Cinematic Synesthesia: A Sensory Overload - Thur. Aug. 4th - 8PM

Oddball Films presents Cinematic Synesthesia: A Sensory Overload, an evening of fascinating science docs divulging the secrets of the human senses and a handful of hyper-kinetic experimental shorts designed to overload your senses with barrages of sublime imagery. Enjoy the science spectacular Gateways to the Mind: The Story of the Human Senses (1958) - from the Bell Science series - about the glory and pitfalls of the human senses, hosted by Dr. Frank Baxter and featuring mind-bending sensory-deprivation animation from the legendary Chuck Jones. Find out what happens when your vision is flipped upside down (and you're paid to live like that for two weeks!) in the imported short Living in a Reversed World (1958). Cartoons sing about your senses in the vintage educational primer The Five Senses (1972). Your sensory re-education will be paired with five extraordinary short works that will stimulate all your senses with dazzling torrents of imagery and music. Caroline and Frank Mouris' Oscar-winning Frank Film (1973) is a stunning stop-motion collage animation of nearly 12,000 magazine cutouts and featuring two concurrent soundtracks. Psychedelic animator Vince Collins loses his mind in the eye-popping Fantasy (1973). Canadian experimental filmmaker Arthur Lipsett's Free-Fall (1964) is a pulsating, eye-popping montage of still and moving images. The hypnotic Tanka (1976) utilizes optical printing to bring the intricate and ominous images of the Tibetan Book of the Dead to life. And the early birds will get a whirlwind tour of vintage Paris at two frames a second in Paul Roubaix's Allegro Ma Troppo (1963). Smell the sounds, taste the visuals, get swept away in cinematic synesthesia. Everything screened on 16mm film from our stock footage archive.

Date: Thursday, August 4th, 2016 at 8:00pm

Venue: Oddball Films, 275 Capp Street San Francisco

Admission: $10.00 Limited Seating RSVP to RSVP@oddballfilm.com or (415) 558-8117
Web: http://oddballfilms.blogspot.com

Strange Sinema 102: Experiments in Electronic Arts - Fri. July 29th - 8PM

Oddball Films presents Strange Sinema 102, a monthly evening of newly discovered, old finds and rarities from the stacks of the archive. Drawing on his collection of over 50,000 16mm film prints, Oddball Films director Stephen Parr has compiled his 102nd program of classic, strange, offbeat and unusual films. This installment, Strange Sinema 102: Experiments in Electronic Arts is a heady, techno-cultural look at the art, sound and early electronic art forms that jump-started the 60s and transformed the way we create and experience art and technology. Films feature documentaries that survey tech art and music innovators as well as experimental and avant garde shorts showcasing early analog and computer assisted animation and graphics.  Art For Tomorrow (1969) is an eye-popping exploration of experimental tech-oriented art incorporating early IBM computers, cybernetics, heart beat triggers, invisible art by magnetism featuring famed artists such as Yaacov Agam, Wen-Ying Tsai, John Mott-Smith, Jean Tinguely and Victor Vasarely’s early experiments with IBM computers. Get in a moogy kind of mood with Discovering Electronic Music (1983) an introduction to the synthesizers and computers used to create electronic music, including the legendary Fairlight CMI, one of the first sampling synthesizers used in music production. Bell Laboratories brings us Incredible Machine (1968) which previews the latest developments in computer-assisted imagery, electronic music, and voice processing. Catalog (1961) features computer graphics pioneer and cinema innovator John Whitney’s kaleidoscopic demo reel made with equipment salvaged from WWII. Ken Rudolph takes us through the history of Art in eight pulsing minutes in Gallery (1969) with electronic music sound score by Clockwork Orange composer Wendy Carlos. We follow that up with the astonishing Peter Foldes' Hunger (1974), one of the first computer-generated animated shorts and a metamorphic nightmare of greed, gluttony and lust. Languid rhythms of fades, dissolves and superimpositions permeate 7362 (1967) a masterful avant-garde film by the auteur of the optical printer (and sometime Star Wars special effects wiz) Pat O’Neill. Experiments in Motion Graphics (1968) once again features early computer motion graphics by John Whitney and a discussion of the computers prospect as an art making tool. Plus! The Critic (1963), an animated Oscar winner from the great Ernie Pintoff with comedy legend Mel Brooks relentlessly ragging on the experimental animation he's shown to hilarious effect.

