Jo Kondo (*1947) is one of the most interesting composers of contemporary music in Japan. His music is composed intuitively and at the same time it is highly abstract. Without clear directionality and at the same time not without form. For a Japanese audience it sounds “Western” and in the West it is regarded “Japanese”. A music in between categories. Like Kondo’s music the film is shifting between places and directions: a concert in the Muziekgebouw in Amsterdam, an elaborate sushi bar in Tokyo, a CD-production in a Cologne radio station, the Zuisenji temple in Kondo’s neighborhood in Kamakura. Kondo wants his music to appear “normal”, without spectacular surface or narrative elements. A concept of “normality” you may also find in the films of Japanese filmmaker Yasujiro Ozu, who – like Kondo – spent most of his life in Kamakura.
He is the most performed contemporary composer in the world. And yet he rarely ventures out in public, prefers to keep quiet about his music, feels at home in the forests of Estonia and generates therewith - perhaps involuntarily - the impression of a recluse, which is attributed to him again and again: Arvo Part.
After the acclaimed Met premiere of Thomas Adès's "The Tempest" in 2012, the composer returned with another masterpiece, this time inspired by filmmaker Luis Buñuel's seminal surrealist classic "El Ángel Exterminador", during the 2017–18 season.
This seminal work of avant-garde opera from composer Philip Glass and director Robert Wilson arrives full-circle, coming to France, the site of its 1976 Avignon Festival world premiere, at the tail end of this 2014 revival tour for a landmark Theâtre du Châtelet production and a first ever filming by award-winning arts filmmaker Don Kent.
"I envy the Japanese" Van Gogh wrote to his brother Theo. In the exhibition on which this film is based - VAN GOGH & JAPAN at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam - one can see why.
"Three Tales" is a video music work by American composer Steve Reich and video artist Beryl Korot. It is set in three "Acts", each depicting a technological advance of the 20th century and its negative implications on humanity: the dirigible airship Hindenburg and its explosion; the Atom Bomb and its testing on Bikini Atoll; and Dolly the sheep, first successful genetic cloning of a mammal.
The first experimental dance film from Croatia, which pays homage to the pioneer of experimental and dance film Maya Deren and her "Study in Choreography for Camera" from 1945.
“Don’t ask me what I mean, ask me what I’ve made” – inspired by this motto, the documentary accompanies the American composer Alvin Lucier (1931 - 2021) on concert travels to The Hague (Netherlands) and Zug (Switzerland).
Shot over the course of a year, this intimate portrait of provocative composer John Adams presents scenes of the artist at work and at play against the backdrop of dramatic American landscapes that reflect the themes of his music.
Popular movie trailers from 2016
These some of the most viewed trailers for movies released in 2016:
1966, United States of America: Kennedy is unable to prevent the Cuban Missile crisis in 1962, creating a nuclear winter throughout the country that seems to have no end.
Atlantis is known across the world as a myth. But is this really the truth? No matter what cultural history we explore, we discover a story very similar to the one we know about Atlantis.
Carlos is an ex-con looking for a job where he earns a lot of money without having to work hard. After discussing it with his cellmate, they conclude that the only work to fit the description is to be politician in Puerto Rico.
A man wakes up to find himself alone in a train carriage. During his train journey, unexpected events will lead him through to finally discover his lost memories.
WWII American Army Medic Desmond T. Doss, who served during the Battle of Okinawa, refuses to kill people and becomes the first Conscientious Objector in American history to receive the Congressional Medal of Honor.
Comments
Have you watched A Shape of Time - the composer Jo Kondo yet? What did you think about it?
