Karlovy Vary International Film Festival 

The visual concept associated with music changes according to the given period. Our era brought music to millions of viewers and listeners via the Internet portal YouTube: a fast, practical and vast global archive which is available to us, however, if we resign ourselves to a highly reduced picture quality. Various video clips have flitted round the world, yet few people have actually seen the cameraman’s work with better definition than the quality offered on YouTube.

Escaping on a Musical Pilgrimage

The visual concept associated with music changes according to the given period. Our era brought music to millions of viewers and listeners via the Internet portal YouTube: a fast, practical and vast global archive which is available to us, however, if we resign ourselves to a highly reduced picture quality. Various video clips have flitted round the world, yet few people have actually seen the cameraman’s work with better definition than the quality offered on YouTube.

Perhaps for this reason as well, strong visual works are emerging as a kind of counterbalance, like the concert road movie Sigur Rós: Heima. Here, the Icelandic post-rock band – after returning from a world tour – travel round their native island as if to investigate whether their music still has a natural affinity with the landscape, the industrial monuments and the local community. Stepping down from the podium and “returning home” truly does reflect today’s music scene: with the music industry in decline, Sigur Rós are not the only ones searching for their niche in tiny venues and also major events, offering to perform for free and surprising their audiences with unannounced appearances in new, unexpected contexts. Our screen collection will also delight music video fans: the series Another Body focuses on artists who yearn to escape from their male, female and human identities (Antony & The Johnsons, Animal Collective, Björk, Peaches, The Knife...).

The world of music and film has recently witnessed an exceptionally powerful event, namely the new global live HD broadcasts of performances from the Metropolitan Opera House in New York. Our festival brings a recording of one of the most successful projects in the series “MET in HD”. The First Emperor, an opera by Chinese composer Tan Dun (who won an Oscar for his score for the film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon), presents a multi-layered contribution to the discussion on relations between China and the West, which has been gaining momentum throughout the year as the summer Olympics draw near. For the sake of completeness, let’s add that the Chinese opera in the Musical Odyssey screenings forms a triangle with the film on Tibet A Guest of Life – Alexander Csoma de Körös and the portrait of brilliant New York-based musician and Buddhist, Arthur Russell.

Cellist, songwriter and disco producer, Russell produced home recordings which combined various musical and emotional worlds. Now, sixteen years after his death, he has become an influential figure, inspiring the current young generation of musicians. The film by Matt Wolf Wild Combination: A Portrait of Arthur Russell reminds us that Russell was ahead of his time: in his exclusiveness, he created something which now seems more natural – and also something which many artists are themselves attempting to create through accessible and cheap technology. Pilgrimage From Scattered Points also tells a story which is more comprehensible today. Artist and filmmaker Luke Fowler pays tribute to Cornelius Cardew who, during the Sixties, sought with his ensemble to ensure uncompromising democracy and social justice in music. Could his visionary journey have taken a different route, instead of proceeding by way of the grotesque towards destruction?

Film stories and reconstructions of lives are given a rare opportunity: to correct the shallow ellipsis of pop-culture posters, and to turn mythicised stars back into three-dimensional, controversial individuals. This is how today’s filmmakers re-examine the lives and professional decisions of Scott Walker (Scott Walker: 30 Century Man) and Lee “Scratch” Perry (The Upsetter: The Life & Music of Lee “Scratch” Perry). Why did Walker leave mainstream stardom to work on more discriminating opuses, and why was his song commissioned for the new Bond movie considered unusable? Why would Jamaican producer Perry successfully introduce king of reggae Bob Marley onto the scene and then burn down his own studio? These films provide the answers: exceptional music is created by exceptional people. Let’s watch them together.

Pavel Klusák