“Des silences, j’en connaissais tout un lexique.”

L’AN 01 (aka The Year 01) – 1973
Film co-directed by Alain Resnais, Jacques Doillon and Jean Rouch.

2010 is nearly over and there is not much left to do except to prepare for the New Year. This seems like a good time to revisit an obscure French film from 1973 tilted The Year 01.

In 1973, Alain Resnais, Jacques Doillon and Jean Rouch teamed up with cartoonist Georges Blondeaux (Gébé) to create a cinematic rendition of L’An 01, a comic strip published in France during the early 1970s. The film received mixed reviews upon its release but this did not prevent l’Association and countless cinephiles from keeping Gébé’s delirious utopia alive online and in print.

L’An 01 : On arrête tout! On réfléchit! Et c’est pas triste.

Première chanson de l’an 01 ?  Quelques chansons, dans le film … plus tard.

Christmas is just around the corner so why not treat yourself to some NFB entertainment?

The folks at the National Film Board of Canada recently created a playlist of Christmas-related films available online. I did not get a chance to watch all six films but I decided I would go ahead and re-post an NFB animation classic tilted Christmas Cracker (aka Caprice de Noël).

Synopsis: “A seasonal pleasantry consisting of three animation segments, employing tricks in movie magic by NFB artists and animators, and with specially arranged music. Three scenarios are presented: a rendition of Jingle Bells in which paper cut-out figures dance; a dime-store rodeo of tin toys; and a story of decorating the perfect Christmas tree. Film without words.”

The soundtrack to Christmas Cracker appears on the long out-of-print Music of the NFB double LP. Consult the following posts for more details about this rare vinyl release:

Music of the NFB (part 1)

Music of the NFB (part 2)

Other years, about this time, a very merry electric Christmas might have meant plugging in the lights on the tree, or getting a brand-spanking-new plug-in-knife sharpener, or giving one, or sticking your finger in one of those turned-on sockets up on the roof while trying to string the lights in the dark – probably in the rain. But no more! For this year, the very merry electric Christmas is a special one, a new kind, synthesized and generated especially for you and yours by Douglas Leedy.

– Taken from the album’s liner notes

Released in 1971, A Very Merry Electric Christmas to You seemed like a grand idea at the time. The album was conceived at the turn of the 1960s. This was a particularly exciting period during which Leedy completed The Electric Zodiac and Entropical Paradise – oddly enough, the composer’s Christmas music album was released between these two highly-sought-after experimental recordings.

I am not sure why Leedy embarked on this project. It is possible that he was tempted to explore the commercial potential of the sounds generated by his Buchla synthesizer and Ognob generator. Perhaps he was trying to occupy a space not yet occupied by Walter Carlos, Hans Wurman and Gershon Kingsley (the three composers spent the greater part of the late 1960s and early 1970s making classical moog albums and taking electronic music into the mainstream). Or maybe he needed the money.

This is his gift to the world… a very merry electric Christmas to you from Douglas Leedy.

“good king wenceslas”

“god rest ye merry, gentlemen”

“silent night”