Cinema Ephemera: The Human Machine
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NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — The Porches' Studio 9 will show "The Human Machine," the first installment of a new film series presented by Cinema Ephemera.
The screening will take place on Oct. 30, at 7 p.m. Tickets are $20 in advance or $25 at the door.
Rich Remsberg and Shawn Rosenheim have curated an evening of ephemeral films: vintage classroom instruction, industrial animations, forgotten children's TV shows, declassified military training films, religious movies, scraps of stock footage, and a bunch of weird science stuff.
"These are films that were not necessarily meant to last beyond their original showings," said Remsberg. "They weren't even necessarily meant to be considered films."
"This is an accidental chronicle of 20th century America," added Rosenheim, speaking of their collection culled from government archives, flea markets, dumpsters, and the basements of old hoarders. "This is a world both very familiar and very strange."
From 1920s personal hygiene guides to NASA's zero-gravity experiments to amateur disco exhibitions, this is a celebration of the ordinary and the forgotten. Some of it is funny. Some is disturbing. Much of it is unbelievably beautiful – a revelation of our world in all its poverty and extravagance, stated a press release.
"Breaking open the original context of these films allow us to see the gems among the pot shards," said Remsberg. "You'll never look at the 20th Century in the same way again."
Rich Remsberg is an Emmy Award-winning and Oscar-nominated archival producer, consulting with such directors as Ron Howard, Ben Stiller, and Lawrence Kasdan for documentary films on Netflix, HBO, Disney+, and PBS. "The Human Machine's" films are the fruits of Remsberg's 25 years of combing through rare and obscure footage.
Shawn Rosenheim teaches film, nonfiction audio, and literature at Williams College, where he co-founded the Documentary Today conference. He has consulted on Errol Morris' documentaries, and his work includes interviews at Mass MoCA and Williams College with Werner Herzog, Ken Burns, and Frederick Wiseman, among others. He is the director of "Biosphere 2."
