True/False Films

O'er the Land

In person: director Deborah Stratman

A freshly minted gem that plays like some lost experimental classic of the 1970s, O'er the Land is fashioned out of mysterious stuff. Like all great work it's richly open-ended, but to one person it appears to be a Martian-eye view of an America built from a robust, and absurd masculinity, as we are taken on a mysterious 16mm tour of men and their toys, from border patrol to a shooting range, an RV lot and firemen in a rural town. Tucked in there as well is Lt. Colonel William Rankin's fantastical first-person account of surviving a plane crash. Stratman's rich soundtrack layers and juxtaposes diegetic sound — musket fire, birds chirping etc. — with a sci-fi soundscape of droning synths, enhanced helicopters and much more. Near the end are golden, gorgeous shots of men using contraptions which shoot out streams of napalm-esque liquid fire in the aftermath of some senseless firepower. What does it all mean? Why does this work so well? It's hard to say for sure, but the important thing is that in Stratman's masterful, intuitive hands, we ask this question throughout her non-narrative. Plays with Bitch Academy — Director Alina Rudnitskaya takes us to a Russian school with a unique perspective on empowerment, where a lone male instructor teaches women to use their powers of attraction for personal gain. The students long to be desired and go through rigorous and humiliating training to achieve their goals. The Third Coast International Audio Festival short Is That My Imagination? (dir. Meghan Vigeant, 3 min.) is the story of a mind on strike, with a cameo by Mario Savio of the Free Speech Movement. (PS)