Date: Friday, July 29th, 2016 at 8:00pm

Venue: Oddball Films, 275 Capp Street San Francisco

Admission: $10.00 Limited Seating RSVP to RSVP@oddballfilms.com or (415) 558-8117
Web: http://oddballfilms.blogspot.com

Cinema Soiree: Jim Morton on East German Genre Films - Thur. July 28th - 8PM

Oddball Films welcomes back Author and Film Historian Jim Morton for our Cinema Soiree Series, a monthly soiree featuring visiting authors, filmmakers and curators presenting and sharing cinema insights. Film historian and editor of ReSearch’s Incredibly Strange Films, Morton has turned his attention to the films of East Germany and discovered that they are every bit as odd as anything from the West. He will be at Oddball Films for one night only to discuss the films of the former German Democratic Republic, with clips from some of his favorites. Some of these films have not yet been released in United States. Some may never be. Here’s your chance to see what was going on behind the Berlin Wall. Morton's previous soiree sold out, and he's finally returned with a second helping of all new weird and wonderful clips. This time he is taking on genre films in the GDR, with all-new clips of everything from westerns to musicals. Here’s the story of the topsy-turvy world of red westerns where the Indians are the good guys, and spy films, where the United States plots world domination. Learn the tragic story of Dean Reed, the American pop singer who become known as the “Red Elvis”; discover the secret world of underground filmmaking that flourished beyond the reach of the government. The classic film genres of musicals and film noir are also revisited in all new clips. Selections include the musical No Cheating Darling (1972), the Western Blood Brothers (1975), spy flic For Eyes Only (1963), the Film Noir The Story of a Murder (1965), bizarro children's fantasy The Tinderbox (1959), the juvenile delinquents of Berlin, Schoenhauser Corner (1957), punk documentary Winter Adé and the rare underground piece Konrad, the Mom Said. If you’re not familiar with the strange world of East German cinema, you’re in for a treat.

Date: Thursday, July 28th, 2016 at 8:00pm

Venue: Oddball Films, 275 Capp Street San Francisco

Admission: $10.00 Limited Seating RSVP to RSVP@oddballfilms.com or (415) 558-8117
Web: http://oddballfilms.blogspot.com

Vintage Burlesque Bonanza! - Fri. July 22nd - 8PM

Oddball Films presents Vintage Burlesque Bonanza!, a titillating night of burlesque beauties, oddities, and even animation from the 1930s-1950s all screened on 16mm film from the archive.  These erotic and exotic artifacts of yesterday are tame by today's standards, but offer us a view into the buttoned-up sexuality of the mid-century man. The night features an array of lovely ladies (and a few strapping men) including the burlesque queens Sally Rand, Faith Bacon, Lili St. Cyr, Betty Dolan and more with more bubble and fan dances than you can handle. Behold the battle of the bubbles with three interpretations of bodacious bubbles including Lili St. Cyr in a tantalizing Bubble Bath Dance (1952) and the ethereal and breathtaking Bubble Dance with Sally Rand (1942), which is parodied in the all-star Merrie Melodies cartoon Hollywood Steps Out (1934), which we will also be screening. Get into the fan dance, originated by Faith Bacon as a way around Broadway censors in Faith Bacon: A Lady with Fans (1950s), and see Sally Rand as she displays the erotic dance at the World's Fair in Streets of Paris (1933), then see another cartoon interpretation in the super rarity Krazy Kat Frogs and Kats (1930s) featuring an old perv with x-ray machine trying to see Miss Kitty nude. Burlesque gets a little bizarre with our next three favorites: a marionette out-strips a stripper in Doll Dance (1940s), The Fabulous Cat Girl (1950s) will scratch her way into your heart, and Betty Dolan fights off her Satanic side in Satan Tease (1950s). Meet the Sweethearts of Burlesque including "Sensational Sandra Storm in Action" (1941),   "Sweethearts of Burlesque" (1948) with Pat Dorsey, Lorraine Lee and Pat O'Connor,"Three Party Girls" (1930) with three gal pals going to a costume party who accidentally burn their outfits with an iron, "Betty Rowland in The Magic Bottle" (1950),  featuring Betty dancing in a bottle on a nightclub bar with lots of old time-y special effects and camera tricks,  "Caught Without Costume" (1930) with a lovely lady who goes skinny dipping, loses her clothes to a pervy dog and has to cover up with a barrel, and "Hunting Bare" (1930s) with three gals out on a hunting trip who mark their path with discarded clothing. And we couldn't let the girls have all the fun, so we're pulling out some fabulous Vintage Beefcake Shorts with handsome young men stripping down and shaking their stuff: Amateur Strip (1960s) and the homegrown homoerotica The Groping Hand (1960s) featuring a groovy soundtrack and shots of 1960s North Beach. So strap on your tassels, grab your fan and blow some bubbles, because it's a scintillating night of stripteases and sensuality at San Francisco's strangest film archive.

