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Cinema is not a product!
The result is the mediocrity that pervades Queer Film Culture. Film schools teach young filmmakers to please their teachers so that they can get good grades. Upon entering the "industry," these filmmakers are well trained and more than eager to please the programmers, who have, with the help of some bland academic writing, elevated programming into an "art."
A Short History of the Future
"A Short History of the Future is a film essay based upon my study of Leni Riefenstahl’s 1932 film Das Blaue Licht. Selected sequences from her film have been reedited in order to highlight the interior process of creative focus in the mind of a film artist who believes in the "neutrality" of art and … Continue reading A Short History of the Future
Program Note for Premiere Screening, AFA, April 22, 2017
“I call it a ‘Film Essay,’ but it’s really a non-documentary film document that gives Jack Smith the chance to be heard without the intervention of talking heads, critics, and had-been friends.” (JT) For more than twenty years, Jerry Tartaglia worked on restoring, preserving and exhibiting the film legacy of Jack Smith. His work … Continue reading Program Note for Premiere Screening, AFA, April 22, 2017
Uncovering The Underground World of Jack Smith (1932 – 1989)
First published in AnOther Man magazine, London, 2017 Is there anyone who has not yet seen the 1963 underground film classic Flaming Creatures by Jack Smith? Or who does not yet know that Jack is now heralded as the gay granddaddy of Performance Art? Or anyone who is … Continue reading Uncovering The Underground World of Jack Smith (1932 – 1989)
“Okay. We’re making progress.” Howard Guttenplan: A Memento.
“Okay. We’re making progress.” Howard Guttenplan: A Memento. By Jerry Tartaglia (First published in The Millennium Film Journal, 2015) “Okay. We’re making progress.” Howard must have said this to me at least once a week during the years that I worked at The Millennium on East 4th Street in the 1970s. Sometimes he would say … Continue reading “Okay. We’re making progress.” Howard Guttenplan: A Memento.
This Is Just What I Expected! (2013)
This Is Just What I Expected! by Jerry Tartaglia (First published in Otherzine 2013 Jack Smith was not what we would call a “positive thinker.” He expected the worst from people and from life situations. He was cynical, depressing, and generally a pessimistic man. In life and art he expected the worst and invited … Continue reading This Is Just What I Expected! (2013)
The Perfect Queer Appositeness of Jack Smith (2001)
The Perfect Queer Appositeness of Jack Smith by Jerry Tartaglia Those who are familiar with the writings of Jack Smith will recognize the inspiration for the title of this study in one of Smith's most notorious essays entitled "The Perfect Filmic Appositeness of Maria Montez/' first published in Film Culture magazine in 1962 (Hoberman, … Continue reading The Perfect Queer Appositeness of Jack Smith (2001)
Restoration and Slavery (1997)
"At first I thought the creature was sent by Fishhook." Jack would not believe that the camera original material of Flaming Creatures, which I had just returned to him, had simply been lost for thirteen years and found by accident.
