having the digits of pi sung on the soundtrack is an homage to Einstein on the Beach by Philip Glass.
ANIMATION
The Ride
Huh Hyunjung
Seoul, Republic of Korea | 2019 | 9 | digital
While running along the riverside, lights are slowly flowing, sparkling and making narratives of reflection and refraction.
Nod. Wink. Horse.
Ollie Magee
Surrey, UK | 2019 | 5 | DCP
World Premiere
Self sabotage. Obstruction of narrative. A film behind a horse.
There Were Four of Us
Cassie Shao
Hangzhou, China | 2019 | 7 | DCP
In a room, there are four people.
The Last Bottle
Max Majoros
Detroit, MI | 2019 | 2 | digital
A cycle of disposal is revealed through the actions of industrious life forms on an unnamed bottle-shaped planet.
Drawing. Dancing
Nicci Haynes
O’Connor, Australia | 2018 | 5 | digital
North American Premiere
Drawing. Dancing is a short experimental animation that sits between visual and performing art. We seem to be watching a mysterious exchange between the drawing and the dancer, employing a body language positioned between choreography and combat.
Goodbye Mommy
Jack Wedge
Katonah, NY | 2019 | 13 | digital
North American Premiere
A detective is hired to go look for an exiled king.
Aphasia or (It Fell Upon My Mind)
Brynne McGregor
Cincinnati, OH | 2018 | 3 | digital
Aphasia or (It Fell Upon My Mind) documents the voices of seven individuals living with aphasia, using hand-painted rotoscoping and digital animation.
Umbilical
Danski Tang
Los Angeles, CA | 2019 | 7 | digital
North American Premiere
An animated documentary that explores how the filmmaker’s parents’ abusive relationship shaped her own experiences in a boarding school as a child in China. The societal pressures on her mother to hide her abuse, and her desire to protect her daughter, ultimately created a situation where the daughter was subjected to the same societal pressures. Shared desires for intimacy, safety, and normalcy have been constantly at odds with surrounding realities. Through a conversation as adults, mother and daughter learn to understand and support one another.
Lickalike
Rebecca Blöcher
Hamburg, Germany | 2019 | 8 | DCP
If man divides invisible, time-grown connections in nature, this has uncontrollable consequences. The collapse leads to a reorganization.
Garnet Graves
Flavourcel Animation Collective
Vancouver | 2019 | 4 | digital
The twisting, neon discomfort of body parts pulsates and trembles from the depths of the deepest ocean up to the cold and unforgiving vastness of space. Bones and tendons dislocate from performer Devours’s earthly queer vessel. A hand becomes the new building block of the universe: evolving from single cell, to fish, to mammal. Devours brings the genesis of a strange new planet of beard-based lifeforms.
AWARDS 1
Tetlalli: the place of stones
Miguel Nájera
Mexico City, Mexico | 2019 | 6 | digital
World Premiere
Through mist and stones, a setar player will embark on a journey from which he will not return.
Photo caption: Tetlalli: the place of stones
The Golden Legend
Chema García Ibarra and Ion de Sosa
Elche and Donostia, Spain | 2019 | 11 | DCP
A summer day at the swimming pool of the village of Montánchez, Spain. From above, Our Lady of Consolation of the Castle keeps her watchful gaze.
The Deepest Hole
Matt McCormick
Spokane, WA | 2020 | 12 | DCP
While the Space Race, the Arms Race, and a myriad of other Cold War competitions are common knowledge, few know that the United States and Soviet Union also faced off to see which country could dig the deepest hole. This lack of public awareness is particularly surprising, seeing that one of the countries may have inadvertently discovered Hell in the process.
The Eyes of Summer
Rajee Samarasinghe
Colombo, Sri Lanka | 2020 | 15 | DCP
This film was shot in the filmmaker’s mother’s village in Southern Sri Lanka—shortly after the civil war in 2010. Collaboratively developed with family members there, a narrative was improvised around an investigation into the mother’s interactions with spirits in the community during her childhood.
Candy Shop
Patrick Smith
New York, NY | 2019 | 3 | DCP
There are 11,926 pharmaceutical drugs available worldwide. This film shows 2863 of them. Pills and capsules are choreographed into a cacophony of shape, color, and size, resulting in a satirical commentary about our cultural, recreational, and economic infatuation with prescription drugs.
Vertigo A.I.
Chris Peters
Los Angeles, CA | 2019 | 5 | DCP
An artificial intelligence computer watched the Hitchcock classic Vertigo 20 times in a row and then made its own disturbing movie.
Colors & Shadows
Andreas Hadjipateras
London, UK | 2019 | 10 | DCP
US Premiere
A documentary short that explores the distortion of memory in old age, this film follows a man as he retraces the important moments of his life. As he enters his final chapter, it becomes clear that he can no longer separate reality from what he has dreamed of.
AWARDS 2
E-Ticket
Simon Liu
US/China | 2019 | 13 | DCP
Sixteen thousand splices in the making, E-Ticket is a frantic (re)cataloging of a personal archive. Frames of 35mm film are obsessively cut apart, reshuffled, then tape-spliced inch by inch as fragmented views rapidly swipe through a trip to India then culminate at a protest of a 2005 World Trade Organization summit in Hong Kong. Dante’s Inferno for the streaming age; freedom of movement for the modern cloud.
I Dream of Vietnam
Jiayu Yang
Chicago, IL | 2020 | 17 | digital
Searching for the “open border” between China and Vietnam, Chinese filmmaker Jiayu Yang embarks on a journey to Vietnam and encounters a very different postwar society than the romanticized version. Taking the form of a lyrical, dreamlike essay film, it explores questions of popular memory and cultural exchange while raising questions about the politics of photography itself.
Scar
Leilei Xia
Guangzhou, China | 2020 | 4 | digital
World Premiere
Scratches on paper, traces of life, seemingly useless but still shed light.
Green Ash (Ceniza Verde)
Pablo Mazzolo
Buenos Aires, Argentina | 2019 | 10 | 35mm
The Hênia-Kâmîare aboriginals inhabited the current territory of the Sierras de Córdoba for at least 1600 years. In 1575, the resistance led by cacique Onga was cornered and defeated by the Spanish conquering troops. Hundreds of Hênia-Kâmîare women, children, and elders jumped off the top of the Colchoquí mountain in order to avoid being enslaved. This was the biggest collective suicide in the territory currently known as Argentina.
Diamonds
Tillo Spreng andTobias Kubli
Music: Yao Bobby and Simon Grab
Zürich, Switzerland | 2019 | 3 | digital
US Premiere
The work merges artistic forms of a critical stance towards global structures of power. It uses free and accessible digital media tools to disclose their non-neutrality and explore their specific visual representation system.
Blue
Laura Magnusson
Ann Arbor, MI | 2019 | 12 | digital
This silent, short film was shot entirely underwater on the seafloor of Cozumel, Mexico, 70 feet beneath the surface. Alone on an ocean “tundra,” a woman arduously moves, exhales, and burrows through the afterlife of sexual violence. The medium of water, with its destructive potential and capacity to heal, holds the fullness of traumatic experience.
Queering di Teknolojik
Timothy Smith
London, UK | 2019 | 8 | digital
US Premiere
A message from the future is spoken by the collective digital voice of a group of queer artists and activists. This collaborative project speculates about the possibilities of a temporality yet to come. Did we manage to avert the impending environmental catastrophe? Which strategies of protest and resistance were the most effective? This is a message of hope.