Time & Fortune Vietnam Newsreel

Time & Fortune Vietnam Newsreel

PG-13 1969 · 4 min · ★ 5.8

Jonas Mekas zoomed in from a completely different angle for his Time & Fortune Vietnam Newsreel. This fake interview with ‘Lapland’s Minister of Foreign Affairs’ brings an outsider’s perspective to bear on the US war, and discusses with ironic perplexity if it might not be possible to kill off the Viet Cong more cheaply. For, whilst white students in the US primarily took issue with the war in South-eastern Asia, African-Americans remained predominantly concerned with their own situation. For them, daily discrimination at home and the Vietnam War were simply two faces of the same racist coin

Directed by Jonas Mekas

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365 Day Project

365 Day Project · 2007

365 Day Project

MovieDocumentary

This exhibition focuses on Jonas Mekas’ 365 Day Project, a succession of films and videos in calendar form. Every day as of January 1st, 2007 and for an entire year, as indicated in the title, a large public (the artist's friends, as well as unknowns) were invited to view a diary of short films of various lengths (from one to twenty minutes) on the Internet. A movie was posted each day, adding to the previously posted pieces, resulting altogether in nearly thirty-eight hours of moving images.

Belladonna

Belladonna · 1989

An experimental short by Beth B. It consists of rapidly intercut close-ups of talking heads reading statements from a Sigmund Freud case history; affidavits attesting to the atrocities of Dr. Josef Mengele, the Nazi war criminal; and journals from the trial of New Yorker Joel Steinberg, accused of killing his adopted daughter.

WTC Haikus

WTC Haikus · 2010

MovieDocumentary

A lyrical diary film composed of fleeting images of the World Trade Center, filmed over decades as the towers appeared in Jonas Mekas’s everyday life—from street scenes and rooftop gatherings to family outings by the waterfront. Together, these fragments form a poetic memorial of presence and absence.

As I Was Moving Ahead Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty

As I Was Moving Ahead Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty · 2000

As I Was Moving Ahead Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty

MovieDocumentary

A compilation of over 30 years of private home movie footage shot by Lithuanian-American avant-garde director Jonas Mekas, assembled by Mekas "purely by chance", without concern for chronological order.

Diaries, Notes, and Sketches

Diaries, Notes, and Sketches · 1968

Diaries, Notes, and Sketches

MovieDocumentary

Also known as Walden, Jonas Mekas’s first diary film is a six-reel chronicle of his life in 1960s New York, interweaving moments with family, friends, lovers, and artistic idols. Blending everyday encounters with portraits of the avant-garde art scene, it forms an epic, personal meditation on community, creativity, and the passage of time.

Birth of a Nation

Birth of a Nation · 1997

Birth of a Nation

MovieDocumentary

Jonas Mekas assembles 160 portraits, appearances, and fleeting sketches of underground and independent filmmakers captured between 1955 and 1996. Fast-paced and archival in spirit, the film celebrates the avant-garde as its own “nation of cinema,” a vital community existing outside the dominance of commercial film.

The Brig

The Brig · 1964

Jonas Mekas’s film captures The Living Theatre’s stage production of The Brig, an unflinching portrait of life inside a U.S. Marine Corps jail in Japan in 1957. Over the course of a single day, prisoners endure relentless drills, abuse, and dehumanization, exposing the brutality of military discipline with stark immediacy.

Scenes from the Life of Andy Warhol: Friendships and Intersections

Scenes from the Life of Andy Warhol: Friendships and Intersections · 1990

Scenes from the Life of Andy Warhol: Friendships and Intersections

Jonas Mekas’s intimate diary film spans 1963 to 1990, capturing Andy Warhol alongside friends and collaborators from the New York avant-garde. Featuring figures such as Allen Ginsberg, John Lennon, Yoko Ono, and George Maciunas—as well as rare footage of the Velvet Underground’s first performance—it offers a personal portrait of Warhol’s world and his intersections with art, music, and counterculture.

Senseless

Senseless · 1962

"Consisting of a poetic stream of razor-sharp images, the overt content of SENSELESS portrays ecstatic travelers going to pot over the fantasies and pleasures of a trip to Mexico... highly effective cutting subtly interweaves the contrapuntal developement of themes of love and hate, peace and violence, beauty and destruction."-- David Brooks.

Strong Medicine

Strong Medicine · 1981

Strong Medicine

Adaptation of an avant-garde play about Rhoda, a hysterical heroine who feels oppressed by the people around her. She suffers through her birthday party, goes to see a doctor, plans a vacation, argues a lot and even breaks the fourth wall.

42 One Dream Rush

42 One Dream Rush · 2010

42 One Dream Rush

An omnibus project bringing together acclaimed directors from around the world, each contributing a 42-second short inspired by a dream. Produced by 42 Below vodka, the collection blends surreal, poetic, and experimental visions into a mosaic of oneiric cinema.

20 Little Films

20 Little Films · 2012

20 Little Films

MovieDocumentary

Since 1995, the Viennale has invited renowned directors to create short, one-minute films as personal contributions to the festival. Ranging from home movies to political essays, musical sketches to abstract studies, these “little films” form a unique anthology of cinematic moments. 20 Little Films collects a selection of these works, premiering together for the Viennale’s 50th anniversary at the Locarno Film Festival.

River of Fundament

River of Fundament · 2014

River of Fundament

MovieDramaFantasy

Visionary artist Matthew Barney returns to cinema with this 3-part epic, a radical reinvention of Norman Mailer’s novel Ancient Evenings. In collaboration with composer Jonathan Bepler, Barney combines traditional modes of narrative cinema with filmed elements of performance, sculpture, and opera, reconstructing Mailer’s hypersexual story of Egyptian gods and the seven stages of reincarnation, alongside the rise and fall of the American car industry.

Notes on an American Film Director at Work

Notes on an American Film Director at Work · 2008

Notes on an American Film Director at Work

MovieDocumentary

Filmmaker Jonas Mekas follows his friend, film director Martin Scorsese, and his cast and crew, through various locations during the shooting of his film The Departed, released in 2006.

Hare Krishna

Hare Krishna · 1967

Jonas Mekas captures an afternoon in New York as a Hare Krishna group fills the streets with chanting and song. Filmed with his characteristic freewheeling style and later incorporated into Walden, the short stands as an impressionistic sketch of spiritual fervor and Mekas’s participatory approach to cinema.

Empire

MovieDocumentary

Filmed by Jonas Mekas from the 44th floor of the Time-Life Building, “Empire” explores the passage of time without the use of characters or a traditional narrative. The film, that consists of one stationary shot of the Empire State Building, was made from standard 1,200-foot rolls of 16mm film with a more than eight-hour runtime.

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