Thank you to everyone who attended the memorial for Stephen Parr.
We appreciate the support.
The memorial can be viewed in full at this link. The video tribute that was made for the memorial can be viewed here as well.
Thank you.
Video of the Memorial Service for Stephen Parr
The video tribute that was made for the memorial can be viewed here as well.
1/7/2018: Memorial Service for Stephen Parr
The Memorial for Founder and Director of Oddball Films and the San Francisco Media Archive, Stephen Parr is scheduled for January 7th, 2018 at the Roxie Theater (3117 16th St, San Francisco, CA 94103) from 12:30pm - 3:00pm to be followed by a reception. The program details and location of the reception will follow.
There will be film, there will be performances, there will be remembrances, there will be friends and colleagues.
We are still accepting input about the program and are interested in presenting a program Stephen would enjoy.
For those of you who are connected to Stephen from Syracuse, or who are nearby to Syracuse, there are services for Stephen planned in Syracuse with a wake at Farone's on Sunday December 10th, 3:00-5:00. Farone's is located at:
1500 Park Street, Syracuse , NY , 13208
Telephone: (315) 422-1911
The burial will be the following day at 11 am Greenlawn Cemetery in Warners, NY and the family will be leaving from the funeral home.
We would also like to share this video Stephen made for the Friends of Helen Hill program as part of the 2017 Association of Moving Image Archivists (AMIA) Conference that took place this past week. We thought Stephen's humor and keen use of archival footage would be appreciated during this time.
More details about the memorial will follow and we thank you for your support.
In Remembrance
Sadly, founder and Director of Oddball Films and the San Francisco Media Archive, Stephen Parr, passed away suddenly on October 24, 2017 after a struggle with declining health. His family and Oddball staff have come together and are carefully working on ensuring a productive future for both entities while preserving the proud tradition of providing the most eclectic footage to our customers. Oddball continues to fill your orders for the most unusual and hard to find material for your projects.
Concurrently, we are accessing the arts community of the most creative city in the world to help reshape Oddball Films. Exciting and challenging, we are confident that we will be able to maintain the high quality of our product and services.
A Memorial Service for Stephen Parr is being planned for early 2018. Details to follow.
Cinema Soiree - The Making of Maupin: Tales of the Archive, 10/26 (EVENT POSTPONED)
Due to some unforeseen circumstances, the Oddball Cinema Soiree with Jennifer Kroot scheduled for October 26th is being postponed. At this time, the new date of the event has yet to be confirmed. Thank you for your interest, and stay tuned to oddballfilms.blogspot.com for updates.
We are are pleased to announce that local documentarian and director of The Untold Tales of Armistead Maupin Jennifer Kroot and her co-director/editor Bill Weber will be joining us at the archive for the next iteration of our Cinema Soiree series, and are thrilled to have provided over five minutes of rare archival material for the film.
The Untold Tales of Armistead Maupin examines the life and work of one of the world’s most beloved storytellers, following his evolution from a conservative son of the Old South into a gay rights pioneer whose novels have inspired millions to claim their own truth. Jennifer Kroot’s documentary about the creator of Tales of the City moves nimbly between playful and poignant and laugh-out-loud funny. With help from his friends (including Neil Gaiman, Laura Linney, Olympia Dukakis, Sir Ian McKellen and Amy Tan), Maupin offers a disarmingly frank look at the journey that took him from the jungles of Vietnam to the bathhouses of 70’s San Francisco to the front line of the American culture war.
On Thursday, October 26th at 8:00 PM, Kroot and Weber will be in attendance at Oddball to present our next Cinema Soiree, The Making of Maupin: Tales of the Archive, an in-depth examination of their archival process, with exclusive commentary, deleted scenes, and plenty of LGBT footage from our collection to provide insight into the writer's cultural context and historical moment.
Plus! The film will be screening for one week only beginning this Friday, September 22nd at the Roxie Theater. Jennifer Kroot will attend for opening night, and will be joined by Maupin himself on Sunday, September 24th at 3:15 PM and 6:00 PM. See the film first, and then join us for a behind-the-scenes look at how it got made!
The Making of Maupin
Tales of the Archive
Thursday, October 26, 8:00 PM
POSTPONED
This event has been postponed. Stay tuned for an announcement about new date. Next month, Jennifer Kroot and her editor/co-director Bill Weber will be stopping by Oddball Films to present a behind-the-scenes look at the making of The Untold Tales of Armistead Maupin. Comparing scenes from the finished film with the Oddball sources it draws from, Kroot and Weber will talk about the process of turning archival research into a coherent vision, and how they sought to convey Maupin's unique milieu in their film. ALSO! Deleted scenes and film excerpts from San Francisco's gay underground (including A Marriage Manual for Male Homosexuals and much more!) provide context for Armistead's work and world. Stay tuned for a complete description of the program.
Seating is extremely limited for this event and it will sell out. RSVP now!
