Film & Video by & about Robert Lax
Compiled by Paul J. Spaeth
[revised 2/06]
 

 

Black & White (1946. b&w)
Directed by Alexander Eliot & Robert Lax
Description: “Our film consisted of nothing but Harlem shadows on an August afternoon: Shadows of
shoppers, pot-smokers, gossipers, basketballers leaping in an empty lot, and finally the shadows of two
 horses hitched to an old-fashioned ice-wagon. Peering through our camera’s view-finder, I couldn’t
quite decipher the horse-team’s sparkly, silent, blue shadow slanting down and in across the frame;
not until the shadow of the high-wheeled, flat-bed wagon itself followed, rolling slow, sun-spoked ovals
 atop its emerald glow of ice-blocks.”
Alexander Eliot

27th & 4th (1960. b&w. live action. 22 min.)
Directed by Emil Antonucci
 
Some Fables (1962. b&w. live action. 9 min.)
Directed by Emil Antonucci

Oedipus (1962. color. drawings. 3 min.)
Directed by Emil Antonucci

Thought (1967. color. drawings. 3 min.)
Directed by Emil Antonucci

New Film (1969. b&w. live action. 21 min.)
Written by Robert Lax
Directed and Photographed by Emil Antonucci
Voice: Giordano Bruno
Contents: “one stone …” [slow zoom on a stone sitting on a black background] /
                “darkness, oh the darkness …” [blank]
                “the air and the dream …” [open window with curtains being blown by wind]
                “the maximum capacity of this room …” [close-up office area & woman’s 
                                                                                    face]
                “word, word, word …” [talking on a telephone]
                “forms, forms, forms …” [street scene showing shop window]
                “push, pull, push …” [man’s head (front), woman’s head (back)]
                “the first goodbye …” [woman’s face fading in & fading out]
                “is, is …” [white teacup on white background, fading in & fading out]
                “even a lie …” [people walking on street, teens dancing, people standing in a 
                                          line]
                “1 2 3 …” [hand opening & closing]
                “love & death …” [woman’s head & her reflection, smoking]
                “in the dark …” [park scene in winter (long-shot)]
                “no, no, no, yes, yes, yes …” [man’s head, speaking; woman’s head in profile 
                                                                 moving in & out of the frame]
                “never, never …” [woman’s face in profile, reading]
                “what does it matter if I am an insomniac? …” [slow reverse zoom of crumpled 
                                                                                             pillows on an unmade bed]
                “never a root without a tree …” [pan along busy street with many marquees]
                “in me, in me …” [cars seen through tree branches]
                “into the heart of the city …” [man hole cover, fade-in to various buildings, 
                                                                 some office buildings, some wrecks]
                “the first thing to do,  …” [sunset scene]
                “are you a visitor …” [bearded man]
                “i do not wish to touch thee …” [pan up on woman sitting on park bench]
                “he was following a hero …” [pan along a street scene]
                “hurry up …” [woman sitting at a table looking at pictures]
                “every night in the world …” [pan along building]
                “things into words …” [piles of books]
                “all of us in the darkened half …” [slow reverse zoom from the “Flat Iron 
                                                                         Building”]
                “You will dissolve before me …” [slow reverse zoom from man smoking pipe 
                                                                        & his reflection]
                “my son, my son …” [slow reverse zoom of man, dissolve, cut]
                “life, life …” [pan around head of a woman]
                “i am thinking as i lift one stone …” [slow reverse zoom from stone in first      
                                                                             shot fade]

The Lion and the Unicorn (1970)
A film by Emil Antonucci
            The Lion: Jack Medoff
            The Unicorn: BobRoca
Journeyman Films

The Man With the Big General Notions (3 min.)
Written by Robert Lax
Directed & Photographed by Emil Antonucci
The man: Joseph Messina
Journeyman Films

Some Short Films (10 min.)
Written by Robert Lax
Photographed & Directed by Emil Antonucci
Contents: A & B / Joy & Pathos / Thought / Drama II / Movie / All Pretty Much in the    
                 Dark / She Finally / A Moment

One Stone (11 min. b&w. 1972)
Based on an untitled poem by Robert Lax
Photographed, edited & directed by Sandy Heblad & Freeman Crocker
Poem read by Charles Ault
The man: Charles Ault
Description: A man is shown walking across a countryside (filmed near Watkins, Colorado)
and although there is a musical background, we hear no voice until the man stops to pick up
a stone. As the man looks at and begins to contemplate the object in his hand, we hear a
voiceover reciting the Lax poem.

Robert Lax: Neue Staatsgalerie Exhibition & Reading (1985)
A video assembly by Michael Lastnite

Robert Lax: Word & Image (57 min. color. 1988)
A Judith Emery & Michael Lastnite production.

In the Middle of the Moment
(80 min. b&w. 1995)
Produced & directed by Werner Penzel & Nicolas Humbert (CineNomad)
Contents: Sections featuring Robert Lax

Why Should I Buy a Bed When All I Want Is Sleep (55 min. b&w. 1999)
A chamber film with Robert Lax by Nicolas Humbert & Werner Penzel (CineNomad)
Contents: “a single room …” [description of house on Patmos]
                On writing poems (“…put yourself in the place where grace can flow to you”)
                “our dreams …” (Lax reads to camera, ends with shot of the moon)
                                            [7:26-10:35]
                Lax goes to town
                “One Island” [13:14-24]
                                      tracking shot of feet walking away along rocky path
                                      man with donkey stopping at well
                                      old bearded man working on stone wall
                                      dark countryside with white smoke in foreground
                                      opened book on Lax’s lap
                                      Lax in profile on train
                                      peasant talking with his hands
                                      door of Lax house on Patmos
                                      Lax’s face reflected in window of train
                                      Lax’s hands drawing (shot from over his shoulder)
                                      man riding donkey (in longshot) showing stone walls
                                      old couple sitting in their house
                [segment ends with the couple talking in Greek]
                Lax sitting on floor of his house, talking about the importance of the present 
                       moment, dream & reality … cut to black … hear his voice saying “I have    
                       spoken” … cut back to Lax laughing in the same room [26-    ]
                Lax talking about art (Schopenhauer: “all art aspires to the state of music”) …          
                       here & gone … permanence of some art forms is not something necessarily 
                       in their favor [29:20- 
                Scene on boat. Importance of the moment. drawing all things into a single line
                Scene on train: camera behind Lax walking in the direction the train is going … 
                          we see the outside rushing by through windows on both sides.
                Back at home. [30:30-          ]
                Home on Patmos [33:28-38:06]
                “…sounds come and go, but the silence remains”
                Scenes: wading into the water / typewriter / reading poem / talking on    
                             telephone / shopping.
                Five Years Later [46:36-       ]

Three Windows
Homage a Robert Lax: a video installation by Nicolas Humbert & Werner Penzel (CineNomad)
Description: Three simultaneous films that run continuously in 45 minute loops, interwoven with each other.
Bibliography: Three Windows. Munich: Distributed by Belleville Verlag, Michael Farin.  
                       Published Bernhard Moosbrugger & Cine Nomad, 1999.
                       [part of the Robert Lax Box]

 

 

 

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