Alternative Projections Experimental Film in Los Angeles, 1945-1980 [Paperback]

Alternative Projections: Experimental Film in Los Angeles, 1945-1980 is a groundbreaking anthology that features papers from a conference and series of film screenings on postwar avant-garde filmmaking in Los Angeles sponsored by Filmforum, the Getty Foundation, and the University of Southern Californias School of Cinematic Arts, together with newly-commissioned essays, an account of the screening series, reprints of historical documents by and about experimental filmmakers in the region, and other rare photographs and ephemera. The resulting diverse and multi-voiced collection is of great importance, not simply for its relevance to Los Angeles, but also for its general discoveries and projections about alternative cinemas.

[T]here are enough examples of ingenuity and achievement contained in this volume to unite a new generation of independent artists, exhibitors, and audiences in maintaining a viable outlet for cinematic creativity in Los Angeles.

Experimental Cinema, The Film Reader edited by Gwendolyn Audrey Foster and Wheeler Winston-Dixon (Routledge, 2002). ISBN 9780415277877.

Alternative Projections provides a useful corollary and often a corrective to what has become a somewhat unilateral approach to experimental cinema in the period taken up here.

David E. James is on the faculty of the School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California. His books include The Most Typical Avant-Garde: History and Geography of Minor Cinemas in Los Angeles.

Adam Hyman has been Executive Director and Programmer for Los Angeles Filmforum since 2003. A documentary filmmaker, he has produced and/or written a variety of historical and archeological films that have aired on PBS, the History Channel, the Learning Channel, and others.