Phil Solomon: Detailed Program Notes

Phil and Mark

In Memoriam听(Mark LaPore, 1952-2005)

where Mark and I,
boys of summer,
were allowed to roam and wander
without mission
without murder
鈥渃heating鈥 our way through the streets of polygonal horrors,
finding (to our continuing astonishment)
amusement,
poetry,
and
darkness,
just over there,
at the edge of town.

--Phil Solomon

Home movie montage/monologue

"Since that fateful day when I met Mark LaPore after one of Saul Levine's Introduction to Filmmaking classes at Binghamton in the fall of听1973, we found that we听shared a mutual love for art,听cinema and rock and roll听that lasted across our听32 years of friendship. I will be screening and narrating a听variety of film and video听clips that were shot over the years with Mark, including the years at听Binghamton, graduate school and after at Mass Art, and our ongoing lives as college professors听and听filmmakers until his untimely death in 2005. Home movies, filmed 鈥榩ostcards鈥 to each other, travel footage, unreleased work in progress, etc. A听very personal introduction to the life and work of a great artist and a great friend." ---Solomon

The Sudan Trilogy

Medina
(Mark LaPore, 1983, 20 min.)
Medina, shot on Super 8, belongs to a loose trilogy of films set in Sudan. 鈥淭he shifting camera movements in Medina pursue a shallow tactile space of the hand rather than a deep perspective of the eye, as their lateral motions caress surface patterns and textures.鈥
--Tom Gunning

Work and Play (Mark LaPore, 1983, 10 min., excerpt)
Shot also on Super 8 in Sudan, LaPore鈥檚 use of a fixed camera and unedited camera rolls generates a certain 鈥渕odesty听 of technique which allows for a deeper participation in the enframed action.鈥--Gunning

The Sleepers听 (Mark LaPore, 1989, 16 min.)
鈥淢emory, as well as the residue of information in text and film from Sudan, led me to make The Sleepers in order to resolve the impression that the third world is present in the first world as an idea and a condition.鈥 --LaPore

Crossroad听听 (Phil Solomon & Mark LaPore, 2005, 5 min.)
"Performed and edited in one evening with Mark LaPore on the very last night I spent with him. All of the material is culled from the notorious听videogame series, Grand Theft Auto"--Solomon

I went to the crossroad, fell down on my knees
I went to the crossroad, fell down on my knees
Asked the lord above 鈥淗ave mercy, save poor Bob, if you please鈥

Mmmmm, standin鈥 at the crossroad, I tried to flag a ride
Standin鈥 at the crossroad, I tried to flag a ride
Didn鈥檛 nobody seem to know me, everybody pass me by

Mmmm, the sun goin鈥 down, boy, dark gon鈥 catch me here
Oooo, eeee, boy, dark gon鈥 catch me here
I haven鈥檛 got no lovin鈥 sweet woman that love and feel my care

You can run, you can run, tell my friend-boy Willie Brown
You can run, tell my friend-boy Willie Brown
Lord I鈥檓 standin鈥 at the crossroad, babe, I believe I鈥檓 sinkin鈥 down

--Robert Johnson, 鈥淐ross Road Blues (Take 2)鈥

So Sure of Nowhere Buying Times to Come听 (David Gatten, 2010, 9 min.)
Excerpts from Sir Thomas Browne's 1658 text Hydriotaphia Urne-Buriall 听Or, A Brief Discourse of the Sepulchrall Urnes Lately Found in Norfolk are superimposed with the stone faces of grave markers and burial urns.听 This image-text bookends a series of objects framed in the ancient glass window panes of a tiny shop, in a tiny snow-covered town, on a mountain top in Colorado.听 A pocket watch, a postal scale, a small mirror.听 A stop watch, some stamps, a knife, some bandages, an hour glass. Time is short.听 Time is running out.听 The time left is all the time we have.

听Still Raining, Still Dreaming 听 (Phil Solomon, 2008, 12 min.)
"Mark LaPore always professed his dream听to do a听re-make of听Basil Wright's great ethnographic essay film, Song of Ceylon. Still Raining, Still Dreaming, the final film of the In Memoriam series, 听is my homage to that dream, dedicated to听his memory." --Solomon

Like Rain it sounded till it curved
And then I knew 鈥檛was Wind鈥
It walked as wet as any Wave
But swept as dry as sand鈥
When it had pushed itself away
To some remotest Plain
A coming as of Hosts was heard
That was indeed the Rain鈥
It filled the Wells, it pleased the Pools
It warbled in the Road鈥
It pulled the spigot from the Hills
And let the Floods abroad鈥
It loosened acres, lifted seas
The sites of Centres stirred
Then like Elijah rode away
Upon a Wheel of Cloud.

--听Emily Dickinson, "Like Rain it Sounded Till it Curved"

Rainy day, rain all day
Ain鈥檛 no use in gettin uptight
Just let it groove its own way
Let it drain your worries away yeah


Lay back and groove on a rainy day hey
Lay back and dream on a rainy day
Lay back and groove on a rainy day
Lay back
Oh yeah !

--Jimi Hendrix, "Still Raining, Still Dreaming"

Essay by Tom Gunning:

Tom Gunning, 鈥淭owards a Minor Cinema: Fonoroff, Herwitz, Ahwesh, Lapore, Klahr and Solomon,鈥 Motion Picture, Vol, 3, Nos. 1-2, 1989-90: 2-5.