![]() The Bardavon/UPAC film series is sponsored by Marshall & Sterling, Herzogs, Rondout Savings Bank and The Upstate Coalition for a Fairgame. It will be up for auction to benefit the Bardavon. Donated by Sterling’s widow and longtime Poughkeepsie resident Martha Morrison. From Oscar-nominated filmmaker Todd Haynes ( Carol) comes this documentary on influential American rock band The Velvet Underground, there rise to prominence in the 60s and 70s, and the multiple strands that brought them together. In addition the lobby will feature an Andy Warhol themed photo op plus, on display, a psychedelic outfit worn by Velvet guitarist Sterling Morrison in the above photo. on the Mighty Wurlitzer Organ take place 30 minutes before each film and are made possible by the New York Theatre Organ Society (NYTOS). “Haynes appears to have vacuumed up every last photograph and raw scrap of home-movie and archival footage of the band that exists and stitched it all into a coruscating document that feels like a time-machine kaleidoscope.” This brand-new Todd Haynes documentary explores the multiple threads that converged to bring together one of the most influential bands in rock and roll. Proof of vaccination is required for this event (see below) In the documentary THE VELVET UNDERGROUND, filmmaker Todd Haynes charts the brief yet powerful career of the innovative, influential rock band of the same name. Reed’s all-round fractiousness - he once punched his hand through a glass door to get out of a gig on a river boat - gives the film its juice as far as Haynes' film is concerned, once he fires Cale it marks the beginning of the end.Film: The Velvet Underground (2021) Presented with Upstate Films It’s here that German guest vocalist Nico enters the picture - much to Reed’s annoyance - shines brightly, then leaves. When the action moves onto Andy Warhol and The Factory, Haynes really puts you in the room. The odd couple - Reed wanted to be a rock star Cale an experimentalist - came together in a Lower East Side loft (where else?), and Reed’s song-writing became informed with Cale’s improvisational genius, the music described as “the drone of Western civilisation”. Cale was raised in a Welsh mining village, wasn’t allowed to speak English until aged seven and was molested by Anglican priests. Reed came from a stultifying suburban background - suffering clinical depression as a child, undergoing electroconvulsive therapy (which his sister denies was to curb his homosexual tendencies) and developing degrading views of sex. Really, it’s Reed’s own challenge, posed by his looking out at us as. ‘They were scary,’ says the sister of VU guitarist Sterling Morrison about their early performances. Within the impressionistic approach, the biographical beats are clear, Haynes deep-diving into the different backgrounds of founding members Lou Reed and John Cale without baulking from the darkness. Early on, Todd Haynes’ mesmerizing new documentary, The Velvet Underground, issues a challenge to that sense of security. The Velvet Underground was what he said was pop, to the despair of the kids. As much as the film is a portrait of a band, it also crystalises the whole ’60s scene: The Velvet Underground not only documents the period but also feels like it could have come from it. ![]() Taking his cue (and footage) from the avant-garde filmmakers of the ’60s, Haynes employs an almost ever-present use of split-screen - De Palma would be green with envy - juxtaposing interview material with adverts, newsreel, photographs and footage of the band made possible by the continuous presence of a camera documenting things at The Factory, Andy Warhol’s creative hothouse (the archival research is immense). Given Haynes’ experimental CV, the structure of The Velvet Underground cleaves surprisingly closely to rock-doc conventions (how they met, the success, the dis-banding). What it lacks in critical edge, it makes up for in imagination and a sense of the bigger picture. With many of the major players no longer with us, Haynes still creates an ambitious, immersive portrait of one of music’s most influential, maverick acts. The Velvet Underground (2021) Plot The Velvet Underground explores the multiple threads that converged to bring together one of the most influential bands in rock and roll. Not only are Haynes’ music dramas Velvet Goldmine and I’m Not There set in the same era as Lou Reed’s band operated in, but the filmmaker and group are united in sensibility: marginalised artists constantly pushing the envelope in challenging ways. Todd Haynes is perhaps the perfect filmmaker to document the short life and weird AF times of The Velvet Underground.
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