Disco is much more than just a music genre from the late 1960s or a place for dancing. Disco is best enjoyed together, but it’s also great on your own. Disco is music and dance, but it also takes place in our minds. Disco is part of our everyday lives and at the same time a wild trip. This selection of short films shows the diversity of disco: disco is everywhere, disco is everyone, disco is everything, and, last but not least, disco is definitely not dead.
Feel the Heat
Pasi Autio / Finland 2022 / 9'15" / DCP / colour / no dialogue / Exp
«Feel the Heat» depicts a one-man disco in a forest at night, and the atmosphere is magnificent – the lights are flashing, birds are singing, dancing continues, and time is standing still. But the night cannot last forever and, in the morning, the surrounding reality is revealed.
Man or Tree
Tom Hancock/Varun Raman / United Kingdom 2021 / 4' / colour / English / Exp/Fic
In the wilderness, a tree begins to question whether it may actually be a man tripping on hallucinogens.
Whateverest
Kristoffer Borgli / Norway 2012 / 15'45" / DCP / colour / Norwegian / Doc
The film reveals the alias of Todd Terje who wrote the YouTube-hit «Inspector Norse». In addition to music, Marius Solem Johansen also puts instructions for the legal production of drugs on YouTube, and he dances in search of light and enlightenment whenever he can find a pretext to do so.
Spell
Khalil Charif / Brazil 2023 / 3' / DCP / colour / no dialogue / Exp
A spell is cast on the dance floors, transforming the atmosphere. Sensory stimuli and traces of a documentary past are captured and thrown into an imaginary present, a fantasy beyond the fascination of the night, towards a re-enchantment with life, with being together, interweaving conviviality and liberation.
Tian Xia Wu Ya
Yi Tang / Hong Kong 2021 / 14'5" / DCP / colour / Chinese/Zhuang / Fic
The short film follows an 18-year-old student, Shengnan, who is invited to a mysterious party by her cousin. Much to her surprise, the party is filled with sleazy middle-aged men. But one of them is different: Jianguo. As the night continues, the two form an unlikely bond.
Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore
Mark Leckey / United Kingdom 1999 / 14'44" / DCP / colour / English / Exp
«Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore» is collaged from tape footage of the 1970s, 80s, and 90s underground dance scene in the UK, including footage from the 1977 Tony Palmer film «The Wigan Casino». It starts with the disco scene of the 1970s, touches upon the Northern soul of the late 1970s and early 1980s, and climaxes with the rave scene of the 1990s; the mashup soundtrack Leckey created for the film follows the same temporal structure as a soundscape, with him occasionally interjecting dialogue.
Tank Fairy
Erich Rettstadt / Taiwan/USA 2021 / 9'31" / DCP / colour / Chinese / Fic
In Taiwan, «song wa si de» are workers who routinely supply gas tanks to street vendors and old residential buildings. The magical Tank Fairy delivers her tanks unlike any other – with sass, stilettos, and a healthy helping of glitter. Her arrival upends the life of Jojo, a lonely ten-year-old who dreams of dancing and drag. Outcast by classmates and misunderstood by his stern, single mom, Jojo is inspired to live out loud by his fierce, propane-toting fairy godmother. «Tank Fairy» is a musical extravaganza that encourages us all to embrace our authentic selves.
MeTube: August Sings Carmen «Habanera»
Daniel Moshel / Austria 2013 / 4'6" / DCP / colour / Clip/Fic
«MeTube», a tribute to thousands of ambitious YouTube users and video bloggers, more or less talented self-promoters, on the internet, has attracted international attention.
