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Cinema Muzeul Țăranului -
Wednesday, March 16, 2016 - 18:00
Cast:
Thomas Douglas
Cinematography:
Thomas Isler
Editing:
Max Philipp Schmid
Sound:
Max Philipp Schmid, Knut Jensen
Producer:
Stella Händler
Romanian Premiere
'Everything was good. Beyond the reach of all evils.' - a voice utters repeatedly and persuasively in the beginning of Max Philipp Schmid's film, hinting to a (lost) Paradise. Instead, the viewer is swept into an artificial greenhouse mimicking the Garden of Eden, where the Adam character is played by a middle-aged, middle class man leafing through a collection of index cards and occasionally reciting into a microphone quotes from The Bible, Rousseau, Der Spiegel, Hesiod, and a bunch of academics. The resulting discourse is a multi-faceted complex of ideas, retracing the history of the garden as the primordial protected place, from the literal meaning of the Persian word pairidaēza (enclosure) to the present societal tendency towards reclusion while longing for the lost paradise. (Adina Marin, BIEFF)
Director:
Max Philipp Schmid (b. 1962, Basel, Switzerland) is an independent filmmaker and video artist. Having studied art history, he became a visual arts teacher at Basel’s Arts and Design University. In 1990 he switched to filmmaking, focusing on experimental, short, music and animation films and videos. His works and installations have been featured all around the world.
Website:
Contact:
pschmid[at]vtxmail[dot]ch
Festivals, awards:
- Bester Kunstfilm (Best Arthouse Film) - Basler Filmpreis, Basel 2015
- First Prize - Videoex Zürich, 2015
- Oberhausen, 61. Internationale Kurzfilmtage
- 15th New Horizons International Film Festival Wroclaw
- 13th Bogota Short Film Festival
- 25th International Exhibition of Video and Cinema Beyond, Milano
- 19. Internationale Kurzfilmtage Winterthur
Director's statement:
Presented against the backdrop of an artificial greenhouse, Paradise interweaves texts, documentary images and sounds into a cluster of questions. How do we imagine paradise? How does what we imagine manifest itself in front gardens and urban landscaping? Is paradise, the ideal world, to be found in the untamed wilderness? Why are all the small paradises made by humans fenced in? Is a fence perhaps a prerequisite for paradise? The video explores the current societal tendency toward withdrawal and separation within the framework of a yearning for an ideal way of life closely linked to Nature. (Max Philipp Schmid)
Presented against the backdrop of an artificial greenhouse, Paradise interweaves texts, documentary images and sounds into a cluster of questions. How do we imagine paradise? How does what we imagine manifest itself in front gardens and urban landscaping? Is paradise, the ideal world, to be found in the untamed wilderness? Why are all the small paradises made by humans fenced in? Is a fence perhaps a prerequisite for paradise? The video explores the current societal tendency toward withdrawal and separation within the framework of a yearning for an ideal way of life closely linked to Nature. (Max Philipp Schmid)