| The Great Blondino | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Directed by | |
| Starring | Chuck Wiley |
| Distributed by | Canyon Cinema |
Release date |
|
Running time | 42 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $20,000 |
The Great Blondino is a 1967 American experimental film directed by Robert Nelson and William T. Wiley.
Blondino is a naïve young man who wanders the streets dressed in medieval attire and pushing a wheelbarrow. He has series of adventures, all the while being pursued by a cop. These stories are mixed with sequences showing Blondino's dreams. Blondino eventually dies after falling from a tightrope but is revived in the film's conclusion.
The Great Blondino stars William's brother Chuck Wiley as Blondino, with Beat poet Lew Welch as the cop. The film was shot in San Francisco over the course of 6–8 sessions in 1966. [1] [2] Filming began with a Bell & Howell camera, but after it broke down, Nelson bought an Arriflex camera for $3,500 as a replacement. [3] The protagonist and his climactic tightrope scene were inspired by tightrope walker Charles Blondin, who performed stunts while crossing the Niagara Gorge. [2] The film's soundtrack was performed by Wiley's band Moving Van Walters and His Truck. Nelson recorded them one day in Richmond, California. [3] The total production budget was roughly $20,000, a large cost for an underground film at the time. [4]
The film premiered April 13, 1967 at the Cedar Alley Cinema in San Francisco. Later that year, it screened at the Brussels Experimental Film Festival. [5] When The Great Blondino was sent to Australia, it was censored by the customs department. A scene of Blondino stroking a rhinoceros horn required review by the chief censor, who took issue with a separate scene in which a girl uses profane language. [6]
The film is now part of Anthology Film Archives' Essential Cinema Repertory collection. [7]
According to Lenny Lipton, The Great Blondino "went over…like a lead balloon." [8] Nevertheless, Lipton championed the film following its release and said that it was "decidedly worth seeing", commenting that its "variations on the theme of the interesting and different in a super technological society are interesting, and often beautiful." [9] Film theorist Gene Youngblood called The Great Blondino his favorite piece by Nelson. [10] In his review for The New York Times , Roger Greenspun remarked, "Blondino is a kind of cosmic clown, and…I feel guilty about not liking him better than I do." [11] Critic J. Hoberman wrote for The Village Voice that Nelson "tosses off more good visual ideas in 45 minutes than many filmmakers do in a lifetime". [12] [13]
Leonard Alfred Schneider, better known by his stage name Lenny Bruce, was an American stand-up comedian, social critic, and satirist. He was renowned for his open, free-wheeling, and critical style of comedy which contained satire, politics, religion, sex, and vulgarity. His 1964 conviction in an obscenity trial was followed by a posthumous pardon in 2003.
Dirty Harry is a 1971 American neo-noir action thriller film produced and directed by Don Siegel, the first in the Dirty Harry series. Clint Eastwood plays the title role, in his first appearance as San Francisco Police Department (SFPD) Inspector "Dirty" Harry Callahan. The film drew upon the real-life case of the Zodiac Killer as the Callahan character seeks out a similar vicious psychopath.
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Fireworks is a 1947 homoerotic experimental short film by Kenneth Anger. Filmed in his parents' home in Beverly Hills, California, over a long weekend while they were away, the film stars Anger and explicitly explores themes of homosexuality and sadomasochism. It is the earliest of his works to survive. Fireworks is known for being the first gay narrative film in the United States.
Gene Youngblood was an American theorist of media arts and politics, and a respected scholar in the history and theory of alternative cinemas. His best-known book, Expanded Cinema, was the first to consider video as an art form and has been credited with helping to legitimate the fields of computer art and media arts. He is also known for his pioneering work in the media democracy movement, a subject on which he taught, wrote, and lectured, beginning in 1967.
Jim Newman is a film and television producer, contemporary art curator, gallerist and musician.
Leonard Lipton was an American author, filmmaker, lyricist and inventor. At age 19, Lipton wrote the poem that became the basis for the lyrics to the song "Puff, the Magic Dragon". He wrote books on independent filmmaking and become a pioneer in the field of projected three-dimensional imagery. Leonard Lipton developed 3D cinema technology that is used in RealD 3D cinemas. His technology is used to show 3D films on more than 30,000 theater screens worldwide.
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Schmeerguntz is a 1965 American avant-garde film by Gunvor Nelson and Dorothy Wiley. It is a collage film that contrasts messy depictions of domestic life with the pristine images of women found in media and advertising. The film was an inspiration for the Miss America protest that happened in 1968.
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