Thom Andersen (born 1943 in

Chicago Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

) is an American filmmaker, film critic, and teacher best known for his works of

experimental film Experimental film or avant-garde cinema is a mode of filmmaking that does not apply standard cinematic conventions, instead adopting Non-narrative film, non-narrative forms or alternatives to traditional narratives or methods of working. Many e ...

, including his 1975 film '' Eadweard Muybridge, Zoopraxographer'' and the 2003 essay film '' Los Angeles Plays Itself''.

Biography

Andersen went to high school in Los Angeles, where one of his classmates was future colleague, Michael Asher. Andersen attended the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

in the early 1960s and then returned to his hometown of

Los Angeles Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...

to attend

USC School of Cinematic Arts The USC School of Cinematic Arts is an academic unit of the University of Southern California, in Los Angeles, California, Los Angeles. With a history that dates to the first years of Sound film, talkies, the school descends from America's first ...

, where he studied with Arthur Knight and eventually assisted on Knight's project ''The History of Sex in Cinema''. While at USC, Andersen met long-time friend and collaborator

Morgan Fisher Stephen Morgan Fisher (born 1 January 1950) is an English keyboard player and composer, and is most known as a member of Mott the Hoople in the early 1970s. However, his career has covered a wide range of musical activities, and he is still ac ...

, who assisted on Andersen's student film ''Melting'', a portrait of a sundae. He regularly attended local screening series including shows by the Trak Film Group and Movies Round Midnight and famously wrote about an unpopular screening of Andy Warhol's ''

Sleep Sleep is a state of reduced mental and physical activity in which consciousness is altered and certain Sensory nervous system, sensory activity is inhibited. During sleep, there is a marked decrease in muscle activity and interactions with th ...

''. After USC, Andersen attended

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Its academic roots were established in 1881 as a normal school then known as the southern branch of the C ...

and completed his experimental documentaries ''Olivia's Place ''and '' Eadweard Muybridge, Zoopraxographer.'' During the 1970s, his films screened at Los Angeles' Theatre Vanguard and Berkeley's Pacific Film Archive. He was the programmer for LA Filmforum in Los Angeles during the late 1990s. Andersen's film '' Los Angeles Plays Itself'' won the

National Film Board The National Film Board of Canada (NFB; ) is a Canadian public film and digital media producer and distributor. An agency of the Government of Canada, the NFB produces and distributes documentary films, animation, web documentaries, and altern ...

Award for Best Documentary at the 2003

Vancouver International Film Festival The Vancouver International Film Festival (VIFF) is an annual film festival held in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, for two weeks in late September and early October. The festival is operated by the Greater Vancouver International Film Festi ...

, was voted best documentary of 2004 by the ''Village Voice'' critic's poll, and was voted one of the "Top Ten Films of the Decade" by critics at ''Cinema Scope''. In 2010 he completed ''Get Out of the Car,'' a portrait of signs and abandoned spaces set to Los Angeles music. In spring 2012, Andersen took part in the three-month

Whitney Biennial The Whitney Biennial is a biennial exhibition of contemporary American art organized by the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City. The event began as an annual exhibition in 1932; the first biennial was held in 1973. It is considered ...

Career

He has taught at the SUNY Buffalo and

Ohio State University The Ohio State University (Ohio State or OSU) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio, United States. A member of the University System of Ohio, it was founded in 1870. It is one ...

and had taught film theory and history at the

California Institute of the Arts The California Institute of the Arts (CalArts) is a Private university, private art school in Santa Clarita, California. It was incorporated in 1961 as the first degree-granting institution of higher learning in the US created specifically for ...

from 1987 until 2021. He lives in a two-bedroom

modernist Modernism was an early 20th-century movement in literature, visual arts, and music that emphasized experimentation, abstraction, and Subjectivity and objectivity (philosophy), subjective experience. Philosophy, politics, architecture, and soc ...

house designed by the architect Rudolf Schindler. Andersen coined the term film gris, a type of

film noir Film noir (; ) is a style of Cinema of the United States, Hollywood Crime film, crime dramas that emphasizes cynicism (contemporary), cynical attitudes and motivations. The 1940s and 1950s are generally regarded as the "classic period" of Ameri ...

which categorizes a unique series of films that were released between 1947 and 1951.

Preservation

The Academy Film Archive has preserved a number of Thom Andersen's films, including ''Olivia's Place'', ''Melting'', and ''--- -------'' (aka ''The Rock n Roll Movie).

Filmography

*''

Melting Melting, or fusion, is a physical process that results in the phase transition of a substance from a solid to a liquid. This occurs when the internal energy of the solid increases, typically by the application of heat or pressure, which inc ...

'' (1965) *''Olivia's Place'' (1966/74) *''--- -------'' (1966–67) (aka ''The Rock n Roll Movie'') *'' Eadweard Muybridge, Zoopraxographer'' (1975) (

National Film Registry The National Film Registry (NFR) is the United States National Film Preservation Board's (NFPB) collection of films selected for preservation (library and archival science), preservation, each selected for its cultural, historical, and aestheti ...

inductee) *''

Klassenverhältnisse ', known in English as ''Class Relations'', in French as ', is a 1984 film by the French filmmaking duo of Straub–Huillet, Jean-Marie Straub and Danièle Huillet. It is based on Franz Kafka's unfinished first novel, ''Amerika (novel), Amerika''. ...

'' directed by Straub-Huillet (1984) (actor) *'' Red Hollywood'' (1996) *'' Los Angeles Plays Itself'' (2003) *''Get Out of the Car'' (2010) *''Reconversion'' (2012) *'' Juke: Passages from the Films of Spencer Willams'' (2015) *''The Thoughts That Once We Had'' (2015)Thom Andersen: 'I became a little monster', Film, The Guardian
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References

External links