Venue & Ticket Info
Venue: Oddball Films
275 Capp Street, San Francisco (map)
Tickets: $12.00, seating limited
RSVP to rsvp@oddballfilms.com or 415-558-8112 POSTPONED
Web: oddballfilms.blogspot.com
275 Capp Street, San Francisco (map)
Tickets: $12.00, seating limited
Web: oddballfilms.blogspot.com
About Jennifer Kroot
Jennifer Kroot is a seasoned documentary filmmaker. Kroot brings a background in underground filmmaking to her documentaries, and uses that sensibility to create surprises within her stories. Her tales incorporate shifts in pace and tone that allow a fluid and engaging structure. Kroot focuses on the humanity of her subjects, keeping their stories accessible and unpretentious.
Her most recent feature length documentary, To Be Takei, a portrait of actor/activist George Takei, premiered at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival and was released theatrically by Starz Digital in August 2014 to critical acclaim. Her feature documentary It Came From Kuchar, following cult filmmaking duo George and Mike Kuchar and also featuring footage from Oddball Films, premiered at the 2009 South by Southwest Film Festival. A Bay Area native, Kroot studied film at the San Francisco Art Institute, where she has also taught. She has been a guest lecturer at Stanford and University of Denver.
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7/26 - The Holy Haight - screening at the Roxie!
Davis will draw on a kaleidoscopic array of clips from our vast archive of 60s and 70s era stock footage, amateur films, home movies, documentaries and experimental films. James Whitney's celebrated visionary short Lapis will get us in the mood for a spiritual carnival ranging from Dionysian Acid Tests to Alan Watts' Zen, Jesus Freaks to Satanic Masses, rock star gurus to Pentagon marches, Sufi Dances to Jewish Renewal hoedowns. From celebrity yoga to corporate mindfulness to today's psychedelic Renaissance, we continue to live in the shadow of the hippie mystics. Come catch some of the old sunshine!
Venue & Ticket Info |
6/13 - Sonic Oddities at SF Doc Fest!
 SF Doc Fest is fully underway, and Oddball Films is making its mark! We provided footage to two opening night films, Turn It Around: The Story of East Bay Punk and Take Every Wave: The Life of Laird Hamilton, and our director Stephen Parr heads to the Roxie Theater next Wednesday, June 13th at 7:15 PM for another iteration of Sonic Oddities, a live cinema-sound collaboration featuring local musician bran(...)pos. Sonic Oddities LiveTuesday, June 13th 7:15 PM Sonic Oddities is Stephen Parr’s cinematic and auditory collision of
film shorts, clips, fragments and reprocessed sounds. Drawn from his company Oddball Films' 50,000-film archive, this cinematic trek through the auditory
oddities of film history features
bizarre commercials, Religious propaganda films, campy movie trailers and Italian Spy films
colliding with scenes of sunken jetliners, audio test tones and European
animation.
With a live musical score and mix by bran(...)pos and Stephen Parr
Click here for more information about this event. |
Venue & Ticket Info |
Cinema Soiree - The Holy Haight: How the 60s Counterculture Changed American Religion Forever with Erik Davis, 5/25
The 60s counterculture overturned American politics, but it also radically transformed the practice of religion in America. On Thursday, May 25th, at 8:00 PM, local author, cultural historian, and PhD Erik Davis will be showing choice selections from Oddball Films' vast archive of 60s and 70s era stock footage, amateur films, home movies, pro documentaries, and experimental films in order to explore the many facets of hippie religion. James Whitney's celebrated visionary short "Lapis" will get us in the mood for a spiritual carnival ranging from Dionysian Acid Tests to Alan Watts' Zen, Jesus Freaks to Satanic Masses, rock star gurus to Pentagon marches, Sufi Dances to Jewish Renewal hoedowns. From celebrity yoga to corporate mindfulness to today's psychedelic Renaissance, we continue to live in the shadow of the hippie mystics. Come catch some of the old sunshine!
The event will take place May 25th at 8:00 PM at Oddball Films, 275 Capp Street in San Francisco. Admission is $12.00 (cash only). Event is SOLD OUT -- stay tuned for our next event!
Cinema Soiree: Pop Music Explosion with Richie Unterberger, 3/16
Next Thursday, March 16th, at 8:00 PM, Oddball Films invites you to an intimate evening with author and musicologist Richie Unterberger, inaugurating our new Cinema Soiree Series featuring visiting authors, filmmakers and curators presenting and sharing cinema insights, with a Q+A to follow. Unterberger will be here to present Pop Music Explosion: Film Footage Fantasia, featuring a plethora of footage and rock music film clips curated exclusively from the Oddball Films archives. Oddball Films, the largest archive in Northern California, is a major source of offbeat historical and contemporary footage for feature films, television, documentaries, and media productions worldwide. Unterberger will introduce and provide historical and cultural commentary on the films, honed from his many years as a researcher and writer. The event will take place March 16th at 8:00 PM at Oddball Films, 275 Capp Street in San Francisco. Admission is $10.00 (cash only). RSVP to: programming@oddballfilms.com or 415-558-8117.
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