For over twenty years, Anna Biller has been casting herself in candy-colored films, borrowing from various genres and translating the aesthetic into her world view. As not only the writer, director and star, but also the costume designer and set decorator, she concocts scenarios that seem cut right out of Hollywood films then recreated at a ten year old girls’ slumber party.
VIVA
Dir. Anna Biller, 2007
USA, 120 min.
Digital projection.
TUESDAY, JULY 1 – 10:00 PM
WEDNESDAY, JULY 9 – 7:30 PM
FRIDAY, JULY 25 – 7:30 PM
MONDAY, JULY 28 – 10:00 PM
Anna Biller’s take on 60s/70s sexploitation is so spot on – the film’s texture, clothing and natural nude bodies aren’t things you find laying around in the 2000s. Here she plays Barbi, a naive housewife abandoned by her husband, venturing out into the modern world of the 70s only to find one perversion after another. Biller’s abilities are in top form – the set decoration is so intricately thought through, you’ll be able to feel the shag carpet between your toes.
SHORTS PROGRAM
WEDNESDAY, JULY 23 – 8:00 PM
ONE NIGHT ONLY! All titles on 16mm
THREE EXAMPLES OF MYSELF AS QUEEN
16mm, 1994, 26 min.
A DIY fairytale musical! With elaborate sets and costumes, Three Examples of Myself as Queen finds Anna Biller playing out three scenarios of female domination – as head of an Arabian Nights harem, queen bee and disco dancer.
THE HYPNOTIST
16mm, 2001, 45 min.
A twist on the “you get a huge inheritance, but here’s the catch” story, The Hypnotist (the only film to not star Biller) sets three mean-hearted siblings at each other’s throats as they are forced to live together to collect their father’s money. A humorous spin on Technicolor melodramas, it sends up the genre while also displaying full love for its tropes.
A VISIT FROM THE INCUBUS
16mm, 2001, 27 min.
In this horror western musical hybrid, Biller plays Lucy, a woman who is victim to nightly assaults from an incubus. She seeks to boost her confidence by taking a job in a saloon singing and dancing for a bunch of rowdy cowboys, only to find her demonic tormentor also has a stage act! All of this should sound weird enough to have you sufficiently intrigued.