Traces of the Wild: The Films of Robert Schaller.

On September 25, 2008 Robert Schaller came to UWM to display some of his films. When I first heard about this I admit I did not know who he was or that I had never seen any of his work. Also I didn’t know I would be able to go and see his work because I had class during the showing. However my night took a different turn when I found out that I would be able to attend the showing with my classmates. When we got to the UWM Theater we took our seats and waited for the show to begin.

A little bit after seven o’clock, Carl Bogner, who is one of my instructors and had organized for Robert Schaller to come to UWM went on the microphone and introduced our guest filmmaker. Right away Robert Schaller said how great it was for him to be at UWM and how happy he was to display some of his work for us. He also talked a little bit about his work and what kind of films we would be seeing that night. When Robert Schaller makes a film he truly goes all out. Such as using his own hand made emulsion on his film. This is defiantly a unique way of making a film because he never really knows how the images will come out or how the light was captured. This as I saw during the showings of Robert Schaller’s work, can make a very interesting piece and excellent movie.

During the showing’s I was unable to catch or record any of the titles of the movies he showed. But I do remember the pieces them selves and so I will talk about what I observed. In one of the pieces we watched in the UWM theater featured the camera zooming–in and out on the bark of a tree, the limbs, or foliage. While at the same time there were overlays of other tree limbs, bark, and foliage at different angels which seemed to rotate and change while the camera zoomed-in and out and moved from one tree to the next. This silent film was not a long piece but it was very captivating. The motion of the camera and the slick manual editing that Robert Schaller used for this piece displays the elegance of his technique’s and the truly unique way Robert Schaller perceives the world around him.

The next piece I want to talk about is his dance movie; this film was the only one with a soundtrack to it. He displayed the film on three projectors at the same time; I think this really made the experience worthwhile. The image of the women dancing on the film was very clear, sharp, and extravagant to see as well as hear. In the film Robert Schaller didn’t just set up a static camera, recording a women dance. He used close-ups and extreme close-ups on her feet, hands, face, and torso as she danced. It almost felt as if the camera was slightly rotating with the women as she danced. This was only emphasized by the three projectors that were lined up in a row showing the film. For me this made the effect of watching the women dance as three cameras followed her and that I got to see her movements on three different monitors linked together, almost as if I were viewing a live performance from a secret room. All of this action was split up as the women moved from one projection to the next, meanwhile on the other projections we would see passages from an unknown text. These texts seem to be very ambiguous and yet specific about this event of the women dancing. Visually this film was great the color and lighting of this piece was a wonder on my eyes. The Soundtrack was soft and fit perfectly to the images of the women dancing in Robert Schaller’s film. However if I could change something about this film I would cut about 15-20 minutes off the end. The film was captivating and excellent to watch but I felt it ran a little too long in the end. But that is the only the only thing I would change if given the option.

While I was watching these films by Schaller they also made me think back on the first works I saw in the beginning of class; specifically “5:10 to Dreamland” by Bruce Conner. What really tied these films together for me were the displays of nature and people. While Robert Schaller and Bruce Conner have noticeably different styles of filmmaking; I couldn’t help but to examine the look of the woman dancer in Schaller’s film as compared to the look of the women in the mirror in 5:10 to Dreamland. Both of these women though in different times, settings, and circumstances feel to me as though they could be interchanged without notice. Even though the nature scenes in both films are shot completely different I still feel that Schaller’s idea of capturing the point of view of the mountain side and the flora within. Fit perfectly into the imagery of Bruce Conner’s own unique shots in the beginning of 5:10 to Dreamland.

My experiences of seeing Robert Schaller’s work at the UWM Theater were great. I was sorry I was not able to stay to the end of the showings or ask the filmmaker some questions in hopes of gaining some more insight as a filmmaker myself. But the work of Robert Schaller’s I did get to see really did inspire me and gave me more insight and experience to develop my own eye and how I will make my own films. Before the showings at the UWM Theater I was asking some of my peers at PECK about Robert Schaller, they all told me the man was a great, a real nice guy and an excellent filmmaker. All I can say about this is that he lived up to the hip of what every one told me and even more so when Carl was introducing Robert Schaller as a legend, from what Schaller can do with a camera I don’t think Carl was to far off from that description.

For Field report number two the publication I will be following is Senses of Cinema; http://www.sensesofcinema.com/

picture provided by www.expressmilwaukee.com

By Matt Gonia