The last three programs in this excellent series at the University of Chicago’s Film Studies Center, room 307, 5811 S. Ellis, show that identity loss is a more frequent theme in Japanese avant-garde work than the celebration of individualistic moods or visions.
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Among the best of the 14 films and videos in the strongest program, Expanded Visions (119 min.), is Akio Okamoto’s Snarl-Up!!! (2001), which sets colored silhouettes of figures against landscapes; these ciphers suggest that the fact of human existence is more important than individuality, a point that’s underscored when the silhouettes are superimposed and turn white. The paradox of existence is expressed differently in Toshio Matsumoto’s Atman (1975): multiple zooms in on a masked man sitting in a field only increase his isolation. Takashi Ito’s stunning Spacy (1981) consists of zooms in a basketball court that continue into flat photographs on the court, creating a kind of hall-of-mirrors regression that opens into a limitless space. (Fri 11/5, 7 PM.)
