Casa do silencio

Uno a me, uno a te e uno a Raffaele

An American independent director comes to Italy to shoot a film. But inconveniences and obstacles stand in the way at every step. These are the years in which “Tangentopoli” rages and the golden rule of officials and collaborators is “one (bribe) to you, one to me, one to Raffaele”.

Speaking Directly

Speaking Directly is an essay-film making for a kind of State of the Nation address, from the perspective of someone other than the President of the United States, circa 1973-5. This film addresses both the political and cultural situation of the US at the height of the Viet Nam war, Watergate and its aftermath, and likewise addresses the personal life, in this context, of the filmmaker, at that time thirty years of age, recently out of two plus years in federal prison for refusal to accept military service.

Pequenos Milagres

A film that Jon Jost dedicated to his daughter Clara, an artistically designed home movie and at the same time a look back at his life, mostly commented off-screen by Jon Jost. He used the technology of the digital camera which contrasts nicely with his newly discovered love for watercolor painting.

Another Country

The Portuguese Revolution (1974-75) seen through the eyes of some of the most important photographers and filmmakers that witnessed the event. Their dreams and expectations and what came out of the revolution. With outstanding historical footage.

Vergessensfuge

Vergessensfuge is a meditation on the psychology of obedience and submission, in this instance springing from a handful of photographs taken in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp immediately after its liberation in 1945. The images are of young women, aged 20 - 30, who were guards at the camp - to say, compliant, obedient Germans doing as they were told to do.

Chameleon

A scathing portrait of the Hollywood/LA arts milieu of the late 70’s, Chameleon follows the amorphous day of its lead character, an Armani-jacketed peddler of high-class dope, fraudulent art, and preening postures suited-to-fit the changing victims, though as with all such fakery, the real victim in the long run is the person who lives such a life.

The Bed You Sleep In

Times are hard for Northwestern lumber-mill operators like Ray and his wife Jean. Ray and Jean's lives are thrown into chaos when their daughter writes home from college, claiming to have a horrifying revelation.

The Living End

Two HIV-positive young men — a semi-employed film critic and a hot hustler — tear off on a cross-country crime spree.

Nightshift

As night falls, the receptionist of a small hotel dutifully performs her routine tasks while strange lodgers descend upon the dark corners of the inn.

Last Chants for a Slow Dance

A man who is dissatisfied with his family life leaves home for weeks at a time, drifting from town to town.

Plain Talk and Common Sense (uncommon senses)

Plain Talk is a complex essay-film, a follow-up a decade and some years later to Speaking Directly, and so another State of the Nation discourse, made for Britain's Channel Four in the year 1986-87. The work involved extensive travel around the United States, and poses an examination of just what America is/was, or what do we mean when we speak of it. Done in a series of radically different sections which collide with each other in a manner intended to provoke thinking, Plain Talk, which was made by an American and intended for American viewers, was indeed broadcast in Britain, but somewhat predictably, not in the USA.

Sure Fire

Set in the quasi-Biblical splendor of the Mormon Dixie of central Utah, Sure Fire follows the trajectory of an American archetype, the small town entrepreneur seized by visions of fortune. Wes, eager to sell out the local grandeur to the wealthy hordes of Southern California, wheels and deals in real-estate, but more fundamentally he hones in directly to the get-rich-quick schemes for which America is famed. Sweeping up family and friends into his monomania, Wes' zealotry leads inevitably to tragedy.

Frameup

Ricky, a dim-witted ex-con, meets Beth, a dim-witted waitress, in an Idaho diner. They take off in his car to Washington and begin an affair. Beth, a lonely romance-novel addict, is hopelessly enamored; Ricky is just in it for the (constant) sex. Beth's longing to visit California and Ricky's longing for quick cash leads them into a desperate situation. Director Jost uses a variety of avant-garde visual and narrative techniques, such as montage, collages, split screens and lengthy, tongue-in-cheek monologues to tell the tragicomic story of two complete losers in love.

They Had It Coming

A movie by Jon Jost, who is the maestro of the American experimental movie world. The film tells us the strange incidents that happen in the ruined old village. Comparing to Jon Jost’s previous movies, this film has a clearer narrative and is more experimental with the structure as well. The essay film, which takes place in Missouri where they live an outdated lifestyle and where old culture still exists, confuses the boundary between fiction and non-fiction. The movie is based from a true story but instead of telling the exact story, the director casts real actors and gives a little twist to it. The actors explain about the inhumane incidents that happened in the village and while reviving it, they create their own narratives.

13 Fragments & 3 Narratives from Life

A portrait of alienation is sketched out, focusing on a young art student who passively, but consciously, rejects responsibility for the political storms swirling about her. The epitome of bourgeois mentality, she insists she is, or at least will be, an artist. She says, all she is responsible for is “art”—though she admits she cannot tell you what it is. Beginning with TV images from Viet Nam being turned off, the film ends with the 13th fragment, TV images of Viet Nam being turned on again. We are bracketed by history, like it or not. (Jon Jost)

All the Vermeers in New York

A parable of the missteps of life enacted in the hothouse world of late 1980’s New York, in which the art market and the stock market each boomed, and in process spawned a smorgasbord of “yuppie” delusions which still persist. Anna, a French actress studying in New York, crosses paths with a successful stock-broker, Mark, standing before a Vermeer portrait at the Metropolitan, thence ensues a peculiar romance of missed meanings and connections, with tangential asides to the steaming arts world and stock market, loft-mate conflicts, and, perhaps, love. Wrapped up in their blindered worlds, Anna and Mark deflect away from their chances, leaving at the conclusion the wistful face of Vermeer’s portrait enigmatically asking questions. All the Vermeers in New York is a comedy of manners which, as gently as a Vermeer, looks beneath the skin of this time and place, and of these characters.