Chris Gallagher

A group of camouflaged ninjas stealing a small case of plutonium from a transport vehicle in broad daylight in California. Back in his office in Sanzhi, Taiwan, The Colonel (Bo Svenson) receives word of the heist and the top suspect is the Sakura family. Selected for the job of locating this stolen nuke material is Mai Lin (Page Leong), an informant/dancer. Willi (Jay Roberts, Jr.), a drunken American playboy who is prone to playing the harmonica teams up with Mai Lin. Willi also just happens to be a white ninja.

Mirage offers a thoughtful and disturbing meditation on a wide variety of cinematic problems - the portrayal of women in film, the ability of a reassuring male commentary (“Dreams come true in Blue Hawaii”) to direct our gaze and our conventions of fantasy/dreamland. The film tests ones ability to pay attention. We keep seeing essentially the same image and hearing the same phrase yet we have a difficulty grasping what this film is about. The film has a mystery or haunting feeling to it that perhaps surfaces well after one has seen it, and is the basis of thought on the subject of the sexual portrayal of women on film. Mirage could be seen many times; perhaps the tail could be spliced to the head resulting in a continuous loop - as there is no clear beginning, middle, or end to the film – somewhat like the nature of our own existence. – Martin Rumsby, The Invisible Cinema

To be lost means you cannot recognize space so on the mall directory “you are here” is the first step to restoring meaning to space but that assumes that a being and space are separate entities, one containing the other. But does space exist, as we know it, when it’s unobserved or does it transmute into marvelous forms that instantly snap back to normality when observed by a conscious being. It seems that space is fixed and stationary, as we experience it, but again behind our backs it may be flowing like a liquid violating all physical assumptions. So when we open our eyes to the apparent world is our consciousness the determining factor defining space, suggesting there is no space devoid of consciousness and are we in space or is it in us. Perhaps you are here should be here is you.

Part fictional narrative, part travelogue, part documentary, this unusual film serves as another sign that non-fiction film as we know it is going through a major revolution. Engaging fictional narrative elements to create a ‘mystery,’ Where is Memory is a boldly original and affecting meditation on the nature of complicity and the Third Reich. Masterful use of archival footage matched with contemporary footage of Europe, a haunting score and an inspired mix of realities for a thoughtfully framed poetic odyssey that charts new cinematic territory. — Judges’ Award, Northwest International Film Festival

Chris Gallagher’s feature-length film essay Time Being is an elegant and thought-provoking investigation of the nature and experience of time, and its filmic representation. 88 one-minute shots or shot-sequences counterpoint a spoken commentary that probes and questions the subject from many different angles – psychological, philosophical, mechanical, cosmological, artistic. Equally, Gallagher combines aspects of different cinemas – documentary, structural, poetic, narrative, and personal – skillfully interweaving all the elements into a complex yet coherent and surprisingly moving statement on the human condition. The most brilliant film on its subject I’ve ever seen, Time Being is cool and non-academic yet deeply engaged, and beautifully shot. An educational film in the best sense. —Tony Reif

Terminal City records the demolition of the Devonshire Hotel in Vancouver; through extreme show motion (200 frames per second) and symmetrical diagonal framing, Gallagher underscores the passage from order to chaos within the event. The sparseness of this centering and he patience required of the viewer heightens the literally explosive climaxes of the film, and transforms the everyday violence of the events into moments of convulsive beauty. – Jim Shedden, Michael Zryd, The Independent Eye

Real time is an oxymoron. The film presents one firing of Vancouver's famous gun; an event that attracts an audience visible on screen unlike the audience watching the film; ourselves. Our experience of time in our innermost self is unlike our experience of space or mass yet nothing in physics corresponds to the passage of time. How can something we experience as so real be based on an illusion. Norfolk, Virginia also has a Nine O'clock Gun.

An episodic road movie, “Undivided Attention” offers experiences in cinematic metaphor and structure that contradict, tickle and soothe our desire to understand and make sense of what we see or think we see. A young couple driving in an open car take the viewer through more than twenty intriguing sequences that stimulate the visual sensibility as the film explores the relationship between intellectual and sensual knowledge. It also comments on some conventions of narrative and documentary and has some fun with film theory. “Undivided Attention” works on various levels, the most accessible being entertainment value and on a more astute level, the cinematic exploration of denotation/connotation in an oblique narrative. It is a rich and challenging film that is also a pleasure to watch. - 42nd Edinburgh International Film Festival