AUGUST 12–18, FRIDAY–THURSDAY
NEW YORK NOISE OR TALES FROM THE NO WAVE
Join us for a season of rarely-seen films from a defining period in the history of American underground cinema! New York Noise or Tales From the No Wave offers selected screenings from New York’s explosive yet fleeting era of underground filmmaking, known as “No Wave” Cinema.
Rising from the ashes of a bankrupt and destitute 1970s Manhattan, and reacting to the modernist aesthetic of 1960s avant-garde film, No Wave filmmakers threw out the rules and embraced their own brand of vanguard moviemaking. Inspired by the films of Andy Warhol, Jack Smith, John Waters and the French New Wave, many of the films combined elements of documentary and loose narrative structure with stark, even confrontational imagery. Much like the No Wave music of the period from which the movement garnered its label, these filmmakers freed themselves of the constraints of formal training and pillaged the nascent East Village arts scene for co-conspirators in the likes of Lydia Lunch, James Chance, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Debbie Harry, Richard Hell, Vincent Gallo, Steve Buscemi, Nan Goldin, Cookie Mueller and many others.
With wildly varying styles, they shared the common mindset of fast-and-cheap, catalyzed by collaboration. Equipment could be begged, borrowed or stolen, your friends could be your actors and the city could be your set.
Series passes $20/Film Forum members, $25/General
Sponsored by The Hideout!