Oddball Films presents Eastern European Animation, an evening of rare and masterful works of animation from Poland, Bulgaria, Hungary and the former Czechoslovakia, USSR and Yugoslavia, all on 16mm from the archive. The films range in form and subject matter, from the melancholic to the celebratory but all possess an intricate artistry and many, a dark undercurrent of oppression. Films include Little Gray Neck (1948), the Soviet answer to a Disney film with a small duck who sticks up for his bunny comrade against a mean hungry fox. From Sofia Films in Bulgaria comes Caw! (1982), a quirky tale of birds, music and (dis)harmony, and De Fakto (1973), a cartoon blame game. From Poland's Miniature Film Studio, there is The Divided Man (1971), a short meditation on the choices that shape our lives; Colorful Ray (1974) from the serial Pomysłowy Dobromir featuring a mini-MacGuyver; and 6,5,4,3,2,1 (1967) that combines cell-animation and collage to create a vision on human progress from the dawn of man to the future of rocketeering. From Kratky Film Praha in the former Czechoslovakia, we bring you two clever puppet films from its founder, Jiri Trnka: Passion (1961) about a boy's need for speed and Song of the Prairie (1949), a hilarious western-opera; as well as the Little Mole creator Zdenek Miler's darker tale of rebellion: Red Stain (1969). From Zagreb Film in Croatia, it's the absurd take on a Hollywood chase scene in Zlatko Grgic's Little and Big (1966). Plus! two new hilarious Lego Sports Shorts from Hungary: Downhill Skiing and Soccer (1986) and more surprises. Creative, compelling and conscientious, this is more than just any night of cartoons.
Date: Thursday, April 2nd, 2015 at 8:00PM.
Venue: Oddball Films, 275 Capp Street, San Francisco
Admission: $10.00, limited seating RSVP to: 415-558-8117 or RSVP@oddballfilm.com
Web: http://oddballfilms.blogspot.com
Date: Friday, March 27th, 2015 at 8:00pm 
Oddball Films presents Monumental Artscapes, a program of 16mm short documentaries celebrating those artists that dared to redefine artwork in the modern world by thinking and working on a grander scale. This imaginative evening includes the planning, construction and philosophy behind iconic earthworks, monumental sculpture and murals by Christo, Robert Smithson, David Alfaro Siqueiros, Claes Oldenburg and G. Augustine Lynas. In a mini-tribute to the recently departed Albert Maysles, we will be screening the Maysles brothers first collaboration with Hungarian-born pop-artist Christo as he constructs his first large-scale public work in Colorado in the compelling (and Oscar-nominated) Christo's Valley Curtain (1974). Robert Smithson documents his own massive construction of a 1,500 foot coil in the Great Salt Lake in Spiral Jetty (1970). Watch as one of Mexico's most legendary muralists plans and paints the largest mural in the world (in stunning color) in the kaleidoscopic Siqueiros, El Maestro: The March of Humanity in North America (1969). Claes Oldenburg speaks on the importance of his outrageous soft sculptures in an excerpt from Art of the Sixties (1967). And behold as ephemeral sculptor G. Augustine Lynas turns a frisbee, shells and sand into a Mayan temple on a Fire Island beach in Sandsong (1987). It's a one of a kind look behind the creativity and construction of some of the most impressively huge artwork ever to grace the valleys, lakes and beaches of the earth. 
Date: Thursday, March 26th, 2015 at 8:00pm 
Date: Friday, March 20th at 8:00PM
Date: Friday, March 13th, 2015 at 8:00pm 
Date: Friday, March 6th, 2014 at 8:00pm 
