A mental journey - historical, political, musical and metaphysical - in contemporary times, from the Sixties until nowadays.

A silent film by Alexandre Larose.

The relationship between forms in nature and their interpretation in art is explored in independent avant-garde filmmaker Wayne Sourbeer’s gentle and thoughtful film. Sourbeer follows abstract impressionist painter Corban LePell as he creates one painting, neatly juxtaposing LePell’s various processes with the images in nature that influence him. An original score by Marvin Granostaff completes the circle.

Wayne Sourbeer deftly combines visual forms, the original poetry of Kansas-born poet Charles Plymell and an original music score by David Levinson, who was at the time, associate conductor of the Wichita Symphony. Montage II: Ephemeral Blue is the quintessential example of what continental film critics have called “non-verbal communication.” Sourbeer’s images are the foundation for Plymell’s verbal abstractions and Levinson’s brilliant musical score.

The small town of Lucas, Kansas, is home to one of America’s most unique triumphs of self-expression: S. P. Dinsmoor’s fantastical backyard concrete and wood rendering of the Garden of Eden. Dinsmoor’s self-constructed and wildly imaginative figures represent one man’s attempt to make sense of the world in which he lived. A Civil War veteran, farmer, and self-taught artist, Dinsmoor created a work perhaps more relevant today than ever before; witness Dinsmoor’s Labor Crucified surrounded by a Doctor, a Lawyer, a Preacher, and a Banker to know that this garden is still thriving today. Adding to Dinsmoor’s triumph is the collective work of Montage Production’s Richard Grove, Richard J. Meyer, and Wayne Sourbeer, a trio of avant-garde filmmakers who simply and effectively captured the power of Dinsmoor’s architectural sculptures under the blue-gray skies of southeastern Kansas and further emboldens them using Dinsmoor’s own words.

Vibrant, bursting with color (shot in the late, and much lamented Kodachrome) and ringing with bells and whistles, Wayne Sourbeer’s ode to the joys of the lowly pinball machine is a visual feast; Colored balls whiz, clink, and crash across the laminated landscapes. Dim bulbs illuminate the gaudy caricatures that stare back at the player. Neon lights flash in streaks of hot pink, red, and blue.

An engineer, devastated by the death of his fiance during a mountain expedition in north Italy, hopes he might forget about her by marrying a young nurse who adores him. But one day he returns to the mountain retreat where he’d had such happy days with his fiance, leaving his young bride distraught.

Through the narrative expedient of following, step by step, the working day of a mountain postman (Angelo Lezuo), effectively tells the daily life, in the fifties, of all a community in the Dolomites: that of the inhabitants of Colle Santa Lucia in the province of Belluno.

The Paccha-Picchus are festive little creatures. They live a carefree daily life in sync with the mountains. When the mountains come, their oasis rises and they are lifted up into a winter climate. The Paccha-Picchus are very fond of the winter climate, which is vital for them. But one day, the mountains stop coming and the restless Kinko decides to go looking for them.

Follows the story of an editor, his travel blogger girlfriend and strangers, more strangers and a lot more strangers in hippy island.

One summer, many years after his mother confided in him about her emotional difficulties with his father, a filmmaker questions his parents, curious about the state of their relationship. At first glance, their situation does not seem to have changed. Curious, he decides to inquire about it. Their activities and discussions both revive nostalgic and fearful emotions. He sees that his mother does not feel the same. From this moment that he realizes the magnitude of the subject and that some things are not accessible to him.

Raymond Depardon