FILMS
Watch BATSHIT TIMES' original short films and videos produced in collaboration with activists, scientists, musicians, photographers, and visual and performance artists.
Shroud
choreographer & performer CARLY LAVE
director & producer LUCAS MARKMAN
cinematographer JACK LANGLOIS
hmua & costume NOAM GAD WEISER
editor JACOB BOTTORFF
colorist ADAN LANGBAUM
poetry DELILAH FRIEDLER
i am thirsty, the rains don’t
come anymore, the earth is
dry, i want to grow upward but
a darkness blankets my crown so
the sun no longer bathes me, my
leaves wither early, pool in the
pit where once stood a home.
i am stuck here as the world whirls on; there
may not be time to sprout new buds again.
the shroud is taut, holds me
back so there’s nowhere to go but
down, reach roots like gnarled fingers
into broken foundations, no
minerals left in concrete so i
reach down further, plunge my
taproot thru the soil, find water—
an aquifer, water trapped in rock.
i drink but it’s salty, salt patches my bark; what
i’ve found is a depthless reservoir of tears.
i am immobile, roots grip the
ground like mother’s body gripped
her bed, trusted we’d always be fed
where we grew but now earth and sky
forsake us, now the shroud and
endless bank of tears. channeling them
comes to feel like a duty, to feel
the pain of a hundred generations, who
stored it there in summer when the
growing still was easy; when drunk on
storms they passed it down, down, down.
slowly laboriously i eek
these words out, learn to
separate salt from water, breathe
thru the shroud and create new
sweetness, save it up beneath thorns;
hope it’s enough to grow some flesh
around the little pits forming at my
fingers, protect these seeds of faith.
dear god, let there be time to bear this fruit
and still a creature left to find it.
Pancreatitis
by ant1de & Bad Gateway Studios
Pancreatitis is an exploration of the widespread dissonance and confusion uprooted at the turn of the decade. Relief does not exist here and the idea of normalcy is more of a joke than a comfort. As soon as you start to gain an understanding of the world around you — everything dissolves at once, introducing new information which drastically changes your perception. Everything is unstable, and every step risks transporting you to a new and terrifying dimension.
Inspired by Arkady and Boris Strugatsky’s Roadside Picnic, for which Tarkovsky’s Stalker is inspired, the video explores internal dissonance within one’s external environment. The viewer goes through five stages, each with its own physical anomalous traits which impair, skew, and diverge from one’s initial understanding of how the world around them can and should behave. The track combines Khahimi Karie’s soft, relaxing tones — whispering to you like a lullaby — with harsh and abrupt production, creating an unfulfilled desire to more deeply understand the lyrics, which is repressed by the onslaught of aggressive instrumentation. Pancreatitis seeks to evoke an awareness of the innate dissonance which comes with trying to understand the world around us.
Stanzas For Gertrude
by Dad’s House; Hunter Zimmerman
When everything is still it’s hard to picture otherwise. The endings giving way again, buckling under the slow undoing/blooming dance on the threshold of afterward and now. Here or there becomes inconsequential at some point because eventually all things come back around to where they started. What’s taken is given. Hand to hand going and coming.
Spaghetti Western
by Dad’s House; Hunter Zimmerman
Psychogeographic study.
Who’s To Say Broken
by Dad’s House; Hunter Zimmerman
Chicago, June 2020.
Eyez Wide Byte
There will be avatarization of the self completely out of your control, or you can take control of it yourself. It’s not about creating an alter ego. Skulptor for example isn’t an alter ego, but the art itself. We’re all swipeable humans, but I’ve made the choice to not be swipeable.
WSJ 4/10/20
by Sam Hoffman
Crisis. Complacency. Isolation. Loneliness. Alienation. Nostalgia. Self-evaluation. Self-reflection. Self-portraiture. Body dysmorphia. Sight. Surveillance. Live-streaming. Virtual connection. Digital disconnection. Hardware update. Crucifixion. Yachts.
Unprescribed
by Alex Baumann & Dannah Gottlieb
No description.
Staring Contest
by Adrian Collins
I’d be fine if I never blinked again—if it came right down to it I’d kiss her with my eyes wide open.
Snowfall
by Yasir Masood & Peter McCain
A correspondence of poetic letters in Urdu between mother and son.
Written seasons apart, their words dance around their shared emotions on migration and steadfastness, nostalgia and loss, belonging and distance, and horizons of potential futures so close, one might step into them.
Lollipop
song by Von feat. Maxwell Musick
directed by Peter McCain
cinematography by Jesse Bronstein
Von and Maxwell Musick grow Fuck Boys in a latex laboratory, testing and gauging their sexual, athletic, and emotional prowess with the intentions of designing and producing the perfect partner for a relationship. But the cathartic experiment goes wrong, and the Fuck Boys turn out vapid and emotionless, leaving Von and Maxwell with no choice but to kill them off one by one.
距离Distance
by Hunter Gause & Jojo Guo
Perhaps a new kind of ground can support us.
Anonymity of Disaster
by Nina Gofur
I fall in love with the thought of a passing face, one that stares at me if I smile.
A simple exchange of preferred emotions,
I long for that.
Sunbag
by Christian DeLannoy & Hunter Zimmerman @ Dad’s House Media
I ain’t happy, I’m feeling glad
I got sunshine in a bag
Shoes
by Emily Gurland
song by Harrison Nir & Emily Gurland
I recommend that you wear shoes that will easily come off.
Spowiedź
by Blake Nelson & Caleb Guadarrama
Shot with only 100' of film. Spowiedź is an experiment - one story, one take, one roll. A troubled man who attempts to confront his past seeks confession.
Putting on my Job Face
by Alexander Baumann
'I am officially coming out as a simpy shill beholden to the fat teet of capitalism. No, I didn't think of anything original when succumbing to its evil whim, and yes I hate myself more than you ever possibly could. As you read this I am probably curled up in my computer chair coming up with new ways to zealously rim the man, in hopes that a few copper coins will squirt out of his incumbent rectum, plopping graciously upon my desperate brow. I have taken the time and consideration of these several weeks of solitude to eradicate any shred of dignity I had left. Quarantine has been a desperate cocoon of shame that I, at this point, am terrified to emerge from. Thank you for watching.’
Self Portrait
song by Khaya Cohen
video by Peter McCain
Datamosh music video made with Avidemux. Scene from "The Sexually Mature Adult" by FilmFair Communications; John Wiley & Sons, 1973.
Pitch Glides
by Elise Lebovidge
A videostroboscopy from the Laboratory for Speech Physiology and Motor Control at the University of Washington. Lebovidge demonstrates the shape her larynx makes when uttering pitch glides (low to high /i/).
Garden Variety
by Tessa Bourne and Drew Donnelly
Stir-crazy, Drew discovers the absolute best possible way to spend quarantine.
Going By
by Jill Sermonte
During the coronavirus pandemic and subsequent quarantine that has left many freelance artists out of work and with plenty of time on their hands, Jill Sermonte asks the question on everyone’s minds.
All Kinds of Names
Archival footage of some big bad sheriff putting a stop to those nasty men on the picket line.