SATURDAY, 26 FEBRUARY 2022, 10 PM
farO presents works by Bill Brand, Ben Patterson and Ana Jotta
Attention! The films will be shown only once.
Atenção! Os filmes rodam uma só vez.
Dear Little Friends,
Let us briefly introduce you to the life of Pink Panther’s Portuguese father also known as Vasco Granja. Born in Campo de Ourique, not far from farO, at the age of 10 he was already breaking shop windows in the city centre. By 16 he had dropped out of school and was selling silk samples to the bourgeoisie, and later tobacco and books to well-known intellectuals. Schooled over the counter by day, by night he was screening neorealist movies at film clubs channeling the box office return to the anti-fascist struggle, which in return gave him free tickets to torture and prison.
In the seventies, just after the Portuguese revolution, and 100 jobs later, he became a TV host for the first public television programme dedicated to animation film. Taking inspiration from Norman Mclaren’s film ‘Neighbours’, his programme called for peace by presenting films, independent and commercial, from the two colossal neighbours fighting a Cold War. He proved that American jaw-dropping blocbusters like Tex Avery and Chuck Jones’ Looney Tunes could coexist with the utopian inventiveness of Eastern Bloc experimental animations, like those of Piotr Kamler and Zbigniew Rybczyński. Before running the reel he minutely introduced the cartoons, at length, speaking to all ages and to great despair of a crowd of children anxiously awaiting the pictures to start.
We cannot say Vasco’s vision was decisive to the lift of the iron-curtain splitting the world, but he certainly planted the seed of curiosity and kind transgression in many generations. farO’s Cartoons is a tribute to humour as the medium par excellence for the Delicate and Great causes. As Patterson would say, it is the path of least resistance to implant subversive ideas.
ON THIS WEEK'S EPISODE
6 Cartoons
by Bill Brand
BEFORE THE FACT
16 mm, b&w, sound, 6', 1974
THE CENTRAL FINGER
16 mm, color, silent, 5' 30'', 1974
AN ANGRY DOG
16 mm, color, silent, 5’ 30’’, 1974
THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY
OF BENJAMIN FRANKLIN
16 mm, color, silent, 7', 1974
NEW YORK STATE PRIMARIES
16 mm, color, silent, 5’ 30’’, 1975
STILL AT WORK
16 mm, color, sound, 5', 1975
all copies from the Film-makers' Coop.
A SIMPLE OPERA
by Ben Patterson
mono sound, 15' 51' ' , 1995
narrated in his own voice, performed by Amerigo Ormea, Davide Mosconi, Elisabetta Roncucci, Gabriele Bonomo, Philip Corner, Phoebe Neville and Walter Marchetti
courtesy of the Estate of Benjamin Patterson
and
UP THE FALL
by our neighbour Ana Jotta
a new wall drawing especially for this occasion
and yet again...
The Slant Step
This episode had the technical support of Carlos Gaspar and Borja Caro, and photo coverage by Pedro Alfacinha
The evening programme is printed weekly in Pontinha by Antonio Rijo de Carvalho and, this time, also by Gonçalo Duarte in the ruins of Quinta do Ferro
A Loving Neighbours production, with the support of Fundo de Fomento Cultural Garantir Cultura-Compete 2020 / Republica Portuguesa-Ministerio da Cultura
Thank you Bill Brand, The Estate of Benjamin Patterson and Barbro Patterson, Ana Jotta and her Krazy cat. To Vasco Granja and Amos Vogel.
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