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CinemaPRO -
Friday, December 12, 2014 - 20:30
Written by:
Leigh Brackett, Angelina Fernandez
Cast:
Elliott Gould, Jim Bouton, Rodney Moss
Cinematography:
Vilmos Zsigmond
Editing:
Lou Lombardo, Jody Blyer
Sound:
John Speak
Music:
John Williams
Production:
Public Opinion Laboratory
Romanian premiere
Addressing ethical issues of authenticity and creative ownership, EL ADIOS LARGOS playfully restores the opening scene of the (supposedly) only surviving print (a black and white, truncated, Spanish dubbed version) of Robert Altman’s classic, The Long Goodbye. Andrew Lampert's self-declared "painstaking restoration" sees the protagonist’s nocturnal ride to the supermarket becoming a psychedelic somnambulist’s trip. The characters float within a cinematic space, where analogue and digital artefacts playfully deconstruct the mise-en-scene, blotches of paint transforming the black-and-white space into a surreal carnival of color. A mischievous cinematic (re)reading that purposefully gets lost in the process, down the rabbit-hole. (Andrei Tănăsescu, BIEFF).
Director:
ANDREW LAMPERT (b.1976) is an artist, curator, archivist, and educator based in New York City. A filmmaker who makes work for galleries and theatres, Lampert has long been active in the field of expanded cinema performance. His work varies greatly in subject and approach, but in general he specializes in moving-image preservation and the historical intersections of fine art and analogue production mediums with contemporary technology. He has exhibited widely in international film and video festivals (Toronto International Film Festival, Oberhausen Film Festival, Rotterdam International Film Festival, New York Film Festival), cinemas, museums and his work is represented in the collections of The Whitney Museum of American Art.
Website:
Contact:
lamphole[at]gmail[dot]com
Festivals, awards:
- Oberhausen International Short Film Festival 2014
- Toronto International Film Festival 2013
- Rotterdam International Film Festival 2014
Director's statement:
In 1973, Robert Altman’s The Long Goodbye was both a critical and commercial flop. The film flew out of theatres and was never shown on television. All known prints were destroyed after the film’s dismal commercial release, and the original production elements were ruined by a leaky sprinkler system in a Culver City storage facility in 1983. For years, The Long Goodbye was considered irrevocably lost, an all too important missing link from Altman’s greatest period. Scholars and cinephiles were stunned when filmmaker and archivist Andrew Lampert serendipitously purchased a film print titled EL ADIOS LARGOS from a collector through the mail. Closer examination revealed that this 16mm, black and white, cropped, Spanish-language dubbed copy was actually a reduction of Altman’s 35mm, color, widescreen, English-language film. Knowing the importance of his discovery, Lampert and a team of volunteer preservationists set out on a multi-year mission to preserve this unearthed gem using the most up-to-date digital technology. As you will see, Lampert has gone to extensive lengths to painstakingly reproduce the most authentic restoration possible given the considerable difference in materials.” (Andrew Lampert)
In 1973, Robert Altman’s The Long Goodbye was both a critical and commercial flop. The film flew out of theatres and was never shown on television. All known prints were destroyed after the film’s dismal commercial release, and the original production elements were ruined by a leaky sprinkler system in a Culver City storage facility in 1983. For years, The Long Goodbye was considered irrevocably lost, an all too important missing link from Altman’s greatest period. Scholars and cinephiles were stunned when filmmaker and archivist Andrew Lampert serendipitously purchased a film print titled EL ADIOS LARGOS from a collector through the mail. Closer examination revealed that this 16mm, black and white, cropped, Spanish-language dubbed copy was actually a reduction of Altman’s 35mm, color, widescreen, English-language film. Knowing the importance of his discovery, Lampert and a team of volunteer preservationists set out on a multi-year mission to preserve this unearthed gem using the most up-to-date digital technology. As you will see, Lampert has gone to extensive lengths to painstakingly reproduce the most authentic restoration possible given the considerable difference in materials.” (Andrew Lampert)