Albie Thoms
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Senses of Cinema
Nov 17, 2022As notions of civil rights transformed across the world, so was the screen landscape reformed by the ascension of grassroots film movements seeking to challenge the mainstream. Some aspired to push form to its limit; others worked to destabilise what they saw as a homogenous industry, or to provoke questions around gender, sexuality, migration and race.
Documentary
Palm Beach
Mar 06, 1980
Marinetti
Jun 19, 1969Albie Thoms' Marinetti was the culmination of the synthetic environments that the UBU group had pioneered in Australia; festive public 'happenings' that combined the energy and volume of creative rock and jazz with the mesmeric effect of multi-dimensional lightshows. Another kind of culmination: Marinetti records most of the principal collaborators in the UBU film group, like Aggy Read and the Perrys. Uniquely valuable as a document of Australia's late 1960s counter-culture, the soundtrack provides the best indication of the unrestrained liberty that bands like Tully and the John Sangster Underground band some of whose members perform on this recording were famously achieving in their improvisations of the period.
Music
David Perry
Jan 01, 1968In this kinetic tribute to his Ubu Films collaborator Perry, Thoms combined tests and offcuts from early films with film fragments found on Perry’s editing room at ABC-TV. The Textacolour marks were intended as homage to Perry’s pioneering handmade films.
Man and His World
Jan 01, 1966A one-second explosion of a plastic head filled with milk is reversed, stretched to 50 seconds in length and overlaid with a split screen superimposition of a modernising Sydney: skyscrapers, cranes, trains and planes.
Moon Virility
Jan 01, 1967Bolero
Dec 28, 1967A minimalist exercise described by Thoms as ‘observing the effect of movement on perception within the framework of Ravel’s music’.
Music
Palm Beach
Mar 06, 1980Palm Beach
Mar 06, 1980Bluto
Jan 01, 1967Thoms dedicated three months and a toolkit of pins, razor blades and scalpels to create the rich, abstract surface texture in Bluto. The result, according to the filmmaker, ‘was something like thunder and rain, interspersed with burps, belches and farts, which added an urgency that seemed to express the anxieties of the time’.
Documentary
Rita and Dundi
Jan 01, 1966This experimental documentary about two young Paddington dress-makers was banned for nudity, but was screened widely in Australia without complaint.
Rita and Dundi
Jan 01, 1966This experimental documentary about two young Paddington dress-makers was banned for nudity, but was screened widely in Australia without complaint.
Blunderball, or from Dr. Nofinger with Hate
Apr 15, 1966A spoof of the early James Bond films and Ian Fleming universe from Australia. Bumbling overweight Aussie secret service agent Jim Bond alias Agent Minus 007 blunders his way against arch rival villains Ernest Stavro Blowfly and Dr. Yes down under in Sydney, Australia.
The Film
Feb 26, 1967“The film was made spontaneously one afternoon in 1966. When a few friends got together... We were all in love with the film medium...” (Garry Shead)
Akai Ghost Poems
Dec 31, 1995A compilation of video footage from the Yellow House, Potts Point, Sydney, July 1971.
Sunshine City
Sep 12, 1973SUNSHINE CITY is Albie Thom’s sprawling, protoplasmic experimental portrait of his hometown of Sydney. The National Film and Sound Archive of Australia call it “a structured diary film which investigates the process of living in Sydney, which uses a repeating light modulation to intensify experiences of light, heat, colour”.
Documentary
Tobias Icarus Age Four
Jan 01, 1968An intimate portrait of a son by a mother set to the boisterously pop Batman theme song.
Tobias Icarus Age Four
Jan 01, 1968An intimate portrait of a son by a mother set to the boisterously pop Batman theme song.
The Spurt of Blood
Jul 02, 1965Made for inclusion in a student theatrical production at the University of Sydney, this film was based on an allegorical play by Antonin Artaud.
Poem 25
Jul 02, 1965In this film, David Perry scratched onto celluloid the numbers of a poem by Kurt Schwitters, which were projected beside the actor reciting it.
Bolero
Dec 28, 1967A minimalist exercise described by Thoms as ‘observing the effect of movement on perception within the framework of Ravel’s music’.
Music
It Droppeth as the Gentle Rain
Jan 01, 1963Short film is based on the ballet 'Les Fausses Sceptiques' by the French film scenarist and surrealist poet Jacques Prevert
Dans le parc national de Waratah, en Australie, Matt Hammond est garde forestier. Il élève seul ses deux enfants, Mark l’adolescent et Sonny son petit frère. Vivant au cœur de la nature, cette famille partage son quotidien avec Skippy, un kangourou astucieux. Le fidèle compagnon est de toutes les aventures aux côtés des Hammond.
Family
