1. Balkan Baroque (Balkan baroque)
Balkan Baroque is a real and imaginary biography of the Yugoslavian performance artist Marina Abramovic. Rather than a mechanical reproduction of the artist's work, the film tries to create a new reality by translating the performances into cinematographic images that intensify the fictional context of the film. Abramovic plays herself, but ,appearing in multiple forms, blurs her own identity. Memories and fantasies intermingle with day to day rituals. The chronological narrative often breaks to reflect the interior voyage of the protagonist from the present to the past and back to the present. The result is a visually impressive film. Balkan Baroque had its world premiere at the International Film Festival Rotterdam, 1999.
It has an average vote of 5.5 on TMDB.
2. Diorama
A ritual of transformation and awakening within the walls of the only existing original ‘diorama’ building in London
3. Pretend Not to See Me
Life and art intersect on a spectacular Newfoundland farm where visual artist Colette Urban mounts thirteen art performances in the fields and barns of her property. Resilient, determined, self aware and funny, Colette embraces the transformative power of art as she restages the significant art performances of her thirty-year career. With the camera as her audience she transforms the quotidian into a playful world of the imagination with elaborate costumes and idiosyncratic self invented rituals.
4. Tony Conrad: Completely in the Present
Feature documentary on the pioneering life and work of iconoclastic filmmaker/musician/composer/artist Tony Conrad.
It has an average vote of 7.6 on TMDB.
5. Athens Rising: The Sicyon Project: Volume One
Featuring dozens of performances from the living rooms, backyards, and unconventional venues throughout Athens, GA, the first Athens Rising film takes a deep look at music, dance, food, stand-up comedy, strange theater, visual art, and the origins of AthFest.
It has an average vote of 10 on TMDB.
6. Love the Earth
A concept film from Imogen Heap and Thomas Ermacora, made with crowd-sourced video footage, creating a nature film accompanied by an Orchestral score composed by Heap.
7. By Rook Or By Left Hook
In 2003, Dutch artist Iepe Rubingh became the first World Champion of Chessboxing. This brain-busting combination of alternating rounds of chess and boxing was in fact an art performance calling for more balance in a world of extremes, and the audience reaction was so electric that it inspired Rubingh to push it as a real sport. Rubingh’s methodical ability to achieve balance in the ring is put to the test outside of it when impulsive British TV Producer Tim Woolgar takes up the sport and his opposing vision for success creates a rift between them, endangering chessboxing’s future.
8. New Garage Explosion: In Love with These Times
Documentary about the contemporary garage scene.
It has an average vote of 4.2 on TMDB.
9. You Will Never See It All (Chybění)
Conceptual visual artist Ján Mančuška died in 2011. However, in his short 39 years of existence, he managed to create a number of remarkable works, many of which have been exhibited in renowned galleries around the world – including the Centre Pompidou in Paris and MoMA in New York. In his homeland, however, his work reflecting everyday life, social reality or the meaning of language has never achieved comparable fame. Together with the children of an artist who was not afraid to confront the public with the question of the meaning of art, the director embarks on a journey that aims not only to get closer to Mančuška, but also to reveal him in hitherto unrecognised shades, thus filling in the gaps that are increasingly appearing in the context of the fading memory of his personality.
10. Cirque Du Soleil: Without a Net
Tells the story of when the world shut down, its greatest Circus went into freefall. Within 48 hours Cirque du Soleil closed all its 44 shows; within a week it let 95% of its workforce go. The show seemed over for the billion-dollar brand. Now, more than a year later, a group of world-class artists, athletes and crew at "O", Cirque's flagship production, face uncertainty as they prepare to bring their show back to life. With unprecedented access, this film documents their extraordinary journey as they attempt a return to stage after one of the world's greatest crises.
11. Fall 1
Bas Jan Ader's first fall film shows him seated on a chair, tumbling from the roof of his two-storey house in the Inland Empire.
It has an average vote of 6 on TMDB.
12. Fall 2
Bas Jan Ader rides his bike into a canal in Amsterdam.
It has an average vote of 6 on TMDB.
13. I'm Too Sad to Tell You
This short film is part of a mixed media artwork of the same name, which also included postcards of Ader crying, sent to friends of his, with the title of the work as a caption. The film was initially ten minutes long, and included Ader rubbing his eyes to produce the tears, but was cut down to three and a half minutes. This shorter version captures Ader at his most anguished. His face is framed closely. There is no introduction or conclusion, no reason given and no relief from the anguish that is presented.
It has an average vote of 6 on TMDB.
14. Broken Fall (Geometric)
One of a series of ‘falls’ by Bas Jan Ader that he recorded on film, this work was filmed in West Kapelle, Holland in 1970.
It has an average vote of 5 on TMDB.
15. Broken Fall (Organic)
Bas Jan Ader hangs from the branch of a tall tree, until he loses his grip and falls into a river below.
It has an average vote of 6 on TMDB.
16. Blue Man Group: The Complex Rock Tour Live
Offbeat performance artists The Blue Man Group have finally been captured live on this disc that features concert footage, three full-length music videos and three songs from Blue Man Group's album, "The Complex." The live footage was filmed during Blue Man Group's successful and widely acclaimed August 2003 rock tour, where they wowed 9,000 fans in two sold-out concerts.
It has an average vote of 6.8 on TMDB.
17. DJ Punk: The Photographer Daniel Josefsohn (DJ Punk – Der Fotograf Daniel Josefsohn)
Nobody captured the atmosphere of 1990s Berlin better than German photographer Daniel Josefsohn, who died in 2016 at the age of 54, leaving his mark in advertising with his irreverent aesthetic and punk sensibility. It was his spontaneous, imperfect images shot for an MTV campaign in 1994 that first made him famous.
It has an average vote of 6 on TMDB.
18. Meat Joy
"Meat Joy is an erotic rite — excessive, indulgent, a celebration of flesh as material: raw fish, chicken, sausages, wet paint, transparent plastic, ropes, brushes, paper scrap. Its propulsion is towards the ecstatic — shifting and turning among tenderness, wildness, precision, abandon; qualities that could at any moment be sensual, comic, joyous, repellent. Physical equivalences are enacted as a psychic imagistic stream, in which the layered elements mesh and gain intensity by the energy complement of the audience. The original performances became notorious and introduced a vision of the 'sacred erotic.' This video was converted from original film footage of three 1964 performances of Meat Joy at its first staged performance at the Festival de la Libre Expression, Paris, Dennison Hall, London, and Judson Church, New York City."
It has an average vote of 6.6 on TMDB.
19. Marepe (Marepe)
Marepe, an artist from Bahia, produces art with anything he comes across in the town he lives in, Santo Antônio de Jesus. Packs of cigarettes, coconut palms, walls, and memories taken from the streets, go into putting together a personal archeology for this young artist.
20. Discovering Hamlet
IN 1988, rising star Kenneth Branagh tackled the role of Shakespeare’s prince of Denmark for the first time in his professional career under the guidance of celebrated actor Derek Jacobi. Narrated by Patrick Stewart, this hour-long film documents how Kenneth Branagh and Derek Jacobi, two intelligent and passionate men, found new depths in Shakespeare’s classic drama, Hamlet. Filmmakers Mark Olshaker and Larry Klein follow the company through four weeks of rehearsals, from the first read-throughs to opening night.
It has an average vote of 5.7 on TMDB.