Date: Friday, July 22nd, 2016 at 8:00pm

Venue: Oddball Films, 275 Capp Street San Francisco

Admission: $10.00 Limited Seating RSVP to RSVP@oddballfilm.com or (415) 558-8117
Web: http://oddballfilms.blogspot.com

Humanimation - Stop-Motion Pixilation - Thur. July 21st - 8PM

Oddball Films presents Humanimation: Stop-Motion Pixilation, a super fun and funny program of stop-motion animation utilizing human actors as puppets, animated one frame at a time.  Films include four shorts from Academy Award winning luminary Norman McLaren and the National Film Board of Canada: Neighbors (1952) a grim tale of two men feuding over a beautiful flower, Two Bagatelles (1953) with two delightful tales of men dancing and flying over a field of grass, A Chairy Tale (1957) featuring music by Ravi Shankar, and his hilarious Opening Speech (1961) with an out of control microphone. From the hilarious and Oscar-nominated duo Leo Janson and Chuck Menville come four raucous shorts of speed racers without their cars in Stop Look and Listen (1967), cowpokes without their horses in the Western spoof Blaze Glory (1969), bikers without their motorcycles in Vicious Cycles (1967), and high-flying superheroes in Captain Mom (1972).  Other films include Mike Jitlov's eye-popping high-speed chase The Wizard of Speed and Time (1979), the Encyclopedia Britannica short Let's Pretend: Magic Sneakers (1969) featuring a high speed pair of enchanted Converse, and a section of Six Filmmakers in Search of a Wedding (1971). Plus more! All films screened on 16mm from our stock footage archive.

Date: Thursday, July 21st, 2016 at 8:00pm

Venue: Oddball Films, 275 Capp Street San Francisco

Admission: $10.00 Limited Seating RSVP to RSVP@oddballfilm.com or (415) 558-8117
Web: http://oddballfilms.blogspot.com

Learn your Lesson Plays in Traffic - The Bloody Road to Shockucation - Fri. July 15th - 8PM

Oddball Films and curator Kat Shuchter present Learn Your Lesson Plays in Traffic: The Bloody Road to Shockucation, the 40th in a monthly series of programs highlighting the most ridiculous, insane and camptastic educational films, mental hygiene primers and TV specials of the collection. This month we're heading out on the highway to hell with a truckload of gory and kitschy pedestrian and driver safety scare films from the 1930s - 80s including tons of new discoveries from the archive. There will be dolls flying through windshields, little boys in pantaloons, animated drunk driving foibles, an appearance by Raymond Burr, and (of course) blood on the highway! Films include Signal 30 (1959, excerpt), the notorious driver scare film from Dick Wayman and the first to feature footage of real accidents. Industrial film giant Jam Handy and General Motors team up for Safety Patrol (1937) featuring an annoying school crossing guard and his bff, a 65 year-old police sergeant (who lures him underground). Look Alive! (1961) with your host Raymond Burr as we see the POV of a victim of a pedestrian accident. Dad gambled with his life and lost in the melodramatic Technicolor cheesefest Anatomy of an Accident (1962) from Jerry Fairbanks (the man that previously brought us singing bears and harem dogs from the Speaking of Animals series). See a history of drunk drivers through the ages in the short animation A Snort History (1971). A little girl's doll gets the crash-test dummy treatment in the ridiculous Safety Belt for Susie (1962). Boozed up test subjects hit a staged parking lot and tons of ludicrous driving is documented in Alco Beat (1965). And for the early birds, a 24 year-old Scott Baio plays a high school senior with a bright future, but a bad habit of drinking and driving in the CBS Schoolbreak Special All The Kids Do It (1984, directed by Henry "The Fonz" Winkler). So drive on down to Oddball and learn your lesson. Everything screened on 16mm film from our stock footage archive.

Date: Friday, July 15th, 2016 at 8:00pm

Venue: Oddball Films, 275 Capp Street San Francisco

Admission: $10.00 Limited Seating RSVP to RSVP@oddballfilm.com or (415) 558-8117
Web: http://oddballfilms.blogspot.com

Revolutionary Black Voices - Thur. July 14th - 8PM

Oddball Films presents Revolutionary Black Voices, an empowering and entertaining evening of 16mm film rarities documenting the history and enduring legacy of the Black musicians, poets, revolutionaries, protestors, and artists that stood up and sung out to change the world. Watch the Black Panthers (including Angela Davis and Eldridge Cleaver) protest, lay down their demands for a fair and just country, and even see Huey P. Newton speak from the Alameda County Prison in the radical and slightly experimental "Newsreel" Off The Pigs! (1969). In James Brown: The Man (1974), "Mr. Dynamite" discusses his rise from the slums to the top of the charts, as well as his dreams for the Black community - including an all-Black currency known as "brown and black" stamps.  In Protest: Black Power (1975), view the struggles, set-backs and triumphs of the Black Power movement with footage of Stokely Carmichael, Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, and Martin Luther King. In The Weapons of Gordon Parks (1965), the famed LIFE photographer describes the camera as his weapon of choice against a hostile and bigoted America. Hey Cab! (1969), based on the life of Bob Teague shows one Black man's difficulty in even the simplest task of hailing a taxi on a rainy night. "The Princess of Black Poetry" recites her poetry and relates it to the Black and Women's rights movements in a segment of Spirit to Spirit: Nikki Giovanni (1986). Plus, a dance number from The Alvin Ailey Company, Fats Waller provides a delightfully wacky musical break with the Soundie Your Feet's Too Big (1949), Count Basie and his Orchestra perform Take Me Back Baby (1949), Cab Calloway brings us The Blowtop Blues (1945) and Nina Simone gives us a rare performance of To Be Young, Gifted and Black (1970s). Early birds will get a taste of Aretha Franklin, Soul Singer (1968) which captures the Queen of Soul as a singer and musician in the whirl crossover stardom and also as an artist questing to find the truest expression of her gifts. All films screened on 16mm from our stock footage archive.

Date: Thursday, July 14th, 2016 at 8:00pm

Venue: Oddball Films, 275 Capp St. San Francisco

Admission: $10.00 Limited Seating RSVP to RSVP@oddballfilms.com or (415) 558-8117
Web: https://oddballfilms.blogspot.com

What the F(ilm)?! 17: Oddball's Strangest Ladies - Fri. July 8th - 8PM

Oddball Films presents What the F(ilm)?! 17: Oddball's Strangest Ladies, an evening of some of the most bizarre, hilarious and insane films from our massive stock footage collection.  This time around, we're saluting the girls and women that make our archive so strange with a night full of lady wrestlers, derby dolls, psychedelic ice-skaters, little girl ventriloquists, singing and dancing celebrities, tiger burlesque numbers, talking horses and more feminine cine-insanity than you can handle. Get on the ice in a psychedelic skating segment from the bizarre TV-special Here's Peggy Fleming (1968). Take to the skies with a pre-pubescent pilot, Deborah Gubbins in the Popular Person Oddity: Pigtail Pilot (1944). Who you calling a dummy? Visit a teenage ventriloquist in Double-Talk Girl (1944). Debbie Reynolds dances on stage with some crazy big-headed celebrity marionettes in an excerpt of A Date with Debbie (1960). Two fierce fighting dames duke it out for the women's wrestling world championship in Lipstick and Dynamite (1948). Debbie Harry, Carrie Fisher, Gilda Radner and more celebrity babes in their prime explain why American Women Love Creeps (1979). Little Lulu hallucinates a bar full of celebrity babies in the bizarre cartoon The Babysitter (1947). Tragic figure Thelma Todd stars with bff Patsy Kelly in the hilarious Hal Roach crime comedy Hot Money (1935), one of her very last pictures. See historical women through the ages not talk about their menstrual pains in the opening segment of Cramps! (1983). Take a musical break with the cheeky all-girl big band soundie Feed the Kitty (1942). Burlesque cutie Sheree North is feeling feline in her Tiger Dance (1951) and two other novelty striptease numbers. Derby dolls face off in the rink in clips of vintage Roller Derby (1956), plus The Battle of the Burlesque Queens (1948), Femmesploitation Film Trailers (1970s) and more surprises. This compendium of 16mm madness is too strange to be believed and too baffling to be forgotten.

Date: Friday, July 8th, 2016 at 8:00pm

Venue: Oddball Films, 275 Capp Street San Francisco

Admission: $10.00 Limited Seating RSVP to RSVP@oddballfilms.com or (415) 558-8117
Web: http://oddballfilms.blogspot.com

The Underbelly of the Bay: Dark Secrets of San Francisco - Thur. July 7th - 8PM

Oddball Films presents The  Underbelly of the Bay: Dark Secrets of San Francisco, a program of short films, documentaries, TV programs, and film noirs revealing the dark side of the Bay Area from the devastating quake at the turn of the 20th century up through the dark arts resurgence of the 1970s. From Satanists to cults, murderers to earthquakes, bombings, crooks and more, this is one dark night in the San Francisco of yesteryear. We begin with the trailer for Hitchcock's quintessential San Francisco murder mystery Vertigo (1958). Films also include the classic 1906 San Francisco Earthquake Film with original footage from the turn-of-the-century quake aftermath. Head to the slammer with Parole (1956), a real life, harrowing parole hearing, shot across the bay at San Quentin, in which an anonymous felon fleshes out his perspective before a board of judges, attempting to have them understand what might drive a man to murder, in hope of being granted some leniency on his sentence. In the 60s and 70s, the dark arts made a fashionable return to the world scene and San Francisco was an epicenter for witches and Satanists alike as seen in The Occult: An Echo from Darkness (1972). Kenneth Anger teams up with Anton LeVay for the psychedelic Satanic symphony Invocation of my Demon Brother (1969) with music by Mick Jagger and shot in SF. The mini-noir Flesh and Leather (1951) is replete with cops, crooks, killings, and a fixed game; and it’s set amid our very own fogbound alleys. Edward G. Robinson stars in an action-packed segment of locally-set noir Hell on Frisco Bay (1955). And finally, a multi-projector romp through the seedy side of San Francisco's own News Outtakes, including an original 1977 news broadcast of Jim Jones and members of the People's Temple after a fire was set at the temple on Geary and San Francisco Bombing (1970) with footage of the notorious SF Police Dept. Park Station bombing, as well as snippets of the investigation into The SLA and more. Everything screened on 16mm film from our massive stock footage collection.

Date: Thursday July 7th, 2016 at 8:00pm

Venue: Oddball Films, 275 Capp Street San Francisco

Admission: $10.00 Limited Seating RSVP to RSVP@oddballfilms.com or (415) 558-8117
Web: www.oddballfilms.blogspot.com