The Ann Arbor Film Cooperative
In March, 1970, I founded the Ann Arbor Film Cooperative with assistance from Michael Priebe and Neal Gabler. Our goal was to create a film society that would screen popular films and use the box office proceeds to fund film making facilities for students at the University of Michigan.
The Coop (as we called it) really took off in 1971 when I created a poster using a photograph I took of my grandfather's 16 mm film projector (which had inspired me as a boy). Students hung this poster on their dorm room walls throughout the University of Michigan campus. The publicity was so great that every Coop screening that semester sold out.
Later, the Ann Arbor Film Cooperative sponsored The Alley Cinema, run by future filmmaker Jim Watson and future cinematographer Nancy Schreiber, and the first 8mm Film Festival, as well as Ann Arbor Eye, a student run series of lectures about film. Cinema was only just beginning to be acknowledged by the University as a serious art form.
Details of the history of my friends and I with cinema in Ann Arbor can be found in Frank Uhle's book Cinema Ann Arbor: How Campus Rebels Forged a Singular Film Culture which includes a reproduction of my photograph of my grandfather's 16 mm film projector on its cover.
The Coop (as we called it) really took off in 1971 when I created a poster using a photograph I took of my grandfather's 16 mm film projector (which had inspired me as a boy). Students hung this poster on their dorm room walls throughout the University of Michigan campus. The publicity was so great that every Coop screening that semester sold out.
Later, the Ann Arbor Film Cooperative sponsored The Alley Cinema, run by future filmmaker Jim Watson and future cinematographer Nancy Schreiber, and the first 8mm Film Festival, as well as Ann Arbor Eye, a student run series of lectures about film. Cinema was only just beginning to be acknowledged by the University as a serious art form.
Details of the history of my friends and I with cinema in Ann Arbor can be found in Frank Uhle's book Cinema Ann Arbor: How Campus Rebels Forged a Singular Film Culture which includes a reproduction of my photograph of my grandfather's 16 mm film projector on its cover.
Pamela and Ian
Pamela Guest and Ian Stulberg
My first feature-length film, Pamela and Ian, was filmed in Ann Arbor, Michigan on the campus of the University of Michigan. The film is based on an idea suggested by Alain Robbe-Grillet who wrote that the characters in a film are born in the beginning and die when the film ends. In Pamela and Ian the characters are aware of the temporary nature of their existence and that they exist only as shadows of light.
Pamela and Ian is also a story based in part on the real life experiences of a group of friends at the University of Michigan. As the film unfolds the characters realize that they are caught up in a bisexual love triangle. The film was made a year after the Stonewall Riots of 1969. The audience at the premiere of the film in 1971 gasped out loud when Ian and Doug first kissed on screen--so deep was the taboo of homosexuality.
Throughout the making of the film, Pam was kept unaware of the love affair between Ian and Doug. The facts are revealed to her live on camera near the end of the film in a scene at a local cemetery.
The cast and crew were given different scripts during the filming so that no one was ever certain what was coming next or how the story would unfold.
Pamela and Ian is also a story based in part on the real life experiences of a group of friends at the University of Michigan. As the film unfolds the characters realize that they are caught up in a bisexual love triangle. The film was made a year after the Stonewall Riots of 1969. The audience at the premiere of the film in 1971 gasped out loud when Ian and Doug first kissed on screen--so deep was the taboo of homosexuality.
Throughout the making of the film, Pam was kept unaware of the love affair between Ian and Doug. The facts are revealed to her live on camera near the end of the film in a scene at a local cemetery.
The cast and crew were given different scripts during the filming so that no one was ever certain what was coming next or how the story would unfold.
Rehearsing the birth scene for Pamela and Ian in November, 1970
The film was photographed in 16mm black and white by cinematographer Freddy Sweet who was a Spanish instructor at the University. A newly digitized and re-edited version of the 16mm release print can be seen on You Tube here.
In April, 1971, the student newspaper at the University of Michigan, The Michigan Daily, published an article written by Freddy about our experiences making the film. You can read it here.
Freddy came up with creative lighting and camera solutions to some of the challenging tasks--most notably the Centrifugal Force scene, in which the camera sits in the center of a table and rotates continuously throughout the entire six minute scene, moving faster and faster as the scene progresses.
Unlike modern video equipment, 16mm sound cameras in 1970 involved tethered sync and sound equipment and a "barney" placed over the camera to hide the sound of the camera noise. He had to pre-wind the sync cables around the tripod so that they would unwind as the camera rotated during the scene.
Since the lighting equipment couldn't be in the shot, Freddy covered the ceiling of the room with aluminum foil, placed the quartz lights on the floor and bounced the light onto the actors from the ceiling.
In April, 1971, the student newspaper at the University of Michigan, The Michigan Daily, published an article written by Freddy about our experiences making the film. You can read it here.
Freddy came up with creative lighting and camera solutions to some of the challenging tasks--most notably the Centrifugal Force scene, in which the camera sits in the center of a table and rotates continuously throughout the entire six minute scene, moving faster and faster as the scene progresses.
Unlike modern video equipment, 16mm sound cameras in 1970 involved tethered sync and sound equipment and a "barney" placed over the camera to hide the sound of the camera noise. He had to pre-wind the sync cables around the tripod so that they would unwind as the camera rotated during the scene.
Since the lighting equipment couldn't be in the shot, Freddy covered the ceiling of the room with aluminum foil, placed the quartz lights on the floor and bounced the light onto the actors from the ceiling.
Some of the cast and crew of Pamela and Ian in front of East Quad at the University of Michigan in 1971. From left to right: Michael Priebe, Ian Stulberg, David Greene, Ellen Frankel, Katie Reifman, Jim Watson, Pam Seamon, Ruth Rankin, and Geoff Stevens.