The Free Screen: Mantler’s Visual Music

TIFF Bell Lightbox hosts a series of free screenings on an ongoing basis. The Free Screen features "independent and avant-garde works and explores numerous art forms and disciplines as they relate to cinema."

Tonight's event is Mantler's Visual Music, a selection of short films chosen by Mantler a.k.a. Chris Cummings. The screening will be introduced by Mantler and will be followed by a 15-minute performance of live music by him.

This free event is co-presented with The Music Gallery.

The screening starts at 7pm tonight. It takes place at TIFF Bell Lightbox, Reitman Square, 350 King Street West.

http://tiff.net/filmsandschedules/tiffbelllightbox/2011/201012200061251
---

The Free Screen: Mantler’s Visual Music

Toronto’s Mantler, aka Chris Cummings, has over the past decade gained a devoted international following for his unique, soulful pop music. That Cummings is an ardent cinephile is known to many of his fans, with his film-inflected lyrics and Sirkian swirls of melodrama. Mantler’s music finds fascinating parallels with both a Golden Hollywood moodiness and a rich tradition of avant-garde filmmaking that emerged in the 1920s and radicalized film’s relationship to music thereafter.

The screening will be introduced by Chris Cummings and will be followed by a 15-minute live set by Mantler.

Chris Cummings is a record collector and musician who performs under the name Mantler. As a musician he performs regularly in Toronto and has toured Europe several times. His fourth album, Monody, was released in 2010. As a DJ, he specializes in rare groove, soul, R & B, disco and jazz.

Allegretto
dir. Oskar Fischinger | USA 1936-1943 | 3 min. | 35mm restored Fischinger prints from the Collection of Center for Visual Music
Color still from Allegretto by Oskar Fischinger, (c) Fischinger Trust

Motion Painting No. 1
dir. Oskar Fischinger | USA 1947 | 11 min. | 35mm restored print courtesy of the Center for Visual Music

(c) Fischinger Trust, courtesy Center for Visual Music
___________

Trade Tattoo
dir. Len Lye | USA 1937 |5 min. | 16mm

Rhythm
dir. Len Lye | USA 1957 | 1 min. | 16mm archival print

Free Radicals
dir. Len Lye | USA 1958-79 | 4 min. | 16mm archival print

Synchromy
dir. Norman McLaren | Canada 1971 | 7 min. | 35mm restored print

Lines Horizontal
dir. Norman McLaren and Evelyn Lambart | Canada 1961 | 6 min. | 35mm restored print

Gymnopedies
dir. Larry Jordan | USA 1965 | 6 min. | 16mm

Friendly Witness
dir. Warren Sonbert | USA 1989 | 22 min. | 16mm

When the Organ Played ‘Oh Promise Me’
dir. Cecil Stokes | c.1940s | 3 min. | (originally on 16mm, restored to DigiBeta)