Night hunter

Year2011 Duration15 min. DirectorStacey Steers

Animation, collages, screenplay: Stacey Steers
Music composition, sound design: Larry Polansky
Additional sound design: Joshua Hudelson
Musicians: Doug Perkins, percussion, Nora Jacobson, accordion, Andrea Larson, voice and violin, Larry Polansky, guitars, percussion
Starring: Miss Lilllian Gish
Animation assistance: Chris Pearce
Camera operator: Victor Jendras
Edition: Phil Solomon
35mm film transfer to HD: GW Hannaway and Associates

With generous support from: The MacDowell Colony, Bogliasco Foundation, Sacatar Foundation, Ucross Foundation and The Boulder Arts Commission

Festivals

2012 Denver International Film Festival, Denver, CO, Brakhage Vision Award
2012 Hardacre Film Festival, Tipton, IA, First Prize, Best Experimental Film
2011 Black Maria Film Festival, Juror’s Choice, First Prize

Spanish premiere

Meticulously crafted from approximately 4000 handmade collages and incorporating images of Lillian Gish taken from silent-era live-action cinema, Night Hunter evokes a disquieting dreamscape drawn from allegory, myth, and archetypes. Images from four silent-era films featuring the actress Lillian Gish are combined with 18th and 19th century engravings to create rich, timeless, imaginative environments.

Transitions, both biological and metaphorical, are central themes. In some instances Gish is cut out of specific scenes and reconfigured in collage environments, while collage materials are applied directly to printed film frames in others. The subsequent fluidity of character becomes a critical element in the texture of the film and the identity of the principal character. Night Hunter was shot on an Oxberry animation stand in 35mm using a Mitchell camera.

Stacey Steers

Stacey Steers lives in Boulder, Colorado where she teaches for the Film Studies Program at the University of Colorado. Her labor-intensive animated films are composed of thousands of individual, handmade works on paper. Her animations have screened extensively over the past two decades at film festivals worldwide including the Sundance Film Festival, New Directors New Films in NYC, Telluride Film Festival, and numerous other events, winning national and international awards. Steers has been the recipient of a major grant from Creative Capital and the American Film Institute. She been awarded residencies at Harvard University, The MacDowell Colony, and Yaddo.