To do: Experimental film festival at the High Noon

Joe Uchill | 7/25/2006 3:01 am | ...

Six years ago, in the unlikely city of Grand Rapids, Minnesota, a high school-aged Dan Anderson started one of America's quirkiest cinema events. The Bearded Child Film Festival, still nestled away in that town of 8,000, is one of only a handful of festivals devoted to experimental cinema. Now, Anderson plans to bring a sampling of his show to Madison.
Anderson will present a selection of Bearded Child's submissions tonight at the High Noon Saloon, movies that Anderson says range from the artistic to the wacky.
"There are independent festivals that show movies that don't get into Hollywood. Our stuff is a little more obscure," said Anderson.
He'll show "Volatile Works Does Coney Island," a collage of 1950s stock footage of the titular Island arranged by members of the Montreal-based art collective Volatile Works. He'll also show Auto Domestication, which he wrote and directed.
"I'm an actor in the movie," said Anderson. "The other actor is a gorilla. It's an id and ego film."
Anderson has been making experimental films as long as he's held his film festival. It formed when he started watching David Lynch films and grew as he began renting more obscure directors' work. Only the experimental film selection in a small town video store is limited to Lynch's works. To see less mainstream work, Anderson was forced to make twice-monthly trips to a Minneapolis specialty shop, a four hour drive away.
The Bearded Child Film Festival makes it easier for Grand Rapids to see more artistic (and more bizarre) works.
It was a city craving someone like Anderson. The community arts center had a 600-seat theater that went unused when artists refused to present at an out-of-the-way-city. When Anderson started the festival, he received 28 submissions and had time to show them all. Now the Bearded Child fields 150 applicants a year to present films in a small Midwestern town.
"The first year someone came from Japan - he had never been to another American city than L.A - and as soon as he got off the plane there was a real culture clash. We don't even have an airport anymore," said Anderson. "But we used to."
As the Bearded Child Festival has grown so has Anderson's film resume. It's a time consuming vocation - one that doesn't allow him to have a full time job for fear of a set schedule. But it's that dedication that makes the medium so appealing to him.
"To make experimental films you need a passion for it," he said. "A lot of times you can get a grant to make a film, but once it's completed, it's hard to get any return. It's hard to get anybody to see them, so you have to do it for yourself. But that's sort of the charm for me, the personal aspect."

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What: Cinesplosion (Bearded Child Film Showing)

Where: The High Noon Saloon

When: July 25 at 6 pm

How Much: $3